Rutgers Coach Leads by Example

March 5, 2008 — -- If there are two words that have echoed through the life of Rutgers University women's basketball coach Vivian Stringer, they are "stand up" — stand up for what you believe in; stand up to life's challenges; stand up to those who tell the world you are something you are not.

Standing up is something Stringer has been doing since she first learned to stand at all.

Raised a coal miner's daughter in the tiny town of Edenborn, Pa., one her defining moments came early when, as a talented gymnast, she fought to become the first black cheerleader at her high school. The year was 1965. Stringer says it was her parents who urged her to claim her rightful spot on the squad.

"They just left me with, 'If not you, then who? You must stand up because if you don't stand up for some things, you'll fall for everything. And it's not about you, Vivian, but it's for future generations of young people,'" Stringer said in an interview with Robin Roberts of "Good Morning America."

It's one of the stories she recounts in her just-published book, "Standing Tall." It's also a lesson she's carried with her during her 36 years of coaching women's college basketball and all the milestones she has passed along the way.

She's the first black woman to coach a Division 1 team. Already enshrined in the Women's Basketball Hall of Fame, she's the only coach in NCAA history to take three different teams to the Final Four. Just last week, she celebrated her 800th career victory when Rutgers, where she has coached for 13 years, beat DePaul University.

"It's not about the winning and losing," Stinger says. "It's a lot more about where the player started and where they ended, and how they overcome obstacles. It's not so much that we win, so much as being able to translate what's going on, on a basketball court to life."

Last year, it was a challenge off the court, not on, that thrust Stringer into the national spotlight and into what may have been her finest hour. It came after radio show host Don Imus made a racist and sexist comment about her Rutgers team, one day after they lost in the national championships.

Her first reaction was how to shield her girls from the ugliness she'd experienced back in Pennsylvania 43 years before. Stringer says she asked herself, '"Do you stand up and speak up for these young people? Are you going to be their model and their leader?' There was no question that I would do that. There needed to be a single voice, and it had to come from me."

The remark eventually cost Imus his job, but Stringer knew a teachable moment when she saw one. Instead of calling for Imus' head, she spoke out at a nationally televised press conference about the need for all Americans to rise above racism.

"I ask everyone who can hear my voice, please understand that we all need to make changes. Yes, it happens to be Mr. Imus, but beyond Mr. Imus, it's all of us. Do we understand what's going on in our society?"

At the same press conference, team captain Essence Carson said Stringer had given the players strength "just by living her life, just by being who she is. That's why we exemplify her. We embody her. She embodies us."

When Imus met with Stringer and the Rutgers team last April, he ended the meeting by saying he wanted to stay in touch and he wanted to continue to communicate with the young women. Almost a year later, Stringer says she has never heard from Imus since that highly publicized meeting.

But if you think the Imus episode was the most difficult challenge Stringer has faced, you'd be wrong. Stringer is a mother of three. Her only daughter, Nina, was stricken with spinal meningitis as an infant and was never able to walk or speak. Stringer says her daughter has given her strength beyond what anyone can imagine and she needed that strength just years later, when a sudden heart attack killed her beloved husband Bill at age 47.

Still, for Stringer, the triumphs have outweighed the tragedies, and while she would like to cap her career with the one thing that's eluded her — a national championship — she says she has no regrets.

"It doesn't matter what you don't have. If you've got love in your heart and you've got hopes and you've got dreams, doesn't matter that you get knocked down, just keep getting back up," Stringer said.