Masters in Coaching Podcast- Episode XXV

Tim Cates talks with UCLA Women's Basketball Coach Cori Close about her program, her journey through coaching, learning from John Wooden and speaking at the California Coaching Conference in July.

Episode Transcript

(00:00):
She's the head coach of one ofthe nation's top Division one women's basketball program.
She's also a coach with Team USABasketball. She is Corey Close and
she joins us now on this week'sepisode of the Masters in Coaching Podcast.
Let's Go Welcome in to episode numbertwenty five of the Masters in Coaching Podcast

(00:21):
here on iHeartRadio and wherever you downloadyour podcast. Excited to talk to this
week's guest. UCLA women's basketball coach. Ten seasons in Westwood, got six
twenty wins seasons under her belt,two hundred and fifteen total wins, six
nc Double A Tournament appearances. She'sinvolved as a coach with Team USA Basketball
as well. She is Corey Closeand she joins us here on the Masters

(00:44):
in Coaching Podcast. Coach, thanksfor coming on. How are you doing.
I'm doing great. I need totalk to you every morning now.
It makes me sound a lot betterthan I really am. But thanks for
having me today. I appreciate itabsolutely. Coach all well, deserved the
accolades. All right, this lastseason, you maneuvered this UCLA women's basketball
team through non conference play, throughconference play, through the NCUBA tournament.

(01:07):
When you've a chance now to reflecton maneuvering through a pandemic with a basketball
team. Just how hard was that? Yeah, you know, it's interesting.
I probably more difficult than I evenacknowledged in the moment it was.
It's really probably it's been the hardestleadership year for me, But more importantly,

(01:27):
I think it was one of themost difficult years for the student athletes.
But you know, we lost inthe second round of the NCAA Tournament
to Texas and the disappointing one,and at the time it was probably as
painful of a loss as I've hadin many years. But as I've had
more time to look back and reflecton the year, this may be the

(01:49):
team I'm most proud of, oneof them at least, and my staff.
The resiliency, the focus of thingsunder their control, the ability be
the fine joy despite really difficult circumstances, their commitment to continued growth every single
day. We really played with sevenplayers the almost the entire year, and

(02:10):
one of those seven players was ahigh school early admit. I mean,
we we'd had two players that twoof the best players in the world that
weren't allowed to come over because ofimmigration. Uh, you know, laws
because in regard to the pandemic,and so the list just goes on and
on. It was just a reallydifficult year, but you know what,

(02:30):
we can do hard things, andour team overcame a whole lot and we
had, you know, eleven topfifteen wins, and you know it,
just the list goes on and onabout excuse me, six top eleven wins
and and so I just was reallyproud of how they just the character that
they showed that seems like really sortof coach speak, but you know,

(02:52):
sometimes that character goes deeper than others, and this year it was a it
was a year that the character wentvery, very deep. College. I'm
glad you brought up character because whenwe were reflect upon this year of a
pandemic, whether it's a year fromnow or five years from now or ten
years from now, everybody's going tolook at how they got through it and
how they identified themselves through that pandemic. And I think for you and your

(03:13):
basketball team, character is a bigthing that will be associated with every member
of the group and just how theywere able to maneuver through on and off
the court, the daily testings,studying, being away from their families,
and friends, isolating just so youcan get a season. And I honestly
believe that this group you had,their character and maybe who they are as

(03:35):
adults, as professionals is going tobe built because of this No I life
changing and programs sustaining. You know, we're now going to go into a
year that I think we may haveone of our most talented teams that we've
ever had at UCLA since I've beenhere. But you know what the challenge
will not be on that's just onpaper. Yeah. What my challenge was

(03:55):
to them the other day at ourfirst meeting was, Look, it's going
to be about can you match character, can you match chemistry? Can you
match growth? Can you have thetoughness mentally? And can we carry over
some of the lessons hard lessons,difficult, painful lessons that we had last
year and now apply them to maybea more conducive environment to you know,

(04:18):
championship levels. Corey Close, asour guest here on the Masters and Coaching
podcast here on iHeartRadio, just finishedher tenth season in Westwood as usually a
woman's basketball coach coach. I'm wantto go back to your playing days at
UCSB, your four years starter you'reinducted into the school Sports Hall of Fame.
How would you describe yourself as aplayer. Feisty, Probably like how

(04:41):
you see me on the sidelines alittle bit. You know, I was
always told I was too short,too slow to play Division one basketball,
and so, you know, Ithink I always knew that I had to
be in better shape. I hadto work harder than everybody else. I
had to do things that really nobodyelse was willing to do if I was
gonna be able to compete at thislevel. And so I was. I
was just I was not a verygood shooter. I was not a great

(05:04):
scorer. I was a little stepslow. But I loved the game.
I played extremely hard and I'd loveto pass it. I was a pass
first sort of. I love toget into the lane and and make and
create easy shots for other people.And that's probably what I did best.
And that's, honestly, it's sortof how I coach. I really love
fostering growth and opportunities for young peopleand giving them an environment where they can,

(05:29):
uh, you know, grow andbe their best and prepare it for
life after the ball goes flat anduh and for professional moments as well.
But and then just to like competelike crazy, compete to win and everything
and how you treat people and howyou do in the classroom and every drill,
like be an elite competitor that lovesto win, but also more importantly
loves to make the people around thembetter when you got done playing. Is

(05:51):
coaching something you knew you wanted toget into. No, not at all,
Okay, I think And I grewup my father was a high school
teacher and coach in the Bay Areaat Malpitas High School, and I grew
up around coaches. You know,my faith is journeys really important to me.
I thought maybe I would do somethingwith like the Fellowship of Christian Athletes

(06:13):
or something like that, or becomea high school teacher and coach and uh,
you know, but bottom line isI in the summertimes, all the
best runs at that time. Ifyou want a good pickup games, you
went and worked other people's camps,okay, And so I went and worked
Washington's camp and Organ's camp, andStanford's camp and UCLA's camp. And also
I could get really good runs atnight after camp was over. And through

(06:36):
that though, those coaches got achance to watch you teach, and I
was like, I started do likethis, this is sort of fun.
And I think I you know,as a point guard, you sort of
had to be a coach on thefloor anyway. And so when I when
I worked UCLA's camp, I gotto know Kathy Olivier and I never expected
anything, but after she became thehead coach the year I graduated. At

(07:00):
that time, they had a positioncalled restricted earnings where you were a full
time coach, but you couldn't goon the road recruiting, but you only
got paid sixteen thousand dollars, whicheventually became illegal. But I was the
restricted earnings coach. I got offeredthat position here at UCLA right out of
college, and I was like,this was too good of an opportunity to
pass up. And I was withSteve Lavin. He was the restricted earnings

(07:20):
coach on the men's side, andhe's also the one that ended up introducing
me to Coach Wooden the first yearwhen I was twenty two years old and
November of nineteen ninety three, andI got that started a fifteen year mentorship
relationship with Coach Wooden. You know, and so when you get all those
opportunities right out of college. Youbetter coach, because otherwise you're not gonna

(07:42):
be able to pay it forward.Talk a little bit about that relationship with
Coach Wooden, because you got toknow him in a way that not a
lot of people did well, veryfew. I wasn't. I think he
meant more to me than I meantto him, being you know, completely
transparent about that. You know,it was just one of those things.
There's just so much wisdom pouring outof him, and and I just wanted

(08:03):
to sit with him. I wantto be I wanted to learn from him.
I wanted to watch him. Iwanted to get to know his heart
and his character and his alumni andwhat made him special. And and you
know, I just I just triedto spend time quality times. I tried
to go back the whole time Iwas at UCLA every other Tuesday night,
and for the most part, andthen when I was at uc sound of

(08:24):
Barber coaching, I'd come down probablyonce a month for a really consistent basis.
But it was much more about watchinghim live his life in such a
principal, centered, consistent way thananything that he did on the hardwood.
And you know, it truly was. Winning was truly a byproduct of his
character, his consistency, and hisattention to detail, and his commitment to

(08:48):
coach young men's hearts, not justjump shots and exs and knows you've been
around a lot of other coaches andmentors. Is John one at a different
level? Is there anybody close tohim you've come across, Well, I've
been. You know, there's beena lot of great coaches. And that
was actually one of the really coollessons that he taught me. Said,
just because you have a title,and especially Division one title, doesn't make

(09:11):
you any better of a coach thana junior high coach, you know,
coach or somebody else who's doing thingsat a really high level. It could
be in a little y MCA league, but they're an elite teacher, he
said. Never think of yourself morehighly than you ought, he would say.
And and I think that, yes, I agree that he was a
cut above. But I think oneof the things that made him so unique

(09:33):
is he just admired great teachers whowere committed to master their craft, and
that he always said that there's alot of people that are just as good
as me, or it's not better. They just don't have the title or
the publicities. You don't know abouthim, and so yes, I would
always say he is a cut above. But part of why he's a cut
above is his insatiable desire to learnand his honoring of all the other people

(09:58):
around him. CELA women's basketball coachCorey Close with us here on the Masters
and Coaching Podcast ten years now.Is the head coach at UCLA two hundred
and fifteen career wins, six NCDouble A Tournament appearances, and she'll be
speaking at the California's Coaching Conference onlineon July twenty second. You can hear
her as a keynote speaker. Moreon that coming up in just a couple

(10:18):
of minutes. Women's basketball. Overyour last just twenty years of coaching,
how have you seen this sport grow? How much more can it grow?
And have you been surprised at howit just kind of a skyrocketed during this
time you've been coaching. Well,yeah, it's been amazing to watch.
And you know, I actually gotinto basketball because there was more scholarships available.

(10:41):
I was actually a better soccer playerthan basketball coming out of high school.
Yeah, but they didn't have verymany scholarships, and I just knew
that financing college would be difficult formy family if I didn't do that.
So I sort of fell into thebasketball side and it really worked out well
for me. But then now towatch you know, when I played,
you know, we were taking passengervans everywhere, sport to a room,

(11:03):
you just were It was just adifferent ballgame. And now you're talking about
sellout crowds, you know, thehighest TV ratings in history. You're talking
about the digital landscape and streaming andjust all the different things that you have,
the opportunities that you have on thatfront, and the women are just
killing it. And in fact,you know, last year in the bubble,

(11:24):
the NBA TV ratings were down,but the w NBA TV TV ratings
are a way up. And thenwhen you talk about the engagement and the
branding spaces of social media women.They analyzed the top the elite eight men's
teams, and then they elite eightwomen's teams in terms of brand potential and
UH and monetizations from an outside financialfirm, and eight out of ten of

(11:48):
the top ones from that financial firm'sperspective were women. And so you just
think about the sky's the limit rightnow. And honestly, you know,
yesterday was the forty ninth anniversary ofTILE nine. And when you say that,
a lot of people think, oh, you're just trying to take things
away from the men. Couldn't befurther from the truth. I mean,
I can't wait to watch our men'sbasketball just kill it this year for UCLA.

(12:09):
I'm so excited for the growth ofsports on our campus, and that
includes the men's programs. But whatwe want is we want the opportunity to
take advantage of all the growth.So if our growth trajectory the data points
that way, we want to havethe opportunity to become a product and an
asset that's actually a financial contributions toour universities across the country. Not at

(12:33):
We don't want to be a causeor a charity. We want to be
a product and an asset that's worthinvesting in. And I think we are
finally at a tipping point where peopleare able to see that women's basketball is
not only a passionate, great sportfrom a cultural standpoint to invest in,
but it's also a good business decisiontoo. You see a women's basketball coach,
Corey closes our guests on the Mastersand Coaching podcast at Great follow on

(12:56):
Twitter at coach Corey Close. Andone of the things I love just scrolling
through your timeline is to see thepost of former players of current players.
The support you show for your formerplayers and current players and people that you
know in basketball is so awesome.How important is that for you to have

(13:16):
that relationship with your former and currentplayers. I think it's so important because
I remember when I first got here, I asked about ten men's basketball alumni
and ten women's basketball alumni, andI said, what do you wish we
would have done you know when youwere here that we didn't, And almost
all of them one of the thingsthat they said was keep us connected,

(13:37):
help us feel remembered, you know, and invest in us even when we're
not in uniform anymore, and makeus feel really valued when we come back
to campus, or that you're followingour different paths of either whether it be
professional basketball or whether it be somethingelse in their professional life. And so
I really listened to that. Andyou know, whether it be you know,

(13:58):
Kevin love Of or Ryan Hollins orEarl Watson, or whether it be
Lindsay Plumber or Michelle Greco, thelist goes on and awesome. I'm so
I'm so proud of what Drew Holidaysdoing right now for the for the NBA,
for for Black owned businesses across thecountry, when his foundation and his
wife is a bruin. But youknow what his sister played for us,

(14:20):
and that we know that family andLauren is amazing. So all that to
say is that's not a burden,that's a privilege. And these people have
been incredible and I want them toknow that we value them, that we
appreciate them, and we celebrate them, even long after they're not wearing the
four letters across their chests. Anotherthing I saw on your Twitter account was
the hashtag car rides with Corey.Are we gonna? Are we going to

(14:43):
get more of those? You knowwhat? I don't know. People keep
asking for them, so I dothem. But it's really, to be
honest with me, it's my carride easily to work and it's uh,
and it's usually me sort of preachingto myself, like what do I need
to be thinking about it? ThenI to share it with people and somehow
they've sort of caught on a littlebit. I sometimes wonder why, but

(15:05):
but it's I just want us beable to pay it forward. I mean,
I really am. I've been.My life has been changed by being
a coach, by if other coaches, by people that invested in me,
and so if I can just encourageone person by doing that, then it's
it's a lot of fun to do. UCLA women's basketball coach Corey Close with

(15:26):
us here on the Masters in CoachingPodcast. I'm Tim Kates. Thanks for
being with us. I think thisis a good time to tell our listeners
about the upcoming California Coaches Conference,hosted by the nation's number one graduate athletics
program, Concordia University Irvine's Masters inCoaching and Athletics Administration Program. It's July
twelfth through the twenty second. It'sonline register now at CUI dot eedu slash

(15:50):
coaching. There's access to live sessions. There's gonna be keynote speakers like Alvin
Davis, former Major League baseball player, Jason Negro, head football coach at
Saint John Bosco, Corey Close.Yes, Corey is gonna be speaking as
well. On July twenty second,at eight thirty in the morning. We're
gonna have hot topic panel discussions thatI will be leading with athletic directors and

(16:11):
coaches across the country at different levels. We encourage you to find out more
about it and to sign up forthe California Coaching Conference at CUI dot eedu
slash coaching their sports specific breakout sessionsfor football, volleyball, soccer, baseball,
basketball, track and field, strengthand conditioning. It's a coaching conference

(16:34):
you want to be a part of, and again go to CUI dot eedu
slash coaching to find out all thedetails and where you can register to sign
up. Coach, You're speaking onJuly twenty second at eight thirty as one
of the keynote speakers. How excitedare you to be a part of this?
Very excited? I just you know, the average Division one basketball player

(16:56):
spends over thirty five hundred hours intheir sport over four years, and only
four percent of those are in games. And to be a part of like,
how can I give back to thecoaching profession and be a part of
that. I just think it's awesomeand I love to be around coaches that
want to learn. I love tobe around people that are always looking to
master their craft not only on thefield or on the hardwood, but also

(17:18):
in the way that they use theninety six percent to impact hearts and lives
so that they're different forever. Andso I'm just excited to be a part
of it, let alone speaking atit. I just I am excited to
learn right alongside people. So itis it's my great privilege to do it.
July twenty second, eight three inthe morning, you can hear Coach
Close will be a keynote speaker.It's part of the California's Coaching Conference Online.

(17:40):
You can find out more at CUIdot eedu slash coaching CUI dot edu
slash coaching. Well, coach,we appreciate the time. Congratulations on maneuvering
through this pandemic season. I knowit wasn't easy, and I know big
things are continue to head for youin Westwood with the UCLA women's basketball program.
Thank you so much for joining uson the Masters and Coaching podcast.

(18:03):
Well, thank you for having me. I'm looking forward to continuing our relationship
and looking forward to be in witheverybody on the twenty second. Have a
great day. That's Corey Close,UCLA women's basketball coach, just finished her
tenth season in Westwood stand Out atUC Santa Barbara been a coach almost twenty
years now, from a grad coachto an assistant to now again a decade

(18:23):
plus as head coach at UCLA.She's involved with Team USA as well,
coach in the under nineteen team forTeam USA Women's basketball this summer. We
appreciate Coach Colory Close, and again, if you want to hear more from
coach more from other coaches, bea part of the California's Coaching Conference.
It's online July twelve through the twentysecond. Coach Close will be one of

(18:45):
the keynote speakers on July twenty second. You can hear her and many others.
We're gonna have panel discussions as well. It's a great opportunity for you
to soak in knowledge and hear fromother coaches and athletic directors and administrators from
around the country. To find outmore, you can go to CUI dot
eed u slash coaching. That CUIdot eed u slash Coaching Again thanks to

(19:07):
head coach Corey Close. Until nexttime, I'm Tim Capes and thank you
for listening to the Masters and Coachingpodcast. So long everybody,