Cody Thorn
Derryan Derrough is moving from assistant coach to head coach at Rockwood Summit.
This marks the second head coaching gig for the Arlington, Texas native in Missouri. He previously served as the boys and girls head coach at Lindbergh in St. Louis.
Now, he ascends into the role previously held by Brent Batcheller, who will still help him out with the program.
“Batcheller did a great job of delegating and helping coaches just get better over time,” Derrough said. “So it’s really not that much different. I mean, outside of the administrative things that we’re asked to do. Making sure everybody’s staying engaged and focused so that we have a good season next year.”
His journey to being a head coach started in the Dallas-Fort Worth metroplex.
He wrestled at Sam Houston High School in Arlington and started doing the sport as a junior, finishing a win away from going to state.
The next year, he went to the state meet after a district title and regional runner-up showing. He took sixth place in 1999 when the UIL had only one classification.
Then, the Texan landed in Marshall, Missouri.
Cue, the the popular phrase “You are probably all wondering how I ended up in this situation.”
Well, at the time the entire state of Texas — all 261,193.9 square miles — had 0 colleges that offered wrestling.
But, Texas had a high school coach named Nick Purler.
“I wasn’t really quite sure about wrestling in college, but Coach Purler said I could do it,” Derrough said. “I was going to work like coming out of high school and he was like you need to get out of here and you need to see the world and see something outside of Arlington. So that’s what helped me pursue it.”
Purler, a native of Wentzville who went on to a stellar career at Oklahoma State, left Texas and headed back to St. Louis to start his wrestling academy. He reached out to Missouri Valley College…
