Pat Head Summitt. Where do you begin? Summitt is the winningest basketball coach ever, men or women. Many argue she is as great if not greater than legendary UCLA coach John Wooden. Those arguments are valid, but won’t be discussed here. They have been talked about at length already.
As this is a student publication, I have tried to think about the appropriate way to honor Coach Summitt for the current group of students. How to speak for them. What do they want to say?
What does she mean to a group of millennial students who arrived at the University of Tennessee after she had stepped down as the head basketball coach for the Lady Vols?
For the under-30 Tennessee fans, we don’t remember very many times where we could be proud to be Vol fans. All of us were too young to remember the 1998 National Championship the football team won or the title the Lady Vols won in 1998 as well. We don’t remember the great times our parents and grandparents remember.
Since 2007, the football program has run off the rails and almost a decade later is still struggling to get back on track. The rest of the athletic department, men’s basketball, baseball, softball and track and field have shown flashes of brilliance but have otherwise been pretty mediocre.
For millennial Tennessee fans it has been a rough life but we always had one constant. Our North Star.
Pat Summitt and the Lady Vols.
No matter how bad the other sports at Tennessee had been during their particular season, everyone knew the Lady Vols would win at least 25 games (most likely more) and would at worst only make it to the Sweet 16 in the Women’s NCAA Basketball Tournament.
Summitt delivered National Championships for generations of Vol fans and she did that for millennials as well. In 2007 and 2008, the Lady Vols went back to back as National Champions, beating Rutgers and Stanford respectively. For myself personally, those two years were fantastic.
All my life I wanted to see Tennessee win a national championship and because of Summitt and her Lady Vol players, I was able to witness two titles. I felt great pride in those two championships and I imagine many millennial Vol fans share those same feelings.
Summitt gave the under-30 millennial Tennessee fans the only two major National Championships we have had the chance to celebrate. Thank you just doesn’t seem like strong enough words for those two titles.
Thank you isn’t strong enough words for 1,098 wins, 18 regular season conference titles, 17 conference tournament titles and eight national championships. Thank you isn’t sufficient for all Summitt did for Tennessee away from the basketball court either.
But thank you is all we have.
To the Summitt family and her many Lady Vols, thank you for sharing her with us. Thank you for what each of you gave to Tennessee. Our thoughts and prayers are with each of you.
For Pat Summitt, on behalf of all the millennial Tennessee fans, thank you for everything you did for Tennessee. We love you and we will miss you, but you will never be forgotten. You will live forever in our hearts.
“God doesn’t take things away to be cruel. He takes things away to make room for other things. He takes things away to lighten us. He takes things away so we can fly,” Pat Summitt.
