Robin Selvig Position: Head Coach

Coach successfully for long enough and you become synonymous with your school. That's been the case with Montana coach Robin Selvig, who begins his 34th season with the Lady Griz in 2011-12. Born and raised in Montana, Selvig is entering his 39th year at UM as either a player or a coach at his alma mater.

Selvig IS Montana.

His coaching career has been characterized not only by longevity and loyalty but also the sustained success of the Lady Griz program.

In 33 seasons, Selvig has coached Montana to a record of 758-233 (.765), an average of nearly 23 wins per season.

During that time, the Lady Griz have had 31 winning and 27 20-win seasons, won 22 regular-season conference championships and advanced to 19 NCAA tournaments.

Selvig enters the season ranked seventh among active Division I coaches in victories and eighth in winning percentage.

In victories he only ranks behind some of the most recognizable names in the sport: Tennessee's Pat Summitt (1,071 wins entering the season), Rutgers' C. Vivian Stringer (863), North Carolina's Sylvia Hatchell (859), Stanford's Tara VanDerveer (826), Georgia's Andy Landers (773) and Connecticut's Geno Auriemma (771).

His 27 20-win seasons at Montana is a feat surpassed only by Summitt (35), Stringer (31) and former Texas coach Jody Conradt (29) in women's Division I history.

Only Summitt and Selvig have done it all at the same school. Only Selvig has done it at his alma mater.

When Montana defeated Illinois in November 2008, Selvig reached career victory No. 700. By winning his 700th game in just 899 games coached, Selvig (at the time) matched Conradt as the fifth-fastest coach in NCAA Division I men's or women's basketball history to reach 700 victories.

The 2011-12 season will be Selvig's 38th year of affiliation with University of Montana athletics. He was a four-year member of the Grizzly basketball team (1970-71 to 1973-74), coached the men's freshman team in 1974-75 and was named UM's women's basketball coach in the summer of 1978, following a three-year stint coaching high school girls' basketball in Plentywood, Mont.

He has coached one Kodak All-American, 12 conference MVPs, 82 all-conference performers and 122 academic all-conference selections.

When he was hired in 1978, Selvig inherited a program that had gone 11-27 the two seasons prior to his arrival. His first team (1978-79) finished .500 (13-13), his second team (1979-80) won 19 games and his third team (1980-81) went 22-8 and won the program's first conference championship.

The success has continued with little interruption for over three-plus decades.

Montana's success has been achieved with remarkable consistency and has been accomplished with similar traits year after year: stifling team defense, nationally-recognized home crowd support that has resulted in an incredible home-court advantage and remarkable year-in and year-out league performance.

Team Defense

Seven different Montana teams have led the nation in a defensive category. The trend started early in Selvig's career, when his fourth team, in 1981-82, led the country in points allowed (53.3/g). Four more times the Lady Griz would lead the nation in scoring defense. Twice they have ranked first in field goal percentage defense.

Montana led the Big Sky Conference in 2010-11 in scoring defense at 59.9 points per game. It marked the seventh time in the last 10 seasons that the Lady Griz have allowed fewer than 60 points per game in a season.

Home Support

Prior to Selvig's first year, Montana women's basketball games were attended by an average of fewer than 200 fans per game. Soon the Lady Griz, who have relied primarily on Montana-raised talent, became an attraction that only a handful of programs in the nation can match for consistency.

By 1982-83 Montana had cracked the 1,000 mark for average attendance. Just five years later, in 1987-88, the average had increased to 3,119 fans per game, which ranked sixth nationally, and the fans have continued flooding into Dahlberg Arena.

Montana averaged a program-high 5,235 fans per game in 1994-95.

The Lady Griz ranked 40th nationally last winter with an average attendance of 3,024.

That support has made Dahlberg Arena one of the toughest places to play in America. Montana has gone 450-55 (.891) in home games under Selvig, with a sparkling 441-49 (.900) record at Dahlberg Arena. Only Tennessee, Connecticut and Louisiana Tech enjoy more of a home-court edge.

The Lady Griz have had eight perfect seasons at home under Selvig -- from a 16-0 performance in 1982-83 to a 17-0 record in 2007-08 -- with 10 more seasons with just a single home-court loss.

Conference Dominance

Montana's success in league play (first the Northwest Women's Basketball League, then the Mountain West Conference and now the Big Sky Conference) under Selvig came about immediately and hasn't slowed down.

He took a team that went 4-19 in league play in 1977 and '78 and turned it into a second-place finisher in the NWBL with his first team in 1978-79.

Selvig's first 20 teams would finish either first or second in their conferences. Through his first 33 years, Selvig's teams have had only four seasons when they haven't won a regular-season championship or finished runner-up. In two of those three "off" years, the Lady Griz finished third.

Montana has gone 404-78 in league play under Selvig, a .838 winning percentage.

Grizzly in His Blood

While Selvig is entering his 33rd season as coach of the Lady Griz, his association with the University goes back to the fall of 1970, when the Outlook, Mont., native matriculated at UM as a student-athlete.

Selvig was a four-year member of the Grizzly basketball team, earning second-team All-Big Sky honors as a senior. In his final year of competition he was awarded the John Eaheart Award as the team's top defensive player and the Grizzly Cup, an annual award given to the Department of Athletics' best all-around athlete, scholar and person.

Selvig played his final three years for former Griz and Michigan State coach Jud Heathcote. Montana went 19-8 Selvig's senior season, tying for the Big Sky Conference regular-season title with an 11-3 league record.

Selvig graduated in the spring of 1974 with a degree in health and physical education.

After coaching the Montana men's freshman team to a 10-8 record in 1974-75, Selvig took over the girls' basketball program at Plentywood High, where he totaled a 38-24 record over three seasons.

Selvig was hired by UM Director of Athletics Harley Lewis June 6, 1978, taking over a team that had gone 7-13 the previous season under Eddye McClure.

Selvig's first Montana team finished 13-13 and in second place in the NWBL Mountain Division and, in a sign of things to come, led the league in scoring defense.

Montana's modest improvement to .500 in Selvig's first year blossomed into a stretch of success that rivals any team's in the country.

After going 19-10 in 1979-80, Montana went 22-8 in 1980-81 and won the program's first league title. Those years started a string of 19 consecutive winning seasons and 18 straight 20-win seasons.

Montana made its first of 23 national tournament appearances in 1981-82, losing a tight 57-52 decision to Wayland Baptist in the opening round of the AIAW national tournament in Berkeley, Calif.

After coaching Montana in the NWBL for four seasons, Selvig and the Lady Griz moved to the Mountain West Conference in 1982-83. Montana dominated that league for six seasons, going 78-6 in conference play, winning five regular-season league titles and four postseason conference championships and earning four NCAA tournament trips.

In 1982-83 Montana made its first trip to the NCAA tournament, losing at Louisiana-Monroe, 72-53.

In 1983-84 the No. 4 seed Lady Griz had a breakthrough victory when they won their first NCAA tournament game, a 56-47 home-court victory over No. 5 Oregon State.

Starting in 1987-88, Selvig would take Montana to the NCAA tournament 10 of the next 11 seasons.

When the Lady Griz began Big Sky Conference play in 1988-89, the success they had in the NWBL and MWC did not stop. Montana won the first three Big Sky Conference women's basketball titles with perfect 16-0 marks.

The team has gone 293-57 (.837) in Big Sky play, winning 15 regular-season conference titles in 22 seasons.

Selvig has been recognized often for his coaching. He won his first conference coach of the year award after the 1981-82 NWBL season. Eighteen more league accolades have followed, with five Mountain West and 13 Big Sky Conference coach of the year awards.

Selvig has also been named the Women's Basketball Coaches Association (WBCA) District VII Coach of the Year nine times.

Following the 1990-91 season, Selvig was one of three finalists for national coach of the year honors.

He was inducted into the Grizzly Basketball Hall of Fame in February 1983 and the Grizzly Sports Hall of Fame in 2001.

An influential member of the Missoula community, Selvig has served as the director of the Montana Special Olympics and as a spokesman for Missoula Youth Homes and is the chairman of the 2011 Missoula Heart Walk.

A native of Outlook, Mont., Selvig came from a family of eight children. His brother, Doug, and sister, Sandy, were both University of Montana basketball letterwinners.

Selvig and his wife, Janie, have two adult sons. Jeff and wife Mariana live in Los Angeles. Dan is attending University of Michigan Medical School in Ann Arbor.

Selvig year-by-year at Montana

Year: Overall record ... Conference record (finish)
1978-79: 13-13 ... 5-6 (2nd)
1979-80: 19-10 ... 7-6 (2nd)
1980-81: 22-8 ... 9-3 (1st)
1981-82: 22-5 ... 12-0 (1st) #
1982-83: 26-4 ... 13-1 (1st) !
1983-84: 26-4 ... 14-0 (1st) !
1984-85: 22-10 ... 11-3 (t-2nd) $
1985-86: 27-4 ... 13-1 (1st) !
1986-87: 26-5 ... 12-0 (1st) $
1987-88: 28-2 ... 15-1 (1st) !
1988-89: 27-4 ... 16-0 (1st) !
1989-90: 27-3 ... 16-0 (1st) !
1990-91: 26-4 ... 16-0 (1st) !
1991-92: 23-7 ... 13-3 (2nd) !
1992-93: 23-5 ... 13-1 (t-1st)
1993-94: 25-5 ... 12-2 (t-1st) !
1994-95: 26-7 ... 12-2 (1st) !
1995-96: 24-5 ... 13-1 (1st) !
1996-97: 25-4 ... 16-0 (1st) !
1997-98: 24-6 ... 15-1 (t-1st) !
1998-99: 12-16 ... 7-9 (t-5th)
1999-00: 22-8 ... 13-3 (1st) !
2000-01: 21-9 ... 11-5 (t-2nd)
2001-02: 19-10 ... 10-4 (t-3rd)
2002-03: 20-10 ... 10-4 (3rd) $
2003-04: 27-5 ... 14-0 (1st) !
2004-05: 22-8 ... 13-1 (1st) !
2005-06: 21-7 ... 10-4 (2nd)
2006-07: 27-4 ... 15-1 (1st) $
2007-08: 25-7 ... 13-3 (1st) !
2008-09: 28-5 ... 15-1 (1st) !
2009-10: 15-14 ... 10-6 (t-2nd)
2010-11: 18-15 ... 10-6 (4th) !

# ... AIAW tournament
$ ... WNIT
! ... NCAA tournament