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Spokane, Washington  Est. May 19, 1883

Stanford’s VanDerveer a changed coach

Stanford coach Tara VanDerveer, whose seventh-ranked Cardinal visit Washington State on Friday, started her head coaching career at Idaho. (File / The Spokesman-Review)

Tongues were wagging at the NCAA women’s basketball Final Four last March because Stanford coach Tara VanDerveer seemed to be enjoying the moment more than anyone else in Tampa, Fla.

“She’s showing more emotion than I’ve seen her show in postseason,” Tennessee coach Pat Summitt said before their championship game meeting. “I think that’s a good thing for her team.”

VanDerveer wasn’t ready to admit she was dramatically different than the coach who had last made the Final Four 10 years earlier.

“We all change. … We’re affected by our experiences,” she said. “I think I probably have changed, but maybe I haven’t changed as much as people say because a lot of people don’t know me. I’ve always had a lot of interests. Basketball has always been a passion of mine, but different groups allow you to be certain ways with them.”

Few know the genesis of that attitude dates back three decades, when the University of Idaho took a chance on a young coach.

VanDerveer’s Stanford teams have been to the Final Four six times, winning two championships. She coached Team USA to an Olympic gold medal in Atlanta in 1996 to help spawn the WNBA and she was inducted into the Women’s Basketball Hall of Fame in 2002.

But her first win, the first of 688, came Dec. 1, 1978, when the Vandals defeated Northern Montana 70-68 in Moscow. The next could come next door in Pullman with the seventh-ranked Cardinal (17-4, 8-1) playing at Washington State on Friday night.

“I think about how much I loved being there,” VanDerveer recalled of her Idaho days. “I think it gave me a chance to get started and gain confidence.”

The X’s and O’s would evolve, as would VanDerveer, but she knew what blueprint she wanted to build from when she got to Moscow.

“Probably more than anything – I had been involved in coaching at Ohio State, a team with a lot of dissention – when I got to Idaho, it was not just physical things,” she said. “It was kids playing hard, working for each other, a camaraderie, chemistry. You can’t force it on a team. When things go badly you don’t see people getting upset with each other. That’s something I learned up there.”

Basketball was always the center of her life. VanDerveer, 55, was raised in upstate New York and played basketball at SUNY-Albany.

“I jumped center, was the leading scorer, leading rebounder, leading assists, leading turnovers, shots, by far,” she said. “But I was frustrated. I convinced four friends to get in a big old Delta 88 and drove out to Champaign, Ill., to watch Immaculata play.”

Cathy Rush’s Immaculata teams were women’s collegiate basketball in the pre-NCAA days of the AIAW. VanDerveer took notes and made a decision: She wanted to play serious basketball. Without telling her parents she transferred to Indiana and was a three-year starter at point guard, earning a spot in the school’s Hall of Fame.

Her first coaching experience was assisting at Ohio State before becoming a Vandal. She coached Idaho two seasons, going 17-8 then 25-6 to make the 1980 AIAW tournament, starting the foundation for the Vandals’ only NCAA appearance in 1985. By then, VanDerveer was in her fifth and last year as the head coach at Ohio State. She took the Buckeyes to the Elite Eight and had a record of 110-37 when Stanford called.

The Stanford team she inherited had gone 9-19 in 1984-85, but by 1990 the Cardinal were national champions and two years later had another title.

At times it didn’t appear VanDerveer was enjoying herself, at least from the outside looking in.

“When we first came to Stanford she was really intense, just focused on basketball,” longtime assistant Amy Tucker said. “That’s all she had in her life.”

Over the next few years that changed, as she realized what she wanted in a team she needed in her personal life.

Maybe it was going 60-0 with the Olympic team and realizing that’s all there is. Or, on the other end, maybe it was losing in first round of the 1998 NCAA tournament, the first – and only – No. 1 seed to lose to a 16th seed.

“With her combined 30 years of coaching you learn a lot, you learn a lot about yourself,” Tucker said. “When you experience the highest of highs and the lowest of lows it make you reflect what life is about.”

VanDerveer started playing the piano about seven years ago and reportedly attacks the ivory keys with the same determination as a game plan.

And she made mistakes, which maybe opened her eyes.

“Her focus, enthusiasm, energy for the game hasn’t changed, but she’s more flexible,” Tucker said. “I think she has adapted more to the kids. I think she had blinders on early in her career. Once she got on top, she had to learn how to stay there. She’s learned how to enjoy that process.”

A process that started on the Palouse 30 years ago.