Former women's head basketball coach, Dan Lumpkin, has resigned his position to accept a new role at Liberty University.
Lumpkin took over as Cleveland State's head women's basketball coach in September of 1997. In 19 seasons, Dan accrued an overall record of 337-226, which is the most wins for any Cleveland State basketball coach, men or women. In the 2010-2011 season, Lumpkin led the Lady Cougars to top ten ranking in the NJCAA Division I, landing at #7. During Dan's career, he led Cleveland State to back to back 2nd place finishes in the TCCAA Conference and NJCAA Region, District tournaments from 2014-2016. This led to Lumpkin receiving TCCAA/NJCAA Coach of the Year honors in 2016. Overall, Lumpkin has had over 40 players selected to TCCAA All-Conference and NJCAA Region VII All-Region teams while 2 players were selected as NJCAA All-Americans.
Dan also held the position of Region VII Women's Director for the NJCAA, for the past 16 years. He was also a member of the NJCAA Division I Women's Basketball Committee, the Division I Softball Committee, the All-American Selection Committee, and the At-Large Selection Committee for the Women's Basketball Division I National Tournament. In addition, Lumpkin was the Vice-Chair of the Division I Districting Committee and a member of the TCCAA Executive Committee.
At Liberty, Dan will be accepting the role of Special Assistant to the Head Women's Basketball Coach, which includes player development, video analysis, etc.
Dr. Stokes, Cleveland State's Vice President of Student Affairs commented, "Dan has done a great job leading our women's basketball program for the past 20 years. He has devoted his energy to working with the young women who have come through our program to help them succeed in athletics, in their academic pursuits, and in life. He has a number of former players who have gone on to have successful careers in as variety of professions, including education and coaching. Dan has always represented the college in an excellent manner, and will be missed by all of us at Cleveland State. As much as we are sorry to see him leave us, this move looks like a great opportunity for Dan and his family, and we wish him well in his new position."
Cleveland State Athletic Director, Mike Policastro, also added, "I would like to thank Coach Lumpkin on his 20 years at Cleveland State leading the women's basketball program. He is an outstanding coach who was invested in the overall development of his student-athletes. His teams were always well prepared and always played hard. We wish him and Kelly the best of luck as they begin their new positions at Liberty University."
On what he'll miss the most about Cleveland State, Dan Lumpkin said, "I enjoyed my time at Cleveland State and will definitely miss being there each day. I will miss the people most. It is definitely the people that make a place great and Cleveland State has great people! I'm thankful for all of the young ladies who played on my teams over the past 20 years and I hope I was able to impact their lives in a positive way. We had been talking about hosting a twenty-year Women's Basketball reunion during this coming season and I'm hopeful that we may still be able to do that. I would like to thank all of the faculty and staff as well for their support over the years and I hope Cleveland State has a great 2017-18 school year!"
Cleveland State Athletics would like to congratulate Dan on his new position and to thank him for his 20 years of excellent service.