We all come across people who seem too good to be true.
They’re successful in their careers. Their family life seems idyllic. They even make you feel better about yourself when you’re around them. How can one person have all that going for them? So you do your research and find out they’re all that…and more. Nobody is perfect, but people in this category come pretty close.
One of those people for me was Larry Holley. We lost Larry two years ago yesterday. That still hurts.
Holley was the head men’s basketball coach at William Jewell College in Liberty, Mo., from 1979-2019. I had the opportunity to meet him when he reached out to me to help him with his autobiography (larryholleybook.com). He was an excellent storyteller and he wanted my help in putting those stories together in a book.
I felt honored that a man so accomplished would trust me with his story. It was a long process with a few hurdles, but he took my counsel well. Especially when I used basketball analogies.
Holley was an outstanding student-athlete at William Jewell in the early 1960s. He excelled in basketball, as well as in track and cross country. He and backcourt mate Homer Drew talked about their futures, deciding between ministry and coaching.
After graduating from Jewell, Holley coached in the high school ranks before embarking on a college coaching career, culminating in a return to his alma mater.
His career coaching record was 918-579. But he was about way more than those 918 wins. He was about the people in his life who helped him accomplish so much. He was about the stars, but he was also about the eighth man who rarely saw the court on game day.
Working on his book, he and I became friends, and that was because of him. He never big-timed me, even though he had the credentials to do so. I looked forward to our frequent conversations, because I always ended them feeling better than when they started.
Holley died very suddenly before the book was completed. His stories were written; I just had to polish them up. As much as I learned during the two years I knew him, I learned even more about him when I went to his memorial service.
The place was packed with family, friends, and former players and coaches. Those lines were gray, as many people from his basketball families had become part of his personal family. I was moved to see how many men stood up when one of his former players asked anyone who had played for him to stand.
I’ve never been to a more uplifting memorial service, as one person after another talked about the impact he had on their lives. They didn’t talk about the wins. They talked about the fact that he cared. They talked about the fact that he attended their kids’ games and arranged team Zoom calls.
They talked about how real he was. He definitely was not too good to be true.
I left the memorial service feeling like I knew enough about him that I could do a better job with his book. I knew I’d fall short, but I could hear him say that my effort would be enough. You see, Larry Holley knew he was not perfect, and he did not expect others to be perfect. He just wanted you to provide your best effort, because he certainly would.
In a way, he reminded me of another very successful men’s college basketball coach I had the privilege to know: another amazing man, named John Wooden. Wooden won 10 NCAA Division I national championships in 12 years, double the number of national crowns of any other coach in Division I history.
But Wooden was about way more than hoops. He was about building men. With that in mind, he had the nerve to kick off the two-time defending national player of the year for not following team rules. More than 50 years later, that player—Bill Walton—credits Wooden with making him a better man.
Holley never coached the NCAA Division I national player of the year. He probably never kicked his best player off the team. But I’m sure he would have if that would have made the young man a better man.
Holley knew what was important, and throwing a ball through a hoop was way down the priority list. He would have been too good to be true, except for the fact that his story is all true.
I’m better off for having known Larry Holley.