ABERDEEN — Brandon Kusler has been promoted to interim head coach of the Northern State University baseball team and will lead the Wolves during the 2025-26 season.
The announcement was made on Thursday, Sept. 4, 2025, by NSU Director of Athletics Nate Davis.
Kusler replaces Dean Berry, who resigned his post earlier this week as the Wolves head baseball coach to become the department’s next Associate Athletic Director for External Operations. Berry has been with the department since the fall of 2010, leading the Northern State baseball program as the second longest tenured coach in program history. Berry is the second winningest coach at NSU with 252 career victories.
Kusler enters his fourth season NSU baseball program, serving as a graduate assistant in 2023 and 2024 and assistant coach in 2025.
“I am happy to elevate Brandon to this role for the upcoming year and I’m excited for him to take advantage of this opportunity,” Davis said. “He has been a part of Wolves baseball for the better part of a decade as a player and coach and has a great understanding of the culture of the program. I have great confidence that Brandon is the right person to lead our team, and our staff will provide a great support system for him and our student-athletes.”
In Kusler’s three seasons on staff, the Wolves have won 44 contests, and four Wolves earned Northern Sun Intercollegiate Conference All-Conference honors. In addition, the team tallied the ABCA Academic Award in all three seasons and hit the ten consecutive year milestone in 2025.
“I am incredibly grateful and excited for this opportunity,” Kusler said. “I want to thank Nate Davis and his staff for having the confidence in me to lead this program. I also want to thank Coach Berry for his years of leadership of Wolves baseball. Coach Berry gave me the opportunity to play college baseball and has helped me tremendously throughout my coaching career and for that I am forever grateful. I am honored to fill a role that he has held for 15 years in a program that is near and dear to my heart.”
Prior to returning to NSU as a full-time assistance coach, Kusler was on staff with the Harrisburg Legion program as an assistant coach. The Tigers Legion Gold team went 38-9-1 in the summer of 2024.
Born and raised in Aberdeen, Kusler began his coaching career in 2019 with the Aberdeen Smittys Legion program. In his first season as the head coach for the U13 team, the Smittys won the South Dakota Class A state championship. Heading into the 2022 season, Kusler was named head coach for the American Legion program and served in that role until 2023. In the summer of 2023, the Smittys made their first state tournament appearance since 2017 with Kusler at the helm.Kusler is a Northern State baseball alum, playing outfield for the Wolves from 2018-22. He started 32 contests in his career, appearing in a total of 64 games. In his final season, Kusler tallied a 1.000 fielding percentage with 52 putouts, and five outfield assists.
He graduated in May of 2022 with a Bachelor of Science in education (majoring in physical education) and again in 2024 with a master’s degree in sports performance and leadership.
Follow Watertown Public Opinion sports reporter Roger Merriam on X (formerly known as Twitter) @PO_Sports or email: rmerriam@thepublicopinion.com