A 39-year-old woman hanging from a basketball rim inspired Lynette Woodard to greatness.
As soon as she became a 39-year-old hanging from a rim, Woodard decided to call it quits.
Woodard, one of the greatest women’s basketball players ever, announced her second retirement from the sport on Wednesday and started another career as an assistant coach at alma mater Kansas.
“This is a time of a little bit of sadness,” KU coach Marian Washington said. “The sadness comes because Lynette has decided to hang up her basketball shoes. But that’s blended with a great deal of joy since she’s joining the staff full time.”
Now, about that 39-year-old . . .
At a news conference Wednesday, Woodard told a story from her college days. She was playing in an international tournament and she saw a Cuban woman hanging from the rim. The sight inspired Woodard to play past college — in a time when there was no professional league in the United States and few opportunities to play professionally overseas.
But play beyond college she did — overseas, in the Olympics, as the first female member of the Harlem Globetrotters and, for the past two years, in the WNBA.
Which brings us to the recent past. Playing in what will be her competitive swan song, Woodard’s Detroit Shock team was facing New York last summer. Woodard was “feeling great,” and on one play she skied to block an opponent’s shot.
Woodard caught the rim and hung on, and in a split-second of clarity realized she had become what she beheld nearly two decades ago.
“I thought maybe that was an omen,” Woodard said.
Technically, Woodard’s retirement began on May 7, when she was waived by the Shock. Though Woodard, who will turn 40 in August, stayed in shape, she knew the time was right to call it quits.
“If the call would have come,” Woodard said, “I would have had to say no.”
So she placed a call to Washington, her old college coach, and asked if she could join the Jayhawks’ staff full time. Woodard spent last college season as KU’s special assistant for external relations and women’s basketball.
Woodard will replace Deborah Newkirk as a full-time aide. Newkirk now is an administrative assistant.
Woodard will recruit, replacing office-bound assistant Maggie Mahood on the road.
“I’m really looking forward to it,” Woodard said of recruiting. “It’s a war out there, dog eat dog. But I’ve got something great to sell.”
Name recognition shouldn’t be a problem. Woodard still ranks as the all-time leading career scorer in college women’s basketball with 3,649 points. Louisiana State’s Pete Maravich, with 3,667 points, is the only other college basketball player — man or woman — with more.
A Wichita native, Woodard also lists on her resume four Kodak All-American Awards, a mythical Big Eight player of the decade award and a laundry list of other player-of-the-year accolades.
After her KU graduation in 1981, Woodard played professionally in Italy. She was on the 1980 and ’84 U.S. Olympic teams and won the gold in 1984. After a two-year stint with the Globetrotters, she played professionally in Japan before announcing her first retirement in 1992.
“I love the game,” Woodard said Wednesday. “I played longer than anyone thought I would. I was supposed to quit after college. It didn’t look like there would be a place to play after college. But time kept passing and I kept playing.”
Woodard was athletics director for the Kansas City, Mo., school district in 1992 and ’93 before moving to New York and becoming a registered stockbroker for Magna Securities Corp.
But Woodard came out of basketball retirement in 1997 — the first year of the WNBA — and was an elite draft selection by the Cleveland Rockers, for whom she played in ’97. She joined Detroit in 1998.
“Lynette was a pioneer in so many ways,” Washington said. “We’re going to benefit greatly from her knowledge. Lynette has always been such a great ambassador. Our game is still a little young, but someday people will look back and see what a pioneer she’s been.”
Woodard, for her part, is tickled to come back to her alma mater and embark on a coaching career — however far it goes.
“I feel like a prodigal daughter returning,” she said. “Everywhere I’d go, I was asked, ‘Do you think you’ll coach?’ I always had too much player in me I couldn’t think about settling down and doing that. But I’ve matured. I didn’t want to miss this opportunity.”
And when the opportunity arises to become a head coach?
“I want to keep my focus here,” Woodard said. “When I decide I’m going to do one thing, I focus on it. I’m here now. If a head-coaching opportunity comes up at some point, it will reveal itself. I’m just happy to be where I am.”
