The Privilege of a Lifetime

"Being the head coach at the University of Oklahoma has been the privilege of my lifetime.

"In April of 1996, I accepted this, my dream job. As a native Oklahoman, I was pretty sure I had died and gone to Heaven. Though the task would not be for the faint of heart, I just wanted to build a program that this great state and this storied institution could be proud of. Twenty-five years later, I still cannot believe the ride Oklahoma Women's Basketball has taken me on.

"I arrive here today at the ending of a chapter and the beginning of another, engulfed in gratitude. The thick, goopy kind that comes from the middle of your bones. I am grateful to my family for letting me "pursue my life's passionate obsession" (thank you Wright Thompson), for generously allowing me to take up too much room and for doubling the wins and dividing the losses. Without them, achievement of any kind would fall pretty flat.

"I am grateful to my players for letting me coach them. That's a gift I've never taken lightly and a joy unlike any other I have ever known. I want them to know that they've left pieces of themselves in me and I am better for it.

"I am grateful to my staff for the sacrifices they made through the years. The loved they toiled with breathed a special life into our program. They readied the soil so that our teams could grow. And they never get enough credit for all the good they do.

"I am grateful to our leadership—to the late Donnie Duncan and his partner in big dreams, Marita Hynes, for having the courage to hire a high school coach with audacious plans; to Steve Owens for riding the early waves with Marita and I; and to the incomparable Joe Castiglione for shepherding our growth, for challenging our progress and for being there no matter what. To former President David Boren and current President Joe Harroz, I thank you for cultivating an institution that does what it's supposed to do—prepare its students for an important and meaningful life.

"I am grateful to our competitors for stretching us, our fans for lifting us and our media for covering us. Our game has grown exponentially because of the commitment of you all.

"Through much prayer and the gifts of a year that provided pockets of stillness most years never produce, I have amazing clarity. Basketball was my first and deepest love and coaching has been this wonderfully amazing life that I can't believe they pay me for. But there have always been other things I want to do. I'm ready to explore those things and I'm ready to run toward unfettered days with my brand-new beautiful granddaughter. Twenty-five years just feels right in my bones and in my soul.

"It's never easy to leave no matter how great a thing you are running to, because something is always left behind. It's hard to leave these players. This seasoned bunch of gritty competitors who built their wings in the fiercest of winds clawed their way to the sacredness of team. This season will always be one tattooed on my heart. But that's the trick about sports and the magnificent gift of team — it gets in you and it never goes away. Lucky, lucky, lucky me."

University of Oklahoma Athletics

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