On a Friday afternoon in March, 2001, Athenas basketball coach Jodie Burton, her team and I had the experience of a lifetime: spending three hours with Coach John Wooden in his small condo in Encino, California. How this marvelous event happened is a story in itself.

In late February of that year the Kravis Leadership Institute had given a leadership award to Coach Wooden (read more). On the day he visited CMC, Coach Wooden asked that each of our coaches choose one or two of their athletes to meet with him for several hours in the afternoon in the Parents Dining Room at the Athenaeum. In typical Coach Wooden fashion, he also requested that no coaches or administrators attend the meeting since he wanted to have an intimate meeting with just our student athletes.

That evening following dinner, Coach Wooden gave a nearly two-hour talk to an awestruck audience of students, faculty, and staff. He had just celebrated his 90th birthday, and although his body was beginning to show the wear and tear of age, his mental agility was still that of a young, active English teacher, which he had been earlier in his career.

As I wrote this article, I started several times to drop the term Coach when referring to John Wooden. Most of the newspaper and magazine journalists have done that in the blizzard of articles about this extraordinary man since his death. I just wasn't able to follow suit.

Although he spent some time talking about his Pyramid of Success, which has become a coach's bible in nearly every sport and at every level of athletics, from little league to Division I, he was most impressive when communicating his first love: the use of the English language. He used no notes during his entire talk, yet never hesitated or paused to recover his thoughts. He recited lengthy poems and paragraphs from books that had shaped his core beliefs. The evening was truly one of magic, although he detested being referred to as the "Wizard of Westwood."

Coach Burton and the Athenas basketball team had missed both the afternoon session and the Athenaeum evening because of their successful season. They had left Claremont early that morning to fly to Minnesota to play in the first round of the NCAA playoffs. Normally I would have been with them, since for several years I served as faculty advisor for the Athenas and traveled with them to games. CMS Director of Athletics Mike Sutton also stayed behind because of the Wooden event, so he and I left the next morning for the play-offs.

Upon our return to campus I decided to see if it was possible to arrange a meeting for Coach Burton and her players with Coach Wooden. An active member of the Parent's Club and a long-time friend of the Wooden family had been instrumental in arranging for Coach Wooden's February visit. I wrote a letter to her explaining the situation and asked if there was any possible way a meeting could be arranged. When she passed the letter on to Coach Wooden, he readily agreed. Initially the plan was to meet for lunch at Coach Wooden's favorite restaurant, but later he decided that it would be easier on him to meet at his condo.

During the drive up in a CMS van, I questioned the players about what they knew of Coach Wooden. Perhaps not surprisingly, most knew very little—after all, an entire generation had flourished since his retirement in 1975. But one thing the players shared in common was their parents' knowledge of and respect for Coach Wooden. They had grown up in an era of massive college basketball arenas, continuous coverage of basketball playoffs, and coaches who were constantly in the news and on the move.

They were surprised to learn that for most of his first 16 years coaching UCLA, he did not have a home court; Pauley Pavilion was not completed until 1965. His first teams played in the on-campus gymnasium, which was smaller than Ducey Gym and seated about 1,000. After several years, when the attendance was rapidly approaching 1,200 for every home game, the fire marshal forced Coach Wooden to play his home games at an away venue. That was the end of playing in what had appropriately become known as the B.O. Barn.

Until Pauley was built, UCLA played at local community colleges, the Pan Pacific Auditorium, and ultimately at the Los Angeles Sports Arena, which was the home court for USC. Coach Wooden won his first national championship while using the Sports Arena as a home court.

Since his recent passing, there have been many articles in the press and on television about how modest this hugely successful college basketball coach was. If anything, the articles have understated this characteristic. His condo was indeed very small and virtually every inch of it was covered or stacked with awards that he, or his teams, had received. Had any of us received any one of these rewards they would have hung on the most prominent wall in our house, yet the humble coach had merely stacked them someplace in his crowded home.

It was obvious that he thoroughly enjoyed the opportunity to share his thoughts, wisdom, and insight with 12 young, female basketball players. I doubt that he had ever done anything similar to this afternoon, although he had always made himself available to participate in school and charitable activities. He was most proud of sharing with us the many poems, letters, and songs that his players and family had sent to him. As he sat in his favorite easy chair reading poems from one of his great-grandchildren or a former player, it was hard to imagine that this grandfatherly figure could be a stern taskmaster when it came to coaching his basketball team. Few of our conversations concerned basketball, as he was more eager to share his more personal values.

At one point in the afternoon, he reached into his pocket and produced a small metal cross his pastor had given him before he went into the Navy during World War II. As the cross was passed around the room, Coach Wooden explained how it was always in his pocket and helped him remain composed when events both on and off the court weren't going well. He had been known for his on-court restraint, seldom getting up from his chair during the action. But what many didn't realize was that in the moments he felt on the verge of losing self-control, his hand discreetly grasped the cross inside his pocket, while his other often visibly clutched a rolled-up program. It was obvious this was a lesson he hoped his attentive listeners would always remember.

Coach Wooden has always refused to name his favorite player or team, but I expect that down deep his favorite player was Sven Nader. Sven had the misfortune to come to UCLA at the same time that Bill Walton did. Although both were over 7 feet tall, Sven was always a backup to Bill—for two years! Sven went on to a successful career in the NBA and when Bill was once asked midway through his own very successful NBA career who was the toughest center he had ever played against, he responded "Sven Nader, every day in practice at UCLA."

One might expect that Sven would have held some grudges about such a college career, but Coach Wooden read us four or five poems from a book of probably 100 or more that Sven had written and sent to him. He also played several songs that Sven had recorded to honor Coach Wooden. Some were original, but many merged Sven's lyrics with existing songs. Several were recorded in a professional studio, and it appeared that Sven had sent Coach Wooden at least 20 or 30 such songs.

I also expect his favorite team was his first NCAA Championship team—the 1964-1965 team that had no starter measuring over 6'5," typically went no deeper than six or seven players, yet full-court-pressed the entire game. My wife and I were fortunate enough to watch this team play five or six times at the Los Angeles Sports Arena during its championship season. It is worth noting that it took Coach Wooden 16 years to win his first NCAA championship. In today's world of constant coaching changes when teams don't win championships, that record is almost as impressive as his 10 NCAA basketball championships.

During the visit to his home, I mentioned that Coach Wooden and I had begun our experiences in what was then the Pacific Coast Conference at the same time in 1948, Coach Wooden taking over as UCLA coach and I starting as a freshman student at Washington State. I then added that I could still remember listening to the Pacific Coast Championship play-off games in the B.O. Barn on the radio in 1950, when UCLA beat Washington State two out of three by hitting a game-winning shot on their side of the center court as time expired. Without hesitating, Coach Wooden responded that "it was not two out of three, we won the first two." I then realized that he could probably tell you the score of every game he ever coached, and probably the stats for his own players as well as those on the opposing team.

Later in the afternoon he welcomed us to tour any room of his condo and look at the memorabilia he'd collected over the years. A Los Angeles Times sportswriter recently wrote that Coach Wooden's den should be made a museum and enshrined at either Pauley Pavilion or the Smithsonian. We probably spent 30 minutes just looking at the items in that one room. Coach Wooden had frequently stated that baseball was his favorite game, and sure enough, one of his collections was approximately 100 signed baseballs—stacked in the form of a pyramid, of course. I hesitated to take the pyramid apart to see all of the famous signatures but it was easy to spot Koufax, Drysdale, Rose, Wills, DiMaggio, Ford, Mantle, Berra, Robinson, and many other Hall of Famers.

As the afternoon drew to a close it was obvious that Coach Wooden had thoroughly enjoyed talking to our players. He has often said that he thinks the WNBA is a better league than the NBA because it stresses passing and team-play more than the NBA, which uses isolation plays that emphasize driving the basket and stuffing the ball.

My colleague Professor Ron Riggio, director of the Kravis Leadership Institute at CMC, was seated at the head table with Coach Wooden at the February 2001 Athenaeum dinner. Coach Wooden was telling Ron how he had enjoyed meeting with our student athletes earlier in the day and how much he admired Division III athletes who played for the joy of the game and not for scholarships and potential careers playing professional basketball. At one point he commented to Ron that if he had it to do over again, he might have considered being a Division III coach. What a teacher he would have been!

As we were getting ready to leave, I asked Coach Wooden if he would be kind enough to autograph a copy of his book, They Call Me Coach, which I had brought with me. He graciously agreed. He neatly wrote, "For Jerry—with the best wishes of the ex-teacher/coach, John Wooden."

I believe that it should have been signed "teacher/ex-coach," since long after his accomplishments as a coach have begun to fade, his teachings of love, commitment, honesty, and integrity will endure.