Chancellor shares stories with CDP

By By Tony Krausz / assistant sports editor
Sept. 30, 2003
PHILADELPHIA Van Chancellor had a very clear message for those in attendance at the Community Development Partnership 50th annual banquet Monday evening at the Neshoba County Coliseum You have to believe.
The WNBA's Houston Comets head coach and general manager explained how he got his team to believe in him during its second of four straight league championships in 1998.
Houston breezed through the 30-game season winning 27 games, but the team started to play selfish in the playoffs, according to Chancellor.
The former Ole Miss women's coach (1978-97) found a way to get his players to believe in him and what he wanted them to do.
Chancellor, who played basketball at East Central Community College, stood in front of his team and started dropping $100 bills to the floor.
As he dropped $2,000 in hundreds in front of him, the coach told the team to believe in him and his philosophy.
Chancellor, whose coaching career began at Noxapater High School, told his team to believe in him so much that when he held up a white towel and told them it was purple that they would believe that too.
Cynthia Cooper, who retired from the WNBA in 2001, asked the coach what believing in him had to do with the money he was dropping in the locker room..
The tale from his exploits as a coach on a championship team was used to emphasis the community group's needs to continue to do to help its community continue to grow.
Chancellor, who grew up in Louisville, now lives in Houston, but he said he has connections with CDP group through his childhood friend, David Vowell.
The coach, who has a 133-42 record and is the only coach to still be with his original team in the seven-year existence of the WNBA, mixed in plenty of humor with his speech about working towards the group's goals of helping the community grow and prosper.
Chancellor, who won a gold medal as the U.S.A. women's coach in 2000 and the 2004 coach, used self deprecating humor talking about how he was voted as the least to succeed in his high school class and how women were always talking about how happy they are not to be married to him. He has been married for 41 years to his wife, Betty.
He also talked about the importance of staying humble.
In 1986, Chancellor led the Lady Rebels to the women's elite eight and a showdown against Texas. After Ole Miss loss 66-63 in what has been voted as the best women's tournament game in NCAA history, he said everyone kept coming up to him and telling him what a great coaching job he did.
When he went back to Oxford, people continued to tell him it was his greatest coaching performance, and he thought he was finally going to achieve his boyhood dream of being in Sports Illustrated.
When he got home, he told his son, John, he was going to sleep and he didn't want to be waken up for anything. John did wake him up when Sports Illustrated called.
The point was to stay humble and keep working hard to achieve your dreams. Which is the last thing Chancellor told the group in his 30-minute speech.