J-Speaks: Newest Member of The 1,000-Win Club In College Hoops

In the history of college basketball, there have been only three head coaches. Yes, three with 1,000 career wins on their resume. The first two are the very best to ever patrol the hardwood sidelines of the collegiate hardwood in Duke University’s Mike Krzyzewski and the late great Tennessee Lady Volunteers’ head coach Pat Summitt. On Friday night, a name unknown to many, but not to the basketball community and in Pal Alto, CA.

When the No. 8 Stanford Cardinal (20-3; 10-1 in PAC-12) won versus the University of Southern California Lady Trojans 58-42 on Friday night at Maples Pavilion, head coach Tara VanDerveer became just the third head coach of all-time to notch 1,000 wins in her career, joining Krzyzewski and Summitt.

At the end of the game, led by the 21 points from Karlie Samuelson, who is the older sister to Katie Lue-Samuelson of the University of Connecticut showered her with confetti from a Gatorade jug, getting assistance by fellow seniors Erica McCall and Bri Roberson.

VanDerveer then proceeded back to the sidelines to hug her mother, Rita, who flew in from Colorado to attend the game.

That was followed by former Cardinal star Ros Gold-Onwude, who played for VanDerveer from 2005-10, who is currently a basketball analyst for Pac-12 Network, calling the game, as well as the sideline reporter for the Golden State Warriors of Comcast SportsNet Bay Area handed the microphone to her former head coach to address the audience.

“I never started coaching to try to win a 1,000 games,” VanDerveer said. “I have more than a 1,000 memories as a coach. I’m looking for 1,001 Monday night.”

In the arena to celebrate VanDerveer’s achievement were many great luminaries of Stanford like football head coach David Shaw; former Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, NCAA champion volleyball coach John Dunning and members of the U.S. Olympic swim team who attended Stanford—Katie Ladecky, Simone Manuel and Lia Neal, who also took part in a halftime ceremony honoring women and girls in sports.

“She is in the pantheon at Stanford,” Secretary Rice said on Friday. “You see her on campus and she’s one of our great Stanford citizens. It’s such an amazing achievement, what she’s done for hundreds of young women, and she’s done it in the most dignified and honorable way.”

Pac-12 commissioner Larry Scott echoed those same high remarks by saying that VanDerveer has a unique place amongst the legends of coaches who have worked in the conference.

“She has a deep-rooted passion for what she does and her commitment to the kids she coaches, but she is also always thinking about the greater good,” he said. “She has been instrumental in making sure the Pac-12 is getting the credit and the attention it deserves. She has been consistently open to new opportunities and new ideas.”

Not bad for a lady, who when she was younger was suggested by her father to go and assist her younger sister Marie’s high school basketball team, which did not have a real coach.

“They had just lost the night before 99-11,” VanDerveer said recalling that moment. “I said, ‘No.’”

Even though she protested, VanDerveer went to aide her sister and found out right then that she had a solid grasp of being able to lead people, including pointing out a couple of flaws in her sister’s game.”

Her parents once asked their eldest daughter when they got home from a game one time, “‘How come you didn’t play Marie more?’”

Her reply, “‘Mom, she can’t dribble. She can’t shoot.’”

Right from the beginning, VanDerveer learned two big keys to what helped her become the Hall of Famer she is today. One, she recognized that she was a great at teaching, and she had the kind of patience and perseverance that she always imagined. Second, she learned that besides the X’s and O’s part of being a coach, which is gravitated to naturally, there is a human aspect to being great in this profession.

As she said every player, that ever wore a Lady Cardinal uniform is “someone’s daughter, or someone’s sister.”

That list of those daughters and sisters that were coached under VanDerveer consist of many that played or play in the WNBA currently like Jennifer Azzi, Val Whiting, Kate Starbird, Kristin Folkl, Nicole Powell, Ruthie Bolton, Candice Wiggins, Jayne Appel, and the Ogwumike sisters Nneka and Chiney.

This moment was even more special for Azzi, who was here at the beginning of this great run leading Stanford to the national title in 1990. On top of that, Azzi and Bolton were on that 1996 Women’s National Basketball team coached by VanDerveer that won Gold in Atlanta, GA.

Bolton who still resides in Sacramento, CA after playing for years for the then Sacramento Monarchs said she would not have missed this moment to honor her former collegiate head coach.

“There have been a lot of basketball games played, but not a lot of coaches who have won this many of them, and then to do it in the style she’s done it, which such humility,” Bolton said. “I am so thankful I had the opportunity to play for her. And I’m so happy for her.”

VanDerveer after this great achievement on Friday night thanked her coaching staff, which includes her longtime assistant Amy Tucker, who has been at Stanford for all 31 seasons of VanDerveer’s tenure and assistants Kate Paye, a former Lady Cardinal.

She also praised the administrators who gave her the opportunity to be the head women’s basketball coach, first at Idaho (42-14 record) from 1978-80; at Ohio State (110-37 record) from 1980-85 and then at Stanford, where she has compiled a record of 848-177 from 1985 to this season.

To put into perspective what VanDerveer has done at Stanford, she has won more games than 341 of the 349 of the Division I women’s basketball programs in the United States. Her record accounts for 83 percent (847 out of 1,023) of the school’s all-time women’s basketball history.  

She also showed her appreciation to the most important people in the stands that evening, the 4,490 fans in attendance.

Her ultimate thanks VanDerveer said she owed the most to was her mother and father, who both were teachers themselves. VanDerveer’s her father, who had passed away and her mother, who instilled in her a great work ethic and the value of life. She joked after the game that her team needed to get this win so her 90-year-old mother could return to her Colorado home.

What made VanDerveer the great coach she is and will continue to be is she fell in love with every part of her profession. She looked the part and took on all aspects of being a coach, which consisted of an obsession with watching game film and a love of scouting reports.

What also helped VanDerveer reach this milestone is the fact she had great timing, like being on the ground floor of women’s basketball after the passage of Title IX 45 years ago and being the head coach of the 1996 U.S.A. Olympic Team that won the Gold Medal in Atlanta, GA.

That new rule gave women something that can be taken for granted like going to basketball camp over the summer or earning an athletic scholarship to attend college.

These opportunities in sports not available to the now 63-year-old VanDerveer when she was growing up. Rather than reflect on what did not happen before, VanDerveer has focused on the opportunities she has gotten and has created for others, like Brooke Smith and Krista Rapphahahn Birnie, who sat courtside Friday night across from the woman who recruited them to come to Palo Alto, CA.

“We were getting teary together, hearing the band playing and the people cheering,” Rappahahn Birnie, one of the best three-point shooters in Lady Cardinal basketball history. “It’s special to be part of a night like this, because Tara so deserves it.”

Smith, who played for VanDerveer from 2005-07 joined many former Lady Cardinal players in the locker room to celebrate with the current players after the game concurred about how this was an emotional evening for everyone when she said, “It’s amazing to get to see this continue year after year. I mean Jennifer Azzi just walked past us. This success over this period of time…it speaks for itself.”

Former Lady Cardinal guard Sara James, who played for VanDerveer from 2011-14 rushed from here nursing shift at Stanford Hospital to just arrive in time for the celebration. She stood in the wings and watched the postgame video tribute, which included Appel, Wiggins, Jeanette Pohlen, the Ogwumike sisters as well as South Carolina head coach Dawn Staley, who played for VanDerveer on the 1996 Olympic team.

Before Friday night’s tilt with the Cardinal, USC Lady Trojan head coach and four-time champion in the WNBA with the then Houston Comets Cynthia Cooper-Dyke made it a point before tip-off on Friday night to thank VanDerveer for all her work with that previously mentioned 1996 Women’s national team 19 years ago, which built enthusiasm for the launch of the WNBA one summer later.

Cooper-Dyke kept her team on the floor so that they can watch part of the celebration and for them to understand how valuable and important the contributions of VanDerveer have meant to not just women’s college basketball, but basketball in general.

“Tara’s a team player. Yeah, she wants to win championships, but she loves women’s basketball,” Cooper-Dyke, who was still playing at USC when VanDerveer took over at Stanford 32 years ago, said on Friday night.

“Had it not been for her push with USA Basketball, the opportunity would have passed me by [with the WNBA]. All the young women that she’s mentored—words could not describe how many lives she’s actually touched.”

Something that Azzi also touched on when she said about her former head coach, “I just think it’s great for sports, in general. It is not about gender. It is about celebrating greatness.”

That the part VanDerveer said she was most proud of, being able to have influenced the lives of the women she coached and several them had wonderful messages to her that appeared on the Maples videoboard after the game, including one from a player who was never a part of her 1,000 career wins, but was a part of the 1996 Olympic team.

It was Staley, the former star for the Virginia Lady Cavaliers and WNBA star, who said in her message, “When I grow up, I want to be just like you.”

Even though she is as focused on continuing to be a great coach, VanDerveer said that one thing she has learned over her career is to enjoy the moment, which she did on Friday night.

She said that moments like the passing of Summitt last summer served as a reminder to take the time to appreciate every person in her life and the great experiences she has had the chance to have. How the friendships and memories are what make coaching very rewarding.

This great moment though is not possible if not for that one bedrock that VanDerveer learned way back when she gave a helping hand to her sister and her struggling high school team.

She became their conductor and whether it was teaching them notes or being able to play in unison, there is a great feeling you get when you help make something happen.

Very few have done it better at making a team play in unison on the collegiate hardwood better than Pat Summitt, Mike Krzyzewski and now we can add to that list Tara VanDerveer.

Information, statistics and quotations are courtesy of 2/3/17 ESPN news crawl under NCAAW; 2/4/17 www.espn.com article “Former Players on Hand To Honor Tara VanDerveer’s 1,000 Victory,” by espnW.com contributor Michelle Smith and 2/4/17 www.espn.com article “From Career’s Early Days To Her 1,000 victory, Tara VanDerveer Has Been A Coaching Pioneer,” by espnW.com contributor Mechelle Voepel.