COLUMBIA — South Carolina ladies’s basketball coach Daybreak Staley has loads of recollections of legendary Tennessee coach Pat Summitt, although not all of them are fond. In reality, Staley credit a loss to Summitt’s Girl Vols in her freshman yr at Virginia with altering the trail of her basketball profession.
“We misplaced to them by 33 factors, and it is etched in my reminiscence. From that loss is after I simply vowed to myself and our group that that may by no means occur once more,” Staley mentioned. “And we might have misplaced to them (once more), but it surely wasn’t by 33 factors. That is the type of impression and impression, good or unhealthy, that Coach Summitt had on individuals.”
The SEC dedicates per week to the We Again Pat marketing campaign yearly in honor of Summitt’s life and legacy. Each group hosts a sport supporting the Pat Summitt Basis to boost consciousness about Alzheimer’s illness and funds for analysis. Summitt was recognized with early-onset dementia in 2011 and died in 2016 at age 63.
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The Gamecocks (19-0, 7-0 SEC) will play their We Again Pat sport towards Arkansas (17-4, 4-2) at Colonial Life Enviornment on Sunday (3 p.m., ESPN2).
Staley crossed paths with Summitt recurrently, each as a participant and a coach. At Virginia, she confronted Summitt’s Tennessee groups three consecutive years within the NCAA Event from 1989-91. The Girl Vols beat Staley’s Cavaliers in 1989 — by 33 factors — and in 1991, occurring to win the nationwide championship each years. Virginia pulled out a four-point time beyond regulation win in 1990.
After taking up as South Carolina’s head coach in 2008, Staley confronted Summitt eight instances earlier than the Girl Vols coach retired after the 2011-12 season. The Gamecocks received simply a type of conferences 64-60 in Summitt’s remaining season.
“If you happen to’ve been within the sport lengthy sufficient, she’s impacted you, whether or not that is shedding to them or her simply being round on the recruiting path and imparting information and data to develop the sport,” Staley mentioned. “We should proceed to pay homage to the illness that took her life, and likewise simply her legacy as a result of she’s meant a lot to our sport. There will not be one other Pat Summitt, ever.”
A decade after her retirement, Summitt stays one of the vital profitable coaches within the historical past of collegiate ladies’s basketball. In 38 years at Tennessee, she led the Girl Vols to eight nationwide championships and is one in all simply three coaches to win back-to-back titles in 2007 and 2008. She is the second-winningest coach of all time, concluding her profession in 2012 with a 1,098-208 report.