Former Lady Cajuns coach Jim Izard, gone at 57

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Jim Izard coached the Lady Cajuns for one season 1982-83 finishing with an 18-10 record

Jim Izard, who led the Berry College women’s basketball team to the NAIA National Tournament in 2003, died at his home in Rosemary Beach, Fla., Tuesday morning at the age of 57. Izard, who was Indiana University’s all-time winningest coach, served as the Lady Vikings head coach from 2001 until January of 2005 when he suddenly resigned during the middle of the season. He left Berry, where he earned his 400th career win, with an 81-80 record. Izard went 11-22 during a rebuilding year in his first season at Berry. The following season, he led the Lady Vikings to a 23-12 record and a trip to the NAIA national tournament. In 2004, Berry was 22-12, and narrowly missed earning a berth to the national tourney. Before coming to Berry, Izard won 188 games as head women’s coach during 12 seasons at Indiana, setting a record for most wins by a women’s coach in school history. Izard led Indiana to the NCAA Tournament in 1994 and 1995, was the NIT runner-up in 1992 and helped the Lady Hoosiers to the NIT Final Four in 1998. Before coaching at Indiana, Izard coached at DePaul University in Chicago, the University of Southwestern Louisiana (now Louisiana-Lafayette) and Livingston (now West Alabama University). His career record stands at 416-263. The rest of the story Jim O’Hara Rome News-Tribune

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Jim Izard, the coach who put a winning stamp on Louisiana's Ragin' Cajuns women's basketball before moving on to successful stops elsewhere, died Tuesday at age 57 at his home in Santa Rosa Beach, Fla. Izard came to UL in 1982, taking over a program that was 5-23 the previous campaign, and led the Cajuns to an 18-10 record and a runner-up finish in the Southland Conference. That was Izard's only season with the Cajuns. Ross Cook arrived the next year and posted a 22-6 mark. Their combined 40 wins in two years was the best two-year showing in school history until the current Cajun women equalled it with 22-9 and 18-9 records the last two seasons under coach J. Kelley Hall. Ironically, Hall was a close friend of Izard's. "We became friends when he was at Indiana and I was coaching at Auburn," said Hall, who is preparing his squad for a Sun Belt Conference Tournament game on Saturday against tournament host Middle Tennessee. "We took vacations together and were close." The rest of the story Bruce Brown bbrown@theadvertiser.com