Women's Basketball to Honor C. Vivian Stringer on Jan. 5 Versus Iowa
Dec 20 | Women's Basketball
PISCATAWAY, N.J. – Legendary Rutgers women's basketball head coach C. Vivian Stringer has been named a 2024 Naismith Outstanding Contributors to Basketball Award Winner. Naismith made the official announcement on Thursday, Dec. 7.
Stringer, who was previously named a Naismith Award winner for her on-court success, will be honored for the award pregame as the Scarlet Knights face Iowa on Friday, Jan. 5 at 6 p.m. in front of a sold-out crowd.
Fans still interested in tickets should look on SeatGeek, the Official Ticket Marketplace of the Rutgers Scarlet Knights. You can search for tickets here.
RU is hosting its Scarlet Out Game against the Hawkeyes and encourages all fans to wear red. The first 1,000 fans to arrive at the arena will receive a Red T-Shirt giveaway.
The contest is presented by RWJBarnabas Health and the entire 2023-24 season is presented by Prudential.
About C. Vivian Stringer
The second full-time head coach in Rutgers women's basketball history, Stringer served at the helm of the Scarlet Knights from 1995-2022, finishing her career as the longest tenured RU women's basketball coach. During that span, Stringer won 535 games with the Scarlet Knights while qualifying for 17 NCAA Tournaments, including 10 consecutively from 2003 to 2012.
The 2022 Rutgers Hall of Fame Inductee led Rutgers to a pair of Final Four appearances in 2000 and 2007, with the latter culminating in RU's first NCAA Championship game. In 2000, she became the first men's or women's basketball coach to guide three different programs to the Final Four after playing in the first NCAA Championship Game with Cheyney State in 1992 and leading Iowa to the national semifinals in 1993.
In addition to her Naismith Basketball Hall of Fame induction in 2009 and Women's Basketball Hall of Fame enshrinement in 2001, Stringer entered another elite club with a 2020 induction into the New Jersey Hall of Fame alongside Eli Manning, Rick Barry, Ed Harris, and Anne Hathaway. Last season, the court at Jersey Mike's Arena was named in Stringer's honor, leaving her undeniable mark on the program and the Rutgers University.
Stringer's historic impact was evident at every stop. She turned paltry resources and pre-Title IX injustices at a small, historically Black school at Cheyney State into a run at the national title. She turned a seven-win Iowa program that ranked 299th out of 302 teams in attendance figures into a perennial contender that posted its first-ever advance sellout of Carver-Hawkeye Arena. Within three seasons at Rutgers, the Scarlet Knights won 20 games and won a Big East division title. Within five years, RU rose to national prominence as the women's game exploded in popularity across the United States.
Stringer surpassed the monumental 1,000 career victory mark in November 2018. She became the fifth NCAA Division I women's basketball coach to reach 1,000 career wins and was the first African-American coach to reach the milestone. She retired ranked fifth all-time in NCAA women's basketball history with 1,055 career victories. In 2019-20, Stringer passed the late, great Pat Summitt and became the NCAA record holder with 37 seasons of 20 or more victories. Following that season, she received the John R.
Wooden Award "Legends of Coaching" honor based on character, success on the court, graduation rate of student-athletes in their basketball program, coaching philosophy, and identification with the goals of the John R. Wooden Award. Her standard of excellence extends to Stringer's staff and student-athletes. In March 2021, Stringer was honored in the Sports Business Journal as a Leader in Diversity and Inclusive Hiring. Stringer also recruited, developed, and coached 21 student-athletes who would be selected in the WNBA Draft, along with others who played professionally overseas.
Stringer has served the game of basketball as an administrator and an international coach. An assistant coach for the gold-medal 2004 U.S. Olympic Team, her first USA Basketball experience came as an assistant for the bronze-medal 1980 USA Jones Cup Team. Stringer was one of the key players in the development of the Women's Basketball Coaches Association. Stringer served on the Board of Directors of the Kay Yow/WBCA Cancer Fund, created in fall 2007. The Foundation, in partnership with the V Foundation for Cancer Research, is an initiative to fight breast cancer.
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