Stanford coach Tara VanDerveer has become the greatest coach in men’s and women’s NCAA basketball history. With Stanford women’s basketball’s 65-56 victory against Oregon State on Sunday, Coach Tara VanDerveer earned her one thousand two hundred third career win and broke what had previously been a tie with Mike Krzyzewski. She came onto the all-time list for men’s and women’s coaches at all levels of the sport.
VanDerveer is in her forty sixth season as a Division 1 head coach, with much of her career taking place at Stanford, where she was hired in 1985. Her teams have won three NCAA championships. This season, the Cardinal are 17-2 and No. 8 in the US LBM Coaches Poll. VanDerveer grew up in Massachusetts, where there weren’t many girl basketball teams. Later in her life, she won more college basketball games than any man or woman, making great accomplishments. Even with a not so good upbringing, VanDerveer persevered and became the winningest coach of all time.
While Mike Krzyzewski is no longer the winningest coach in all of college basketball, he’s still the leader in all-time victories for a men’s college basketball coach, and has made many accomplishments in his lifetime that have been hard to surpass.
Among all the coaches, Coach Auriemma a college girls basketball coach, could pass Mike Krzyzewski by the end of UConn’s season, with the Huskies already at 16-3 in 2023-24. Depending on how their team plays this season, we could see him move past VanDerveer’s wins, too.
However, Tara VanDerveer broke the glass ceiling of girl’s basketball by becoming the winningest coach in all of college basketball history. She persevered hard and made it to the end. Congratulations, Coach VanDerveer!