The story of Kim Mulkey: A Hall-of-Famer who never accepts defeat, even in marathon skating (2024)

The first time Kim Mulkey competed at something she didn’t win.

And she never forgot it.

Mulkey was 12-years old when she signed up for a marathon skating competition. Equipped with her own skates with adjustable wheels and a personal carrying case, she skated for 23 hours and 55 minutes with 10-minute breaks allowed every couple of hours.

The only reason Mulkey stopped skating even then was to speak to her grandfather, who came to the rink to check on her. She was disqualified.

Mulkey finished fourth, thinking enough about it decades later to devote a page to the event in her 2007 autobiography, “Won’t Back Down.”

“I was so mad at myself,” Mulkey wrote.

Finishing down the list has never been something Mulkey has done much of.

Whether it was being picked at recess to play quarterback or playing and excelling with boys in Dixie Youth baseball, playing at Hammond High (where she was of course valedictorian) and Louisiana Tech or coaching Baylor to three national championships, Mulkey has personified the name of another book. The one about legendary Alabama football coach Paul “Bear” Bryant called “I Ain’t Never Been Nothing but a Winner.”

Her winning, her success, has taken Mulkey from tiny Tickfaw to, as of Saturday night, a place in the Naismith Basketball Hall of Fame.

The classic “emotion on her sleeve” kind of person, Mulkey admitted she cried when she got the call last March saying she had finally been elected to the Hall of Fame. But having just decided to leave Baylor to be LSU’s new women’s basketball coach three weeks ago, Mulkey hasn’t had much time for introspection.

In an interview last week, she said the achievement will hit her when she looks around the room at the other assembled basketball greats, hears Michael Jordan introduce her and takes the podium herself.

“You’re almost like, ‘Do I really deserve to be in that company?’” Mulkey said. “You think, ‘Oh, Lord, I got talked into this profession and look where I am.’”

Mulkey was working on her Master’s degree in business administration after returning from the 1984 Los Angeles Olympics— where she of course helped the U.S. team win gold—when then school president F. Jay Taylor convinced her to return to basketball as an assistant coach.

“You don’t do it alone. It takes a lot of people that helped you along the way,” she said. “You do it because you’ve got players and coaches who brought those players to you, and administrators who gave you the resources. We’ll only have 3-5 minutes to speak, but you could never thank the number of people from the time you start playing and coaching. You could never get them all in. That’s what I think about. ‘Gosh, you put me in this position. You talked me into doing it and look at what the rest of you have done.’”

The Little General

You can find it with a quick YouTube search, a jumpy, blurry video from the 1983 NCAA championship game between Louisiana Tech and Southern California.

You see Mulkey, all 5-foot-4 of her, bringing the ball up court with her trademark French braids, playing defense, arms outstretched, tumbling to the floor chasing for a loose ball, and you hear the voice of CBS announcer Frank Glieber:

“Mulkey is not fast, but she is fairly quick and is she smart. She is an Academic All-American in addition to being an outstanding point guard …”

“Mulkey was a big scorer in high school, but of course they made a point guard out of her. She doesn’t score much now, but she is the little general that runs the Louisiana Tech attack …”

“Everyone called her the Little General,” said Carolyn Ashley, a longtime Mulkey confidant and devoted Louisiana Tech fan. “She controlled everything on that court.”

Mulkey couldn’t control the great Cheryl Miller that day. She led a Trojans comeback for a 69-67 victory. Mulkey missed a desperation shot at the buzzer. It was the first time in her basketball career she lost the last game of the season. She won four straight state titles at Hammond, won the last AIAW title at Tech in 1981 (AIAW was the former governing body of women’s college athletics) and the first NCAA title in 1982.

She was still on Leon Barmore’s staff in 1988 when Tech won its last NCAA title. Twelve years later, when Barmore decided to step down at the end of his own Hall of Fame career, Mulkey seemed the heir apparent.

But Tech only offered a four-year deal. Mulkey wanted five. The school president, Dan Reneau, wouldn’t budge.

Neither would the Little General.

“Why was five so important? A couple of reasons,” Mulkey said. “I had 15 years in the state retirement system to that point. Kristy Curry had just taken the Purdue job for a five-year deal, and she was the second assistant at Louisiana Tech.

“To me (five) was fair. I’ve proven my loyalty to Louisiana Tech, I’ve turned down two jobs to that point. Baylor just happened to be the next offer.”

Son Kramer Robertson remembers crying, 6-years old, standing at the foot of her bed asking her not to go to Baylor.

“I just remember her telling me this just felt right in her heart,” Robertson said, “that this was where she needed to be.”

Baylor won seven games the season before Mulkey arrived under former Tech co-head coach Sonja Hogg. It was difficult to peg expectations for that 2000-01 season, so Mulkey and her team set up a string of mini goals.

“I remember celebrating when we won our eighth game,” she said. “That was one more than the previous year. Then we’d count up how many games we had on the schedule to see how many we needed to win to have a winning season. And we’d celebrate that. Then our next goal was we had to beat somebody who’s ranked. We celebrated every little milestone.”

Baylor finished a respectable sixth in the Big 12, went 21-9 and reached the NCAA tournament for the first time. A year later, the Lady Bears won their first tournament game. Two years after that they reached the Sweet 16.

In 2005, Baylor reached the Women’s Final Four with a rematch against No. 2-ranked LSU. Though LSU had to fight off a late closing run by Baylor for a 71-70 win in Austin, Texas, in November. Mulkey expected a short stay in Indianapolis.

“The best player in the country in Seimone Augustus, the best post player Sylvia Fowles and the best point guard Temeka Johnson,” Mulkey said, rattling off LSU’s superb trio.

It was LSU’s best women’s team ever and looked the part, taking an early 24-9 lead. But Baylor tied LSU at halftime and roared away in the final 20 minutes to a 68-57 victory.

Mulkey, who doesn’t get a charge out of clothes shopping, needed something to wear for the final against Michigan State.

“On our way to the airport, Jennifer (Roberts, Baylor and now LSU assistant coach) called me and said, ‘I was just in Dillard’s and there is this most beautiful light blue suit,” Mulkey said. “It’s got you written all over, Kim. What two outfits are you taking to the Final Four?’ I said, ‘I’m not bringing two. Get real.’ And she said, ‘Well, I’m bringing this one just in case.’”

It happened to be a baby blue pants suit. Some thought it was a dig at Louisiana Tech, light blue being one of its colors.

“It wasn’t,” Mulkey said. “She just saw it on a mannequin.”

Home again

Two more national titles followed, with a record-tying 40-0 season in 2012 and another championship in 2019. Twenty-three Big 12 championships in all (regular season and tournament). The third-best winning percentage in women’s basketball history (.859) behind only Barmore and Geno Auriemma.

John Werner, who covers Baylor athletics for the Waco Tribune-Herald, said Mulkey’s drive and determination influenced the entire Baylor athletic program, which just collected its first NCAA men’s basketball title.

“I don’t think there’s a better coach than her in any sport anywhere,” Werner said. “She emphasizes defense. A real physical team. Obviously, her personality is very demanding, but she gets the most out of her players.”

But after 21 years at Baylor, the LSU job seemed one last move she wanted to make when news broke former coach Nikki Fargas was stepping down to become president of the WNBA’s Las Vegas Aces.

Hall of Fame coaches don’t change jobs.

Mulkey did.

Robertson said her mother saw both a chance to finish her career in a home state that was always part of her and a school that not only needed her in women’s basketball but to be a positive influence in the midst of a huge Title IX scandal.

“She had such a big impact not only on women’s basketball but every sport” at Baylor, Robertson said in a recent interview with the Baylor website SicEm365.com. “I hope she can do that at LSU, that she can be a beacon of light at a time when they need it.

“She feels a calling at LSU like she did at Baylor. Hopefully, she can have a little bit of the success she had at Baylor. If she does it will be a job well done.”

Hall of Fame enshrinements usually signal the ends of careers. Mulkey, who at her introduction pointed to LSU’s five Women’s Final Four banners and noted none of them said “national championship,” threw down the gauntlet to herself.

“That is what I came here to do,” she said.

In other words, finishing fourth in the skating marathon still doesn’t cut it with Kim Mulkey.