Langston’s new basketball coaches meet Guthrie community at Chamber Coffee

 

By Darl DeVault
Special to Guthrie News Page

The Guthrie Chamber of Commerce’s weekly coffee had a distinctly sports theme Wednesday morning at the Territorial Capitol Sports Museum when Langston University officials introduced their new basketball head coaches to the community.

Optimism for the Lion’s basketball programs was in abundance when Langston Athletic Director Mike Garrett introduced his new men’s and women’s program coaches to those gathered from Langston and the Guthrie community.

A quiet man, Garrett let his tailback skills do the talking all the way to playing in the first and fourth NFL Superbowls with the Kansas City Chiefs as the 1965 Heisman Trophy winner for the USC Trojans.

Honored by TCSM executive director Richard Hendricks for his impact on Langston’s plans for the future, Garrett quickly turned the public speaking over to his new men’s head basketball coach Stan Holt. Garrett introduced Holt, who began in late May, by saying that he expects to one day look back on this year as one in which Langston began building a powerhouse basketball program. Holt has been coaching for 10 years.

Holt then introduced Cheryl Miller, one of the superstars of women’s basketball, as the school’s new women’s basketball head coach. She became the head coach of Langston’s women’s basketball program in late April.

Miller said when initially approached to begin coaching the NAIA Lions by Garrett, who had first hired her in 1993 as a coach when he was the athletic director at USC, all she knew of Oklahoma was the Thunder is in Oklahoma City from her 17 years as a TNT sideline reporter. She said had to do some searching to discover exactly where Langston was, but sees the future as brightly as her athletic director.

Miller was a College Hall of Fame player at the University of Southern California as a three-time national player of the year while leading her squad to consecutive national championships in 1983 and 1984. She also led the United States to a gold medal at the 1984 Olympics in Los Angeles.

Miller was USC’s head women’s coach for two years in the mid ’90s and coached the WNBA Phoenix Mercury from 1997 to 2000.

Langston University was well represented at the community gathering with seven alumni attending, along with four officials from the school.