🏀 Small-College Coach Garth Pleasant Never Made Excuses — And He Became A Legend 🔌
Weekend Plug-in 🔌
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ANN ARBOR, Mich. — When a legend invites you to the Big House, you go.
That’s how I came to join 110,250 fans at Michigan Stadium — the largest in the United States — for last Saturday’s game between the defending national champion Wolverines and visiting Arkansas State.
I sat beside Garth Pleasant, the longtime basketball coach and preacher featured in the documentary “COACH: Make the Big Time Where You’re At.”
I made the 1,000-mile journey from my home in Oklahoma — where I usually cheer for the Sooners — after Pleasant told me he had an extra ticket.
“Is it a date?” Pleasant asked in an email, punctuating his question with two smiley face emojis.
Given the distance, I brushed off the idea at first.
But then I wondered to myself: How could I turn down such an opportunity — not only to experience all that maize and blue once in my lifetime but also to spend time with Pleasant?
So I booked a flight to Detroit.
The Michigan native, now 75, won 720 games and four small-college national championships in 38 seasons at Rochester Christian University, north of Detroit.
The most incredible aspect of his success: His teams practiced in a cramped gymnasium on campus with a splintering plywood floor. They played their “home” games in borrowed facilities.
But the Rochester Warriors never made excuses for their circumstances.
“We’d play our home games at high schools, and for our level, we were the best team in the country two out of four years that I played here,” Jon Horst, one of Pleasant’s former players and now the general manager for the NBA’s Milwaukee Bucks, said in the documentary. “The weird thing is, you never thought about it … and I think it’s because we won.”
Pleasant wasn’t just the coach. He was the team’s trainer. And the bus driver.
“These kids, their middle school gyms were better than what we had,” Pleasant recalled on our drive to the football game. “So it was hard to recruit. But I always said, ‘I don’t apologize for anything we don’t have.’”
When Pleasant stepped down as coach in 2011, his son Klint, who previously led the Abilene Christian University basketball program in Texas, succeeded him. Between them, the father and son have compiled 1,022 wins.
Since 2017, Rochester Christian has played in its own shiny digs: The aptly named Garth Pleasant Arena can seat 1,000 fans.
Garth Pleasant still works with the Rochester Christian sports program. He organizes athletics chapels and town halls on subjects such as sports gambling and NIL (name, image and likeness) deals for college athletes.
Don Clemons, a retired 27-year assistant coach for the Detroit Lions, spoke at one of the recent town halls.
He’s one of thousands of people — students, coaches and fellow Christians — influenced by Pleasant.
Garth Pleasant talks to athletes and sports management students during a town hall discussion at Rochester Christian University in Rochester Hills, Michigan. (Photo provided by university)
I contacted Clemons to talk about his friend.
“I have to tell you, you had my interest right away because I used to work for Bobby Ross,” Clemons told me, referring to the Lions’ head coach from 1997 to 2000.
I’m not related to the retired coach, but I’m glad our common name helped me make the connection.
Turning to the reason for my call, I mentioned that my interactions with Pleasant always leave me feeling so encouraged — as if I’m his best friend and the most amazing person in the world.
“That’s who he is,” Clemons replied. “He makes everybody feel like they’re the center (of the universe). … He sincerely listens to you and talks to you, not at you. I realized that from the beginning.”
So did I. I first met Pleasant about 13 years ago while on a reporting trip to Michigan.
For decades, he mixed coaching during the week with preaching on Sundays.
“His faith is real,” Clemons said. “I mean, there is no cynicism at all in any part of his body. He’s just a good person. He’s just your friend, and he’s a willing participant in your life.”
Bobby Ross Jr. poses for a photo with Garth Pleasant before the Michigan Wolverines hosted the Arkansas State Red Wolves. (Photo by Klint Pleasant)
Pleasant still fills the pulpit every Sunday at the Horton Road Church of Christ in Jackson, Michigan.
But he doesn’t limit his preaching to the Lord’s Day.
At the NIL town hall, he couldn’t resist taking a moment to urge Rochester Christian’s athletes to focus on finishing their degrees.
“It’s hard. It’s supposed to be hard,” Pleasant told students. “If it wasn’t hard, everybody could do it.
“I’m closer to 80 than I am 70 now, OK?” he added. “It’s my 53rd year here. I love this place. This has been my ministry. This is how I have served God every day, OK?
“I’ve got a degree, and because of that degree, I’ve been able to be with young people like you and coach young people. Man, get your degree!”
Later during the event, he emphasized the importance of strong character and teamwork.
“I would not tolerate bad character,” he told the students. “We left everywhere we went cleaner than when we got there. If we had to borrow towels for the shower at an away game, they had to lay them out nice, and my captains had to write a thank-you note to put on the towels.
“And I wanted every McDonald’s to say, ‘This is the politest group of kids we ever had.’”
Known for his humility, Pleasant was hesitant when approached about the documentary, especially after the construction of his namesake arena.
But he relented when told that the focus on him could help raise money to build an outdoor athletic complex at Rochester Christian.
The “Game Changer” campaign seeks $8 million. Donations so far exceed $1.5 million.
“Our softball team, our soccer teams, our lacrosse teams — they have to go off site to practice and play their games,” Garth Pleasant said, explaining his thought process. “So I said, ‘Well, if it’ll help the school, OK.’”
On the Friday night before the Michigan game, I joined Garth and Klint Pleasant as well as Randy Harris, a retired Abilene Christian theology professor who spoke in the athletics chapel that morning, at Comerica Park.
Bobby Ross Jr., Garth Pleasant, Klint Pleasant and Randy Harris attend a Detroit Tigers game at Comerica Park. (Photo provided by Ross)
We saw the Detroit Tigers defeat the Baltimore Orioles, 1-0. A team of Tigers pitchers nearly no-hit the Orioles, giving up a triple with two outs in the ninth to Baltimore’s Gunnar Henderson.
The next day, Garth Pleasant bought treats at Knapp’s Doughnuts, a local favorite, to share on our 70-mile journey from Rochester Christian to Michigan Stadium.
Inside the stadium, he greeted everyone he met — from the parking attendants to the security personnel — as if he had known them his entire life.
That’s just the way he is.
Hearing tens of thousands of Michigan fans yell “Go Blue!” was an amazing experience, even for an out-of-state visitor more accustomed to Oklahoma’s crimson and cream. The 17th-ranked Wolverines beat the underdog Red Wolves, 28-18, a score much closer than the home fans would have preferred.
But for me, the best part was visiting with Pleasant and soaking in all his stories.
“As a coach, I wanted to win, and I studied coaches who won who shouldn’t have won,” he told me.
He didn’t sweat the small stuff.
“If our floor warped, Bobby, they’d cut it out," he said with a chuckle. "They’d go to Home Depot, get some plywood and put it down. OK, it's fine.”
There’s nothing, in Pleasant’s view, that a whole lot of faith and hard work — and a little bit of plywood — can’t fix.
He is a special person.
He is a legend.
And when he invites you to the Big House, you go.
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Happy Friday, everyone! Enjoy the weekend.
Bobby Ross Jr. writes the Weekend Plug-in column for Religion Unplugged and serves as editor-in-chief of The Christian Chronicle. A former religion writer for The Associated Press and The Oklahoman, Ross has reported from all 50 states and 18 nations. He has covered religion since 1999.