When Jack Watson built the Arizona Western baseball program in 1964, he did so as apart of a surge in Matador Athletics that saw young programs race out to successful seasons. Watson’s teams over his 11-year tenure secured three playoff appearances and the first conference championship while establishing a winning tradition. Watson stepped away from coaching and his position as Athletic Director in 1975 and the Matadors faced their most uncertain era over the next nine seasons. Four different head coaches led the program with the Del Blunk being the only one of those to stay for more than two years. But Blunk’s four-year tenure ended under .500 and sent Athletic Director Charlie Dine searching for continuity.

In 1985, Dine brought in a young graduate assistant from the University of Arizona by the name of John Stratton. Stratton immediately found success and returned the program to its winning ways in his first season. Arizona Western secured the school’s first conference championship in the ACCAC in 1986, year two of Stratton’s leadership. The Matadors racked in the wins over the 27-year tenure of Stratton with 20 winning seasons and never going three years without one. The program wound up in the Region I Semifinals 11 times with three ACCAC Championships. The peak of the era was the 1996 squad that made a deep NJCAA Tournament run, finishing third. Stratton capped off year 27 in 2010 with 817 wins, the longest tenured and winningest coach in all of Arizona Western Athletics history.

In 2011, Drew Keehn stepped in and guided the Matadors back to the Region I Playoffs for the first time since 2006. Keehn’s teams continued with winning seasons in the heavily contested ACCAC and Region I before returning to the Region I Semifinals in 2015. The success reached crescendo over the next two seasons as Arizona Western posted 43 wins in 2017 and 49 wins in 2018. The 2018 squad became the winningest in Matador History. The ’17 and ’18 squads became the first back-to-back Region Champions since the ’95 and ’96 seasons that ended in the National Tournament. While the Matadors were thwarted in their recent bids at the West District Finals, the 2019 squad posted 38 wins to make it the most successful three-year period in Matador history by winning percentage.

The three-year period also brought attention after each season with Matadors going directly to the pro’s at a not-before-seen rate. Sean Roby was drafted by the San Francisco Giants in the 2018 draft and kicked off an impressive draft that saw a few more Matadors leave Yuma for the Minor Leagues. 2019’s MLB Player Draft saw a program best five former Matadors selected including two from that year’s squad. Zach Huffins and Gabriel Ponce each began their pro career’s immediately after leaving Yuma, speaking to the player development of the Arizona Western coaching staff.

Coach Keehn has overseen the most successful era for the Matador Baseball program as a whole, entering his ninth season with a .614 winning percentage, the best of any of the seven Matador coaches while also amassing the second most wins and third longest tenure. With all that success, the target remains the same of a return trip to the NJCAA National Championship in 2023.