Former TCU basketball coach Billy Tubbs is in hospice care
One of the most colorful, successful, and funniest men in the history of college basketball is struggling right now, and Billy Tubbs and his family could use a prayer or two.
The man who coached the Oklahoma Sooners to the NCAA title game in 1988, and made TCU basketball nationally relevant, is 85 and has entered hospice care in a facility near Lake Texoma, which borders Oklahoma and Texas.
Former TCU staffers became aware of the situation on Thursday when Tubbs’ son, Tommy, let people know about his father’s condition.
Tubbs coached TCU from 1994 to 2002, during which time he led the Frogs to four 20-win seasons and the 1998 NCAA Tournament, which came in a season where the Frogs were undefeated in conference play.
For a brief period under Tubbs, TCU’s athletic identity was men’s basketball. Tubbs made the program relevant. His teams would finish near the top in scoring every year, and the football team was just that bad.
He had players such as Kurt Thomas and Lee Nailon, both of whom were among the nation’s leading scorers under Tubbs, and both went to play in the NBA.
Tubbs resigned from TCU in 2002, and coached Lamar from 2003 to 2006, where he also served as athletic director and led that department’s effort to bring its football program back.
With his unmistakable southern twang that sounded as if his vocal cords could snap on every consonant, Tubbs’ left his mark on college basketball during the 80s when the sport featured four-year players, and an endless list of entertaining coaches.
Tubbs’ era included men like Bob Knight, Lou Carnesecca, Jim Valvano, Norm Stewart, Johnny Ore, Bill Freider, Lute Olson, Larry Brown, Dean Smith, John Thompson, Roy Williams, John Thompson, Eddie Sutton, Nolan Richardson, Jerry Tarkanian, Gene Keady, Tom Penders, just to name a few.
Standing out in this era among these men was not easy, but everybody knew who you meant when you said, “Bill-ee.”
Between Tubbs’ twang, unfiltered mouth, and the style of uptempo basketball he coached, he created an identity in college basketball at places known more for football. His teams stepped on throats, and 100 points was the goal.
Tubbs’ Oklahoma teams actually made noise at a time when Sooners’ football was rolling under coach Barry Switzer.
At Oklahoma, Tubbs had future NBA players such as Harvey Grant, Wayman Tisdale, Mookie Blaylock and Stacy King. In 1988, Tubbs had the Sooners in the NCAA title game with a loaded roster.
Grant, Blaylock and King were on that team, and were the heavy favorite to beat Larry Brown’s Kansas Jayhawks. But Danny Manning led Kansas to a four-point upset win, and Tubbs never reached the title game again.
Tubbs coached at OU from 1980 to 1994.
He left Norman for Fort Worth, where for a few years he gave a struggling athletic department a morale boost when the school was left out of breakup of the Southwest Conference to the Big 12.
As a head coach, Billy Tubbs was not for everybody. He ruffled more feathers than a chicken farmer.
Feisty is one way to describe Tubbs. Particular is another.
If given some latitude, Billy was tremendously entertaining, and made no apologies for who he was.
His impact in college basketball is as unmistakable as it is permanent.
This story was originally published October 30, 2020 at 5:00 AM.
