Legendary women’s basketball coach Pat Summitt has died at the age of 64.
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When Summitt took over the University of Tennessee team, the school’s total yearly budget for six women’s sports was $5,000.
Summitt didn’t like me questioning her integrity.
– Olympic gold: August 7, 1984 – Chery Miller has 16 points and 11 rebounds as a U.S. Olympic team coached by Summitt breezes by South Korea, 85-55, in the championship game, giving the U.S. its first gold medal in women’s basketball. Sixteen Southeastern Conference titles and 16 SEC tournament titles, eight-time SEC coach of the year; played on the USA’s silver medal team at the 1976 Summer Games in Montreal, coached the U.S. team to a gold medal at the 1984 Summer Games in Los Angeles – the first in U.S. Olympic basketball history to play on and coach medal-winning teams.
Summitt’s record of 1,098 wins still stands as the most of all time for men’s or women’s basketball.
“It’s hard for people outside Tennessee to understand just how much Pat Summitt became a part of the lives of so many citizens in our state”.
Summitt, the winningest coach in Division I college basketball history who helped boost the women’s game to the big time in a 38-year career at Tennessee, has died.
“Since 2011, my mother has battled her toughest opponent, early onset dementia, ‘Alzheimer’s Type, ‘ and she did so with bravely fierce determination just as she did with every opponent she ever faced”, Tyler Summitt said.
Summitt grew up in Clarksville, Tennessee and played college basketball at Tennessee-Martin. She sent 39 Lady Vols to the WNBA, including 15 drafted in the first round and three picked No. 1 overall. When you think of all he great coaches in all sports, Pat Summitt is at the top of that list.
She never got to the 40th season in that contract, her career cruelly and prematurely ended by early onset dementia, Alzheimer’s type. She was a genuine, humble leader who focused on helping people achieve more than they thought they were capable of accomplishing. Summit chose to retire in 2012, taking the role of “head coach emeritus”.
– No. 1,098: March 24, 2012 – Meighan Simmons scores 22 points off the bench as Tennessee rallies from 14 points down to give Summitt her final victory in an 84-73 regional semifinal win over Kansas at Des Moines, Iowa. You study all the great coaches, the traits that made them successful, and you try to incorporate those into your own program and teams. “Her fans and influence reach far beyond the borders of Tennessee”. She was given the job because no one else wanted it.
But the most selfless act Summitt took came in coaching decisions.
A month before she won her final championship, in 2008, Summitt dislocated her shoulder while shoving a raccoon off the deck of her home in Knoxville, then tried for two hours to reset her shoulder before calling a doctor.
For the past few years, Summitt has devoted her life to bringing awareness to Alzheimer’s disease.
Summitt is survived by her mother, Hazel Albright Head; son, Tyler Summitt; sister, Linda; brothers, Tommy, Charles and Kenneth.
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“If anyone asks, you can find me observing practice or in my office”, Summitt said at the time. She had been cutting back her public appearances, coming to a handful of Tennessee games this past season and occasionally also traveled to watch her son Tyler coach at Louisiana Tech. A statue and plaza were constructed near Tennessee’s Thompson-Boling Arena in 2013.
