SANTA BARBARA, Calif. - UC Santa Barbara Director of Athletics Kelly Barsky welcomed new Gaucho women's basketball head coach Renee Jimenez to Santa Barbara, introducing her on Friday afternoon at a press conference in the Winnie & Lynn Reitnouer Auditorium.

Jimenez, who has a 270-151 career record with seven NCAA Tournament appearances as a head coach. Most recently she led Cal State San Marcos to the NCAA Division II Elite Eight and Final Four after knocking off No. 1 seed Gannon University. Additionally, she was named CCAA Coach of the Year three times. Prior to her years as a head coach she worked at Stanford under legendary head coach Tara VanDerveer helping the Cardinal to a 32-3 record, an NCAA Elite Eight appearance and being crowned the Pac-10 Regular Season and Tournament Champions.
 
Renee Jimenez, Gaucho Women's Basketball Head Coach

Opening Statement…
"It feels so good to be home. What a great day to be a Gaucho!

"I want to thank Chancellor Yang and Kelly Barsky for this incredible opportunity here at UC Santa Barbara. I also want to acknowledge and congratulate Coach Henrickson on such an amazing career and wish her well. I have had the opportunity to chat with her a couple of times through this process and she is such a pro and has been gracious and welcoming. I also want to acknowledge Coach French. I look forward to picking his brain about all the success he has had in his career here at UC Santa Barbara and acknowledge the incredible legacy he has left behind. Lastly, to the women's basketball alumni, I am extremely excited to connect with you all and I feel very honored and humbled to be chosen to lead your program that has such an amazing basketball tradition."

"I would also like to thank my parents and my family for being here today. I'd like to thank my wife Chelsea for all of your support through this, I cannot wait to go on this incredible journey with you. To my favorite little assistant coach, who has been through every program with me, My daughter, Quinn. Buckle up Q, this is going to be a fun ride!

"This is truly a dream come true. Some of you know that I grew up just down the 101 in Ventura.  But I spent a lot of time up here as a kid. I played many AAU games in the historic Rob Gym. My senior year of high school, I won the SB Tournament of Champions in the Thunderdome on my 18th birthday. I cheered on Coach French and his team as they made a run to the Sweet 16 in 2004. There is just so much here on the UCSB campus that feels familiar to me, but there is one situation in particular that quickly made me feel a part of the community here. When I was on campus last week, I got my first parking ticket. So, we will just call that my first "donation" to the university. 

"All of this is amazing, but I would particularly like to acknowledge two groups. 
First, to all of my former players and coaches, thank you for trusting the vision I had for our programs, you never wavered in your loyalty to our process of how everything matters and that winning is in the details. Some of you who had me as a first-time head coach, I know it wasn't "always easy, there was a lot of trial and error, you were there when I was trying to find my identity as a young coach but you allowed me to make mistakes and learn from them, something I will always be grateful for.

"To my most current players at San Marcos, you all have impacted me immeasurably, you have made me a better coach, a more compassionate coach (although it may not seem like that when you turn the ball over or take a bad shot) but most importantly I am a better mom because of all of you. We have had an amazing ride; one I will cherish forever. We have hung banner after banner, put rings on our fingers, but most importantly and my most proud accomplishment, you became incredible keepers of our culture, and we became a family.

"Now, we have a whole new group to bring into the family. Which leads me to you all. You are young, wide-eyed and in a whole new situation that you don't have a lot of control over, but this is about you. This is your program; I am here to guide you and create a vision for us, our Gaucho family.

"In our program, we believe that who we are is why we win, and we win because we trust that everything we do, matters. When we step on the court, our performance will be a reflection of our work, our detailed work. 

"We'll be selfless, appreciative and never take the little things people do for us for granted. We'll give back to a community who has welcomed us with open arms. We will be leaders on this campus. We'll do the work, in the classroom and on the court. We know that to be a great team, we need to care deeply for one another. We'll protect each other fiercely.

"We are workers, competitors and understand that no one will ever be more prepared than us, more disciplined than us, or care more about being good humans and winning championships than us.

"To keep it simple, there will just be a way we do things around here. It'll be our process. We'll go all in on this process and we will be loyal to it because we understand that the good times and our struggles will be part of our 'growth' story.

"All I am going to ask of you is that you trust the process, trust that everything we do will matter and trust that winning is in the details. If we can do this, good things will happen. 

"To the fans, alumni and to the Santa Barbara community, we will wear our Gaucho uniform with pride, we understand it is a privilege for all of us to have this opportunity and we will do all we can do to bring honor to this program. So many people come to work every day for us and we will thank them by how we carry ourselves, we will thank them by our GPA, we will thank them by how hard we hustle and we will thank you with our positive energy and enthusiasm of being a Gaucho. 

"I would like to thank everyone for being here. Today is the first day of something I know will be very special."

Describing her basketball philosophy from an X's and O's standpoint…
"Flora, do you remember? I've got you, don't worry. That's a great first question. I would say, basketball-wise, we're going to defend, we're going to be a defensive team. We are scout heavy, we will not play zone, Coach Pasternak, that is not something we're going to do. We're going to follow your lead on that one. But, we will play a really exciting brand of basketball. I think our toughness on the defensive end, our cerebral-ness that we will bring to the games will be something that our fans will visually be able to see and feel. Offensively, we talked about that a little bit in there also, that's to be determined. You know, I like what's in front of me, I think we have a lot of really good pieces, I'm not a coach that comes in and is going to say this is what we're doing. We're going to kind of work through this together. We're going to try to score a lot of points and keep people from scoring a lot of points, and at the end of the day, if we can do that, we're going to win a lot of basketball games."

On her outlook on roster building in the current era…
"You're talking about the portal? Yeah, let's talk about the portal. You know, it's changed everything, right? It's changed everything, and I think obviously there are some really good things to come out of the portal. You know, it's obviously given student-athletes an opportunity to move on and find places that maybe fit them well. I think when you're asking young women to make decisions at 16 or 17 years old, it's almost unfair, so I think the portal's really given kids an opportunity to go out and find that right fit. I never discredit anyone if that's the decision they want to make, but I also think to build culture, you need young players. You know you're going to need players that are coming out of high school who you can build with, who are going to be in your program for four years. Those are really going to be the culture keepers of your program, and I think you can use the portal to balance those two things out, and we'll do a little bit of both."

On if she had to pick one thing from her coaching experience that will help her most at UC Santa Barbara…
"I want to continue my relationships with the student-athletes. I think that's the most important thing, especially in the day and age we're in. I think if you go back 15 or 20 years, they used to tell them what to do and they just did it. Now, they want to know why. I mean, my own kids do that to me, right? I think so much of it now is the relationships that you build with players, I think if they know that they can trust me, that I always want their best interests, the basketball is kind of going to fall into place. I told these guys it's important to me that they have a good relationship with me and that we're able to communicate openly with each other and have hard conversations, and I also want them to have balance in their life. I think Division II, that's a big piece of why our student-athletes have been really happy. They never felt like it's a job and they never felt like scholarships or jobs are on the line. We made it a very family-oriented atmosphere, and that's what we intend to do here. I want this team to know that they can always depend on me as their coach and us as a staff, that we always have their best interests at hand. You leave one family behind to create another family, but they all really end up blending in together, and like I said, I have former players in the room that have played for me, and I think that says a lot about how much care is there between myself and my student-athletes."

On her plan on making any big or significant changes to the current state of the program…
"No, I don't think so. I think what Coach Henrickson did has been amazing. I am trying to be a great listener. I just gave the student-athletes some homework. I told them to text me the three things that, as a group, you feel like have really worked for you all. That can be basketball, relationships, whatever it is. Just some things we want to build on and make our own. If there weren't smiles in that room today, I would feel much differently. From what Kelly has told me, other staff and Coach Henrickson, they enjoy each other. That is part of the day in age we are in, you have teams that care deeply for each other. If teams care deeply for each other which I think Coach Henrickson's staff has taught these guys to do. The other basketball part really falls into place.

On if she thinks the program can capitalize locally on the explosion in popularity of women's basketball…
"Absolutely. We were watching the draft the other night and my daughter Quinn was like, 'so who on that team would get drafted,' so you guys have some big shoes to fill. My daughter has never watched the draft before. She sat there and watched it, three hours, beginning to end, and was like, 'Nika Mühl's going here, so she's going to be able to guard Caitlin Clark.' That's incredible. And those are things that growing up, we didn't always have. One thing that's really big to me is to really drive that community support in and really bring those young, elementary to middle school girls on campus. We really want to get our camps and clinics going here. I think branding this team is going to be really important, putting people in the seats is going to be really important while getting them around those young players and those camps and clinics. I want them to be able to go out and people know them, and I know they see they're getting a little bit of that now, but I think if you can bring a little bit to that community, especially in a community like Santa Barbara. Santa Barbara County and Ventura County are really going to rally around this group. I cannot tell you how many 805 phone numbers popped up on my cell phone these last few days that I'm like, 'oh yeah, I remember you.' It's just really cool to have that backing behind me, but behind them. You know, everyone's like, 'I want tickets, I want to come to a game,' and if that brings 30 more people to the game, by all means. I'm excited that women's basketball is so hot. I think this is going to be a really fun product for us to put on the floor and for people to see."

On what her ultimate vision/goals are when her tenure is done as the women's basketball head coach at UC Santa Barbara…
"If you ask my 11-year-old, she would say Elite Eight since she just went to one. Which again, we are shooting for the sky there. At the end of the day, you are competing to play in the postseason every year. I think the one thing the NCAA and women's basketball has done really well is giving you opportunities to play in different tournaments. Whether that be the WNIT or WBIT, your goal is to play in the postseason. When I go to recruit and I am recruiting kids right now who want to go Division I, you have the ability to go to Division II and play in the NCAA Tournament. Going to any postseason play at any level is a big deal, it is a great experience. Every year our goal should be to play in the postseason. Kelly and I have talked more specifically about the program but our goal is going to be to make postseason play. Whether that is the NCAA Tournament, the WNIT or the WBIT; our goal is going to get these guys in the postseason and have them play as long as possible. They will hear me say in October, you end your season because you get beat or there are no more games left to play. Regardless of what tournament that is, we want to end our season because we were the champs and there are no more games left to play."

Final Thoughts…
"I am so excited to be here. It is a whirlwind. Flora asked if we start workouts Monday so I am thrilled they are excited. I can't wait to add to Coach Henrickson and Coach French's legacy. Thank you again for being here, both of you, it means a lot."

Kelly Barsky, Director of Athletics

Opening Statement…
"Thank you all for being here, it is so awesome. I have the privilege of being here and introducing Renee. I am certainly honored and thankful that you are all here on this special day. I do want to highlight and thank the Gaucho greats in the room. As you all know, this is a storied program with a really special legacy. We wrap our arms around student-athletes, coaches and the community that are all a part of it. I do want to thank Mark French and Bonnie Henrickson. I also want to thank all of you and our student-athletes who are here, sitting front and center. They have been going through a process of waiting to get to meet their next head coach. They had about 20 minutes of a quick conversation and look forward to spending more time together. I would be remiss if I didn't take a moment for the department and the mission and I want to read and highlight a couple things and I think this will speak to Renee and I aligning and her joining this Gaucho program. 
 
"You all know Santa Barbara Athletics is committed to developing successful and resourceful people who inspire, innovate and persevere through challenges, who reach their full potential, and strive for excellence to make a positive difference in the world. Our commitment goes deeper than that; our commitment goes further by serving and continuing to grow as we are really engaged and deeply connected with our Gaucho community. We are student-centered, people focused, community engaged and want to build on this strong sustainable foundation that is here into extraordinary achievements in and out of the athletics arena. I am thrilled to introduce you to someone who is a student-first leader, who has really strong ties to our Gaucho community, and who has consistently demonstrated basketball excellence through all of her coaching stops and certainly over the last 15 years as a head coach. Some of you probably know because you did your research. She started at Stanford and then moved onto San Diego State as an assistant coach and has spent the last 15 years as a head coach accumulating a record of 270-151 at Cal State San Marcos, Cal State San Bernardino and Cal State Monterey Bay. We have watched her team knock off the No. 1 seed in the NCAA Tournament this year along with storied success and as I mentioned over her career and proceed on this year to the final four. I have been able to on a personal level follow Renee's career with admiration for a really long time. I have also talked to colleagues, friends, other student-athletes and the thing that always comes up is her commitment and dedication to strong relationships, to caring about people, to empowering and developing those relationships with student-athletes. It is with really great excitement that I have the privilege and honor to be able to introduce you to and welcome our next UC Santa Barbara Women's Basketball Head Coach, Renee Jimenez."