LIVING IN THE VORTEX BASKETBALL LEGEND LYNETTE WOODARD BRINGS HER PASSION TO WINTHROP


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OLYMPIC GOLD MEDALS EARNED


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CHAMPIONSHIPS WON AS A KANSAS PLAYER


t started with a balled up sock. That simple, unassuming piece of clothing receives credit for Lynette Woodard’s life-long passion for basketball.


She and her older brother would use the sock as a basketball to shoot through the hoop anchored on the


bedroom door of their childhood home. They mimicked the moves of, and pretended to be, some of the game’s greatest: Julius Erving, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, Austin Carr and others.


“My parents saw us bumping and jumping in the house and bought a hoop for the backyard. When my brother’s friends came over to play, I had to prove myself to them, that I belonged out there too,” said Woodard, who went on to prove herself many times over throughout her storied career.


The resume of Woodard, Winthrop’s women’s basketball head coach, details the unmatched achievements of the two-time U.S. Olympian, four- time All-American, all-time Division I women’s scoring leader (3,649 points to be exact), 10-time Hall of Fame inductee and first woman to play for the world-renowned Harlem Globetrotters.


Now at Winthrop, Woodard set her sights on having the 2017- 18 team “living in the vortex.” “The vortex is that sweet spot where you have tunnel vision. Your only focus at that moment is the game. Time doesn’t exist in the vortex. All you know is the rhythm of the game and everything else falls aside at that moment,” said Woodard.


Growing up in Wichita, Kansas, Woodard admitted that she did not realize that basketball and college could be connected.


24 RECORDS WOODARD


BROKE AT THE UNIVERSITY OF KANSAS


2005


YEAR INDUCTED INTO THE WOMEN’S BASKETBALL HALL OF FAME


“My mentor [Amateur Athletic Union Coach Forrest Roper] was the first person to talk to me about college basketball. It put me on a path to the University of Kansas where I found another mentor, Head Coach Marian Washington.”


Photo credit: USA Basketball


According to Washington, Woodard immediately lifted Kansas’ program to a national status and made it one of the top programs in the country. “People don’t grasp how impactful she was. She was dominant, and she was the complete package. To this day she’s at the top of my list as the top collegiate women’s basketball player,” Washington added.


While at Kansas, Woodard earned the Wade Trophy given to the top college player of the year, and she was exposed to international travel. “I had no idea that you could travel internationally through basketball. I thought we just stayed in Kansas and played other teams in the state,” said Woodard, who earned a degree in speech communications.


She traveled to the Soviet Union in 1979 where she helped the U.S. women’s team win a gold medal in the World University Games. A year later, she secured a spot on the U.S. Olympic team, an accomplishment that was


dimmed when the United States boycotted the Moscow Olympic Games.


“I was fortunate to have a second opportunity as captain of the 1984 Olympic team. Most of my peers’ careers ended after the Olympic boycott, but I had that second chance, and we won the gold medal in Los Angeles with the world watching us,” said Woodard. Little did she know that playing in those Olympic Games would make her childhood dreams come true.


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