Legendary Leveland Loboette Girls Head Basketball Coach Dean Weese passed away this past Saturday at the age of 88.
Coach Weese started coaching right after college in 1957 in his hometown of Higgins. He coached both girls and boys teams for one season before he moved to Spearman High School where he coached for another 15 years, picking up three state championships and having an impressive record of 444-76.
Coach Weese coached for six years at Wayland with five of his teams making it to the Assosiation for Intercollegiate Athletics for Women National Tournament, including the final four in 1978. Coach Weese won four National Women’s Invitational Tournament titles in Amarillo and two National Amateur Athletic Union Crowns. He coached one season with the Dallas Diamonds (WBL) before he went back to his roots in high school coaching where he ended his career with the Levelland Loboettes.
Weese coached for 19 years with the Loboettes, securing an overall record of 551 wins and 85 losses. He led his teams to 17 district championships and made it to the state championship 10 times with the Loboettes.
The Loboettes and Weese took home seven state championships with Weese at the helm.
He was inducted into the second class of the Women’s Basketball Hall of Fame in Knoxville, Tennessee in 2000. He had an amazing win percentage of 85.97, and was the Coach of the Year in 1968 for the Queens. He finally retired after the 1998-99 season.
Although he was a great coach amassing a total record of 1,207-197, he was also a great inspiration to others as well.
Former player, coach and current Levelland ISD District Assessment Coordinator, Terri White had many words of the great Dean Weese.
“He created a sisterhood with the Loboettes and im so blessed and thankful he landed here in Levelland cause I wonder what my life would have been like without his thumb print”, said White. “Our team was a winner because he was a winner and he brought so much more than just a winning philosophy, he was like a father figure because of how he cared for us and how much we learned from him.”
White played for Coach Weese for two years when they first started the four-peat as she was apart of two state championships with him. After she graduated and went on to play and win a couple of National Championships at the next level, she had the opportunity to come back to Levelland and coach with Weese.
“Outside of the coaching side of him and his competitiveness, he was a great man. A lot of people want to judge him on his spirit on the sideline, but we as players and as students, got to know him as a person,” explained White. “He was a joke-teller, loved basketball, golf and all types of sports but most of all he was really a father figure. I keep bringing it up, but it cant go unmentioned just how much he meant to Levelland and us as players.”
Coach Weese would go down to the middle school and give the students something to strive for when they got to high school. He would give the students goals and make sure they know that when they got into the high school, they would be a family and that they had big roles in everything they did.
“He was instrumental in coming down to the middle school and helping everyone out,” said White. “From the players to the coaches, he would love to come down and encourage us to show us that he cared and that he was our support system.”
According to White, while he cared about winning and he was very great at it, he had everyone’s best interest in mind and would try to help them in any way he could.
“Even though we played for him, he had conversations with us about what our goals were, what we wanted to do and how he could help us achieve those goals in any way he could,” said White. “He always had our best interest at heart when it came to us, and we wouldn’t know what we had become had he not been such a huge impact on not just my life but the lives of all the students and players that he was able to get a hold of.
“It means a lot for the City of Levelland and for the legacy that he left behind, because when you think of Levelland and its rich history its had in sports, the first name anyone thinks of is Dean Weese and his winning ways.”
His memorial service is scheduled for Sunday, November 5th, at 2 p.m, at the Godley Middle School Gymnasium, 9401 Highway 171, about 20 miles from Granbury where he passed away. Danny Andrews, Wayland’s retired Director of Alumni Relations, will be officiating at the service.