Debbie’s Day: Ryan set to enter Hall of Fame

The details are a tad fuzzy.
Thirty-plus years can do that to a memory.
For Dan Bonner, however, the intricate details of the conversation were outweighed by the actual message about his young assistant coach.
“It was a long time ago now and I don’t know whether I was told this or I was given the impression that this was the case, but they thought that Debbie Ryan would someday become Virginia’s coach. She just needed some help to get started, and they thought I would be in a better position to set up recruiting and things like that for the program,” Bonner said. “When I first met Debbie, my first impression was, ‘Hell, they don’t need me.’
“She knew exactly what she was doing.”
After replacing Bonner as the head coach at Virginia prior to the 1977-78 season, Ryan proved she “knew” what she was doing. The 675 wins, the 21 seasons of at least 20 victories and 22 NCAA tournament appearances solidify the claim with an exclamation mark.
Today, the sport Ryan has given her life to will pay homage — the 55-year-old and five other pioneers will be officially inducted into the Women’s Basketball Hall of Fame in Knoxville, Tenn. The 10th-anniversary class also includes official Patty Broderick, Central Arizona College coach Lin L. Laursen, former Penn State passing wizard Suzie McConnell-Serio and former Tennessee and Wayland Baptist All-American Jill Rankin Schneider.
The honor itself, one that has been known for almost a year, was not something Ryan pondered over during the past decade.
“I never aspired to be honored like this,” Ryan said. “I aspired to be successful and do the best I could and work as hard as I could for the University of Virginia. I figured if you do those things, good things will happen, but you don’t think about those kinds of things until it happens to you.”
Two people close to Ryan will introduce the coach today during the ceremony. That honor is bestowed to Val Ackerman, the first scholarship player that Ryan recruited at UVa and the current president of USA Basketball, and former Virginia athletic director Gene Corrigan, Ryan’s uncle.
Those that share in the moment, Ryan pointed out, stretch much further.
“From your family to your administrators to the players and the coaches that have worked with you and the fans and everyone in Virginia, they all share in this,” she said. “It is not just about Debbie Ryan. It is about a whole program, a whole school, a whole community, the whole state. Everybody has shared in this in some way shape or form.
“Honestly, all these other people belong in the Hall of Fame with me. I could never have done it alone. I have never even scored a basket for the University of Virginia.”
Entering her 32nd campaign at Virginia, Ryan’s rise to coaching stardom did not come without adversity. In the summer of 2000, she was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer, a deadly disease that she conquered. And in 2004, the Cavaliers stumbled to a 13-16 record, missing the postseason for the first time in over two decades.
At that point, Ryan’s detractors were prevalent.
“It did hurt me. It was hard on me, but you learn who your friends are and who your friends are not,” Ryan said. “People that live in this kind of protection, where everything you do is glaring on the front page of the newspaper and in the media so readily, you just learn that you have to try to do the best you can. Things happen that are out of your control so you just try to control the things you can.
“Obviously, I would never want our school or our team to be seen in a bad light and it is far more important to me that we win than anybody else. I know fans can be rabid and fanatical, but they are no more fanatical than the coach that coaches the team or someone that is in the fight.”
Ryan preserved and has the program on the brink of a resurgence — again. She’s heading up what should be a preseason Top 25 team next season and she and her staff are well ahead of the game on recruiting with several major catches headed to Virginia over the next two years. That has raised expectations for the future.
That, of course, is the only way Ryan would have it.
“Coaches are not going to say, ‘This is good enough’ — It is never good enough,” she said. “People that think that coaches feel that way … there is no way. I work as hard as anybody else and we are playing as hard as anybody else to be the best. Every coach that has ever coached this game realizes there is no end to excellence.
“I am just glad that I have the chance to continue. That is a great opportunity and I am just proud that I can do this and coach another day.”
Now, Ryan will do so as a Hall of Famer.
And Bonner, an acclaimed color analyst, can watch, offer a hearty chuckle and pat himself on the back.
“I can tell people now that I used to be the head coach of the Virginia women’s basketball
program and Debbie Ryan was my assistant coach, and people are very, very impressed and it has nothing to do with what I did,” he said. “It has to do with what Debbie did so it has been a real pleasure to watch what she has done. She has made me look very, very good.”