Kim Mulkey Q & A Part 2: "I wish I had the power that people think I do"

Though Kim Mulkey now has won four NCAA championships as a women’s head basketball coach – three at Baylor and the most recent one at LSU – there’s a high degree of difficulty winning one title much less multiple championships.

Her 2005 33-3 national championship team was ranked sixth to start the following 2005-06 season and eventually was eliminated in the Sweet 16.

Her 2012 40-0 title team returned all five starters for the following year in 2012-13 when it was voted the preseason No. 1 in the polls. That team had its season ended in the Sweet 16.

Mulkey’s 37-1 2019 champs began the following season in 2019-20 ranked No. 2 in the preseason polls. It had a 28-2 regular season record and was ranked No. 2 in the AP and No. 1 in the coaches polls when the COVID outbreak cancelled the entire postseason.

Her 34-2 2023 LSU championship team has the challenge in 2023-24 of becoming just the second SEC team (besides Tennessee) to win consecutive national championships.

Part 2 of this 3-part series with Mulkey examines the new challenges she faces in maintaining excellence as the college sports frontier changes with athletes now empowered to make money off their name, likeness and image. She also addresses the advantages of coaching at LSU and why she believes LSU likely needs to build a new arena to replace the half-century ol Pete Maravich Assembly Center.

RH: After winning a national championship which has resulted in a flood of endorsements for your top player Angel Reese, what challenges do you have as a coach in the NIL era?

KM: I do not get involved in NIL. I really don't know what our players have until they give me a gift. If you remember, it was last summer when I assigned Jennifer Roberts, one of our staff members, to become our NIL liaison. We were one of the first to do it in the country.

When I was playing, I was cheap. You couldn't get a meal with donors or even have them buy you a Coke. Now donors who own businesses can come into a partnership or an agreement with an athlete where the donors are basically an athlete's employer..

The collective (boosters earmarking money for NIL use) is institution-based, but these kids and their NILs are things they're doing on their own outside of LSU. They just must report it to our compliance and NIL people.

I just don't want to learn all that. I let Jennifer stay in charge of it.

I don't think it has been a distraction at all in our locker room like `Oh, she does this, she does that.’ Hey, there's opportunity for all of our players. They all have different interests. I'm sure different businesses are attracted to different kids.

I just want to coach. Let's recruit good players. Let's get them degrees. Let's try to play for championships. All the NIL and all the stuff they do on the outside, I have enough coaches on my staff responsible for all that. I don't want to get involved in any of that.

RH: Are there things in place at LSU that you didn’t have at Baylor making it easier to build and maintain a program capable of frequently challenging for national championships?

KM: Well, everything is bigger here. You're trying to compare a 15,000-enrollment private school (Baylor) to a 36,000-enrollment public school (LSU). You're trying to compare two different conferences (Big 12 vs. SEC). I had everything I needed to be successful at Baylor. I have everything I need to be successful at LSU.

There are some differences.

We (LSU) have our own social media department and they're off the charts. They are literally so creative, young, and they're into what they do.

I don't even look at budgets. That's one of my assistant's responsibilities. Just tell me yea or nay if we can or can't afford to do it and how much we have left in the budget.

Growing up in Louisiana, I went to Louisiana Tech because it had the best women's basketball at that time. I didn't realize until I started working at LSU those three letters are a very international brand. There's no mistaking what LSU stands for and it's not just regional. You're the flagship university in the state of Louisiana. And you can go anywhere in the world, wear an LSU shirt and they know that stands for Louisiana State University.

Maybe because I didn’t go to school here or pay much attention to it. I didn't realize how big the brand is. This day and age, brand is what athletes want. They want to improve their brand.

LSU is off the charts in those areas.

RH: On your April 20 visit to the Louisiana legislature for LSU Day honoring you and your team, you pushed for possibly the construction of new arena. Why is that needed at this point?

KM: We've got to do something with the PMAC. It’s 51 years old and it’s dangerous. The rails in there are a safety hazard. We have a lot of older people that come to our games. I’ve told my mother `Don't grab a rail, hold on to somebody.’

Can you win without a nice facility? Well, we've proven that. I proved that at Baylor. But it sure helps in recruiting when you have a nicer state of the art facility.

There are new arenas being built (at other schools). We don't need an 18,000 to 20,000 seat arena. There’s a new thing that I'm learning that institutions are doing. The University of Texas just built a new arena a year ago that probably seats 16,000. But they have screens to block off part of the arena when you only want to fill it for 10,000. There are creative ways to build an arena that's just not wasted space. Facilities are all looking different. I like a little about a lot of them.

I like a permanent court,. You push a button, all the seats retract and I like six goals available every day when we're practicing. I don't like a temporary court in which we’ve got to step up to get on the court. Have mats that cover and protect the court when the arena is used for other events.

I like that old Hoosier basketball feel (inside an arena), but I don't care about what the outside looks like. I want parking for my coaches and my student athletes. It's very important the student athletes don’t have to walk to get to practice or a game.

Our coaches’ offices (which are currently in the athletic administration building several hundred yards from the PMAC) need to be in the arena. I want to be able to sit in my office, talk to Angel Reese, walk down to the court and tell her `Get down here, I want to show you something.’

Everything needs to be in the facility you work. Weight room, locker rooms, offices. All that needs to be where you work.

RH: Do you think winning a national championship gives you more sway to get the legislature to provide funding for a new arena when the governor has prioritized spending funds to build a new campus library?

KM: I wish I had that power. I wish I had the power that people think I do. It's just funny to me. All I want is excellence and I want people around me to want it, too. I just have never been a person that settles for mediocrity. I'm not patient. I want things yesterday and I just know that you need to have things done in a timely manner when you're up. Everything's good right now about LSU athletics.

But I'm also an educator. I graduated summa cum laude, I understand the wants and needs on the other side of campus. Well, let's do it all. Let's do it all.

I understand the academic side and I fully support them. I wish I had the answer for a new library. I wish I had an answer for a new arena, but I'm not a politician. I'm just an old basketball coach. And I want all of us to benefit because we’re LSU. We're all on the same team.

RH: Do you understand the reputation of every decision involving the Louisiana legislature as being extremely political? Everybody seeks allies for their personal agendas.

KM: I grew up here, and I do know the reputation. But I do know Mulkey has never been involved one time with any politician. I don’t have a political bone in my body.

All I'm going to do is fight for where I work. I want people to know I also want us to have a new library. But I can only speak for something I'm really educated about and it's basketball.