Hall of Fame
Larry Holley spent 40 years as the head coach of the William Jewell men's basketball program from 1979 until his retirement in 2019, amassing an overall record of 831-458. Throughout his legendary career he received 15 Coach of the Year Awards, most recently the 2018 Kansas City Sports Commission Coach of the Year. In 1996, he became the first NAIA coach to receive the prestigious Sears/NABC NAIA National Coach of the Year Award. He has also been selected to five Halls of Fames: the Greater Kansas City Basketball Coaches Association Hall of Fame, the Missouri Basketball Coaches Association Hall of Fame, the William Jewell College Athletic Hall of Fame, the NAIA Hall of Fame and the Missouri Sports Hall of Fame. In 2011 he was honored by the Kansas City Sports Commission with the Earl Smith Award inducting Holley into the Greater Kansas City Amateur Sports Hall of Champions. In May of 2003 he was a court coach at the USA Basketball Pan American Trials in Colorado Springs, Colo., and is also a recipient of the Gary Filbert Legacy Award (2014) for lifetime achievement in basketball in the state of Missouri. It is the highest honor given by the Missouri Basketball Coaches Association.
During his career he guided 11 Jewell squads to HAAC regular season conference championship and 14 to the NAIA National Tournament, including four who reached the Final Four, and three to the Elite Eight. He guided the Cardinals to twenty-five 20-win seasons, including the most recent 2018 squad who went 20-9 on the season and grabbed the first national ranking in the NCAA era at No. 20 in early December 2017. His overall record in 48 years as a head coach is 918-577, making him the all-time winningest coach among four-year colleges in the state of Missouri.
On January 25, 2018, just two weeks after winning his 900th career game, the Cardinals defeated McKendree to give Holley his 903rd win to surpass Bob Knight and move into ninth place all-time on the men's college basketball career wins list. In that win over McKendree Holley's Cardinals took on Harry Statham and the McKendree Bearcats. Statham, who at the time was the all-time leader in men's college basketball wins, came into the game with 1,122 wins while Holley entered with 902. Never before had two head coaches squared off in a single game with more than 2,000 career wins between them.
Holley has coached 24 NAIA All-Americans including six first team selections and one who was named NAIA-II National Player of the Year (Brook Russell: 1996). Twenty-six of his players have also been named NAIA Academic All-Americans. In addition, 149 out of 155 of his fourth year players at William Jewell have graduated. During their time in the NAIA, Holley's teams were consistently ranked in the top-25 national polls, including No. 1 rankings in 1996 and 2004. They also received the No. 1 seed in the national tournament in 2004.
His teams boasted two of the longest winning streaks in the HAAC, including a 43 game home court winning streak which began in January 1982 and lasted through the same month in 1987. The Cardinals also enjoyed a 45-game HAAC winning streak that included 21 consecutive road wins and lasted from January 1985 to February 1988. He has had two teams, 1988 and 1996, inducted into the Jewell Athletic Hall of Fame.
Also a standout player in his own right, Holley is a 1967 Jewell graduate and lettered four times in each of three sports (cross country, basketball & track). He was captain of each sport and capped his career by being named Jewell’s Athlete of the Year as a senior. He scored 1,122 points in his basketball career at Jewell and was an All-Conference and All-District selection as a senior. Off the court he was heavily involved on campus, serving as President of his fraternity (Lambda Chi Alpha), President of the J-Club, Vice-President of the 1968 senior class, a member of Aeons (senior men’s honorary fraternity), selected to Who’s Who in American Colleges and Universities, and was the recipient of the Colonel Alexander Doniphan Award that goes to the senior man deemed most likely to succeed. He was also a member of the Concert and Pep Bands and Chapel Choir all four years.
After graduating from Jewell he received his master's degree at the University of Missouri Columbia in 1968. He coached one year at Harrisburg Missouri High School from 1968-69. He also coached for six years at Central Methodist College from 1969-75; also he coached for four years at Northwest Missouri State University from 1975-79; two of these years were spent as the top assistant and two as the head coach.
