Lynette Woodard finds new place to continue legendary basketball career

When I ran into Lynette Woodard earlier this summer, she was questioning what she was going to do with her life.

She had spent the previous three-plus years in Wichita attending to her mother, Dorothy, whose health had been slipping. Dorothy died in December and Woodard spent time grieving and thinking about her next chapter.

Woodard, a 1977 North graduate, is in the argument as the greatest female basketball player in history. She scored 3,649 points — more than any other college player — and was a four-time All-American at Kansas. She helped lead the U.S. team to a gold medal in the 1984 Olympics and became the first female Harlem Globetrotter in 1985.

Since she finished playing, she’s been a coach, an administrator and a stock broker. But this summer she was searching, unsure of her next move.

That next move came this week when she was named to Kevin Cook’s women’s coaching staff at Winthrop. Cook spent 11 seasons as an assistant at KU from 1983-93 and after a 4-26 season in 2015-16 — after going 62-34 in his first three seasons — he contacted Woodard.

“Winthrop came to Wichita State for a game (in December 2014) and I remember visiting with Coach Cook,” Woodard said. “He calls me ‘Wood’ and he said, ‘Wood, we’re going to have to do something together.’ I told him I thought we could when it was time. He had a situation where a coach left his program and he called me.”

The contemplative Woodard needed some time to think. She had become accustomed to Wichita again while caring for her mother. And it hasn’t been easy for her to let go.

“Those three years I got to spend with her are the best time of my life,” Woodard said. “I got a chance to be with my mother and literally walk her to the end. There’s nothing I can compare to it — the ups, the downs, the joy. She got to know me — well, she always knew me — and I got to know her.”

Woodard, who was inducted into the Basketball Hall of Fame in 2004, has led a charmed life. But not always an easy one. She has struggled at times to find her place, or at least the place where she thinks she should be.

That she’s returning to coaching is unexpected, yet understandable. Basketball is something she knows.

“I had been thinking about some other things, just on my own,” Woodard said. “I wasn’t quite sure how I was going to bring everything together. And when (Cook) called it was sort of like I had found the missing piece. It just kind of brought my life together. I had been in the mode of reflecting and trying to figure out how I can tie everything together.”

She certainly didn’t expect to wind up in Rock Hill, S.C., where Winthrop is located. Everything happened so fast, Woodard said, that she didn’t have time to consult with former Winthrop men’s basketball coach Gregg Marshall, soon to begin his 10th season at Wichita State.

“If I had had more time, I definitely would have gone to him,” Woodard said. “But I’ve heard the things he’s said about Winthrop and I know he and his family really enjoyed it and that they remember him very well.”

Woodard has been in Rock Hill for the past few days trying to find a place to live and get settled. She’s met with Winthrop’s returning players and realizes her learning curve will be short with the season starting soon.

“I will say this, everything is automated now from the way it used to be as a coach,” she said. “We used to use paper and put that in a file. We used to have tape exchange. Now everything is in a computer and these are good things. It’s making things a lot easier.”

Woodard hasn’t coached since 2005, so automation isn’t the only change she’ll encounter. She’s brushing up on rules — NCAA and game — and hopes to make a positive difference.

“This was kind of a quiet move to get back into what I think I was born to do,” she said. “But man, I cannot believe the reception. Everywhere I go here there’s some comment that’s made. I had to go get renter’s insurance because I’m in an apartment and I left the agency with a handful of gifts. I’ve realized that I have friends here, too.”

Woodard said it was tough to leave Wichita, where she’s lived off and on over the years.

“I’m used to being on the go and it’s not like I’m not ever going to come back,” she said. “Wichita is my launching pad.”

Rock Hill is where she’s landed, for at least the moment.

“I love the trees here, they’re so tall and beautiful,” she said. “So full and green and the grass is so green. It’s so nice.”

Woodard knows her mother would approve.

“She would nod her head ‘yes,’ if I told her about this decision,” Woodard said. “Nothing more demonstrative. She would know. And I would know.”

This story was originally published August 3, 2016 at 2:15 PM with the headline "Lynette Woodard finds new place to continue legendary basketball career."