Marlene Stollings

Linda Marlene Stollings (born January 7, 1975) is an American college basketball coach who was most recently women's basketball head coach at Texas Tech University. Stollings played college basketball at Ohio State University and Ohio University. After serving as an assistant coach at various colleges from 2000 to 2011 and briefly as interim head coach at New Mexico State in 2003, Stollings was head coach at Winthrop from 2011 to 2012, VCU from 2012 to 2014, Minnesota from 2014 to 2018, and Texas Tech from 2018 to 2020.

Stollings led Winthrop to a winning record in her single season at the school and VCU to the 2014 WNIT. Additionally, Stollings twice took Minnesota to the NCAA Tournament, in 2015 and 2018.

In two seasons at Texas Tech, Stollings inherited a losing program and achieved a winning record in her second season of 2019–20. However, months after that season, Stollings was fired following a USA Today story that revealed allegations of abusive treatment of players.

Early life and playing career Stollings grew up in Beaver, Ohio, where she attended Eastern High School. As of 2017, her career point total of 3,514 is the high school basketball career scoring record in Ohio, ahead of LeBron James's 2,657. As a senior in 1992–93, Stollings was a Kodak All-American. The following season in 1994–95, Stollings averaged 5.4 points and 1.2 rebounds.

In 1995, Stollings transferred to Ohio University, where she played for the Ohio Bobcats from 1996 to 1998 under head coach Marsha Reall. In her debut season with Ohio in 1996–97, Stollings averaged 10.1 points and 3.1 rebounds. As a senior on the 1997–98 team, which went 17–11 (13–5 Mid-American Conference), Stollings was Ohio's leading scorer with 22.9 points per game, in addition to 4.8 rebounds and 4.2 assists. Stollings was a Kodak honorable mention All-American in 1998 and graduated from Ohio University that year as a double major with a B.B.A. in marketing and B.S. in sport industry. From December 20, 2002, until resigning on February 5, 2003, Stollings was interim head coach, during which she went 9–3. Eventually, New Mexico State won the Sun Belt Conference West Division title.

On July 9, 2003, Wright State University hired Stollings as an assistant coach for the Wright State Raiders women's basketball program on the staff of head coach Bridgett Williams. Stollings coached for one season at Wright State.

Minnesota (2014–2018) The University of Minnesota hired Stollings to be Minnesota Golden Gophers women's basketball head coach on April 7, 2014. Minnesota went 23–10 (11–7 Big Ten) in Stollings's first season and made the NCAA tournament for the first time since 2009. Stollings finished 82–47 in four seasons at Minnesota. Inheriting a team that went 7–23, Stollings led Texas Tech to a 14–17 record in 2018–19.

USA Today revealed in a story published on August 5, 2020, that 12 players left Texas Tech since Stollings became head coach in 2018 over accusations that Stollings and her staff were verbally abusive and subject players to dangerous forms of conditioning, for instance a requirement for players to have a 90 percent heart rate in practice and games. Texas Tech athletic director Kirby Hocutt verbally heard findings on June 29 from an internal investigation into Stollings but took over a month to take disciplinary action, for which Hocutt said on August 7: "Have we let these girls down? We have," and "While we were aware of the concerns the young women brought forward after the first season, we were not aware of the magnitude to which they had occurred or to the magnitude to which it’d affected the young women in our locker room."

Head coaching record