When Mia Smith won her 500th game as Illinois Wesleyan women’s basketball coach earlier this season, she had supportive family members in the Shirk Center crowd. Among them were her 82-year-old mother, Sandy Smith, and 100-year-old grandmother, Philena Steele.
To her mother, every Titan player is “Babe,” as in “Come on Babe. You can do it.” She’s been that way with every team her daughter has played on or coached. They’re all her “Babe.”
Meanwhile, grandma lends support in another way.
“There are moments when I know she prays for me,” Smith said.
The Titans’ 27th-year head coach holds them both dear and shares their commitment to family. She embraces it, embodies it.
So does her team. Smith makes sure of it.
That’s what sets her apart.
Yes, her 511-207 record is stellar. So are IWU’s 10 conference championships, 13 NCAA Division III Tournament berths and the 2012 national championship under her watch. This year’s team is 14-0 and ranked No. 2 nationally.
The numbers separate her from most, but she’s not the only coach to win big. She’s just the first to do it while fist-bumping fans during warmups and sending players into the stands for hugs just prior to tipoff.
Go to a game and you’ll see Smith roaming the crowd as the pregame music blares, exchanging fist bumps with longtime Titan fans and first-timers alike.
“I just want everybody to know how much we appreciate their support because they are a part of our success,” Smith said. “I hope everybody in the community realizes that. We can hear the crowd roar behind us when we get a turnover in our run-and-jump press and turn it into points. We can feel that.”
Four minutes before tipoff, the Titans leave the court. Two minutes later, they return and players climb through the stands to hug their parents, grandparents, friends … whoever is there to watch them play. If a player has no one in attendance, another player’s parents give her a hug.
A game awaits, sometimes a very big game. But family comes first.
“I was one of those girls (as a player) who before the game if my parents weren’t there, I was constantly looking in the stands,” Smith said. “I want the girls to know that their families are there. They don’t get to see them very often. Whenever they come to the games, I think that’s a moment where you should go tell your parents, ‘Hey, thanks Mom and Dad for coming. I love you.’ ”
The Titans do it every time they suit up, whether it’s an early season exhibition or the national championship game.
Officials routinely comment on how unique it is. So do opposing fans. Rival coaches have told Smith they’d like to start doing it, but can’t because “it’s the Illinois Wesleyan way,” she said.
Brian Ehresman learned that a few years ago when his sister, Rebekah Ehresman, played for the Titans. The first time he went to watch her, Rebekah came into the stands and hugged him.
“I said, ‘What are you doing?’ ” he said. “I’d never seen it before. I was like, ‘This is kind of cool though.’ ”
He’s a big fan now. In his fourth year as an assistant coach under Smith, Ehresman makes a point to talk about the pregame family hugs with recruits.
It is a selling point as the staff seeks to “talk about things that are unique to us,” he said. “I think when you can hug your family or your friend’s family, it just kind of refocuses that, ‘Life’s OK no matter what happens in this game. People are behind us.’ ”
Senior standout Lauren Huber, an honorable mention All-American last season, considers the pregame hugs part of Smith’s “core principles of family, tradition and representing not only our program, but our university.”
“That’s shown through all four years when we were more losses than wins and now when we don’t have a loss on the season,” Huber added. “It’s always been the same.
“When coach’s grandma comes to the game, I go and hug her. We’re hugging our teammates’ parents. That just shows you how we truly embody family on our team. That’s because Coach Smith allows us to do that. She’s not worried that we’re not in the zone or ready to compete, but that we are motivated by our family.”
Senior Kate Palmer recently surpassed 1,000 points in her IWU career, with every point coming after sharing a moment with family in the pregame.
She has found the ritual “relieves the nerves a little bit,” adding, “Going to see your loved ones and your family, it’s very special.”
Special is a word being used frequently regarding the current team. Smith believes it’s fitting.
She considers this her best team since the 2012 national champs, calling it “one of the easiest teams to coach” in her career.
She loves how her players “absorb scouting and prep reports” and are willing to do anything asked of them in practice and games.
“They do it with such excitement,” she said.
Their parents have been unique as well, Smith said. They enjoy time together during games and often meet at restaurants prior to or after games.
“We like to use the word joy with this season and that’s the way it’s been,” Smith said.
The campaign has been less stressful for Smith than in 2012. She battled breast cancer during that championship season, experiencing a full gamut of emotions.
She credits prayers from the community for aiding in her healing and recovery. Basketball also helped lift her, with the squeaking of shoes on the gym floor brightening her most difficult days.
The focus now, as it was then, is to make the Titans the best they can be. A big part is the sense of family and, Palmer said, “having fun each day and getting better at something every day.”
There’s also this: when need be, Smith can coach her team hard. She is committed to playing the game the right way, especially on defense. A four-time Defensive Player of the Year at SIU Edwardsville, she values hard work and precision.
“This team, we give them a couple of opportunities and if it’s not corrected, we kind of lay the hammer down,” Smith said. “They’re pretty good at accepting the hammers. We can be pretty forceful at times with our words and the things that we need them to accept and try to change.”
Tough love? Maybe, but never one without the other.
“She gets the most out of her players. She’s hard on them, but they love her,” IWU athletic director Mike Wagner said. “She earns the right to be able to coach her team hard because she cares so much about them.”
“I tell them all the time, ‘Hey, love ya,’ ” Smith said. “My assistant coaches are about that, too.”
She calls the connection “incredibly special.” The same could be said of fist-bumping fans and pregame parental hugs. They are innovative, unique.
They set her apart.
