1972-1977

Sue Gunter Namea · LSU Head Coach

Sue Gunter, formerly of Walnut Grove, and one of the most outstanding basketball players and coaches Leake County ever produced, has accepted a position as head coach for girls' basketball at Louisiana State University at Baton Rouge and is in the process of moving to that campus this week. Miss Gunter is leaving Stephen F. Austin State University in Nacogdoches, Texas; where she has been head coach for 16 years and where she has produced numerous successful teams and earned several state championships. " It was a very hard decision to make," Miss Gunter told The Carthaginian Wednesday morning. "It has been very emotional. I have been here most of my career, and I love the school, but there comes a time to make a change for the sake of your profession. This seemed to be the time for me." She admitted that the job at LSU would "be a real challenge." "The last five or six years have not been good ones for girls' basketball at LSU," she explained. "They have lost players, and their recruiting has not been successful." Miss Gunter goes to this big school which at this time has only . nine players in the basketball camp. As far as

winning games is concerned, last year was a very poor one atLSU. "This means that we will have to · go into a major rebuilding job," Coach Gunter said. "We will have to work from the bottomup, and it will be difficult." If anybody can do it, Coach Gunter can. She has been in basketball all of her life. Back in high school SueGunter was a member of those outstand– ing, winning teams at the Walnut Grove High School, and the same was true of her college days As a college player at Peabody she was an All-American and played on teams that went overseas for exhibitions. In 1980 she was selected as the coach for the · United States Olympic team, but, of course, because of the international situation at the time, the U. S. team did not participate in the games which were held in Russia. Coach Gunter attended East Central Junior College at Decatur and then went on to Nashville where she took her BA and MA degrees at . Peabody Gollege. She taught two years at Middle Tennessee State and then went to Stephen F. Austin where she has been since.

She is the daughter of Mrs. Iva Dene Gunter of Walnnt Grove and the late L. G. Gunter.

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