Deep diving into Eagles’ athletic dominance over the state of Iowa

Kirkwood Community College has long been a prestigious athletic program not only at the junior college level but also in all of Iowa.  

Here is how each of Kirkwood’s athletic programs fared last season: 45-10 for baseball, 60-7 for softball, 21-9 for men’s basketball, 30-5 for women’s basketball, 37-3 for women’s volleyball. When combined, Kirkwood’s sports teams averaged an 85.02% win percentage. 

There are 44 colleges in Iowa that offer athletic programs. They compete in the NCAA, NAIA, NJCAA, NCCAA and USCAA. Each is a separate collegiate athletic association and governing association.  

So how does Kirkwood fare against the rest of the colleges in Iowa? 

Each of the 44 schools offers a handful of sports, and all their stats are recorded. All of the information and data used will be from the 2025-26 athletic season. 

When accounting for these numbers, only sports with quantifiable win-loss metrics were considered. For example, in basketball, the team that scores the most points wins. Otherwise, it loses.  

Sports like golf, swimming, track and field, cross-country, e-sports, shooting sports and bowling cannot be quantified in the same way that basketball or soccer can. For that reason, they aren’t included in this article. 

When reviewing every Iowa college’s record for their qualifying sports, Kirkwood is only in fifth place, tallying 193 total wins. It trails Morningside College with 224 wins, Iowa Central Community College with 215, Iowa Western Community College with 214 and the University of Iowa with 199. 

However, each of those four schools offers at least 10 sports that count toward this ranking. Kirkwood only has five. Instead of looking at total wins, winning percentage should be considered as well. 

With a total winning percentage of 85.02%, Kirkwood sits comfortably in first place. In second and third place are two Iowa Community College Athletic Conference schools in Iowa Western Community College and Iowa Central Community College, totaling 76.57% and 74.57%, respectively.  

However, this formula highly favors colleges that play more games. For instance, Kirkwood’s softball team played 67 games last season, going 60-7. While Grand View University’s football team played 12 games, finishing undefeated. Therefore, Grand View football had a higher winning percentage than Kirkwood softball (100% to 89.55%). Because the combined winning percentage is calculated from all games, sports with longer schedules have a greater influence on the overall figure. So what if every sport’s winning percentage held the same weight? 

Kirkwood’s equal weighted winning percentage would become 83.92% — first place by a large margin. Indian Hills Community College would turn into Kirkwood’s biggest threat, as it now boasts a 75.17% winning percentage. Iowa Western is third with 74.98%. 

It is also worth noting that this does not necessarily mean Kirkwood is the best athletics program in Iowa. 

Iowa State University and the University of Iowa are only ranked 12th and 13th, with combined win percentages of 62.67% and 59.82%, respectively. They are also facing the best competition in the nation. Aside from NCAA Division I and Division II programs, every college faces almost exclusively in-state schools, while Iowa State and Iowa are both consistently sending players to their respective professional sports.

Kirkwood not only succeeds in every sport it offers, but its athletics dominate as well. Of the 44 colleges in Iowa that have athletic programs who fit the criteria, none of them wins as much as Kirkwood. This does not even take into account Kirkwood’s men’s golf program, which recently had a national fourth-place finish.