Leta Andrews began her illustrious career as a player at Granbury High School when she and her sister, Shirley, led the Lady Pirates to the state tournament in 1954 and 1955. Her coaching career began in 1962 at Tolar High School and included stops at Gustine, Comanche (1965-1976) and Corpus Christi Calallen (1980-1992), where she won a Class 4A state title in 1990. Andrews coached at her alma mater, Granbury, from 1976-1980 and then again from 1992 until her retirement on May 31, 2014. On Dec. 9, 2005, Andrews won her 1,218th game to break Charleston, Tennessee Coach Jim Smiddy’s record as the winningest girls’ high school coach in the nation. Five years later, when Granbury defeated Midlothian, 62-43, on Dec. 7, 2010, Andrews became the nation’s winningest coach for girls or boys, surpassing longtime friend, Fort Worth Dunbar Boys Coach Robert Hughes, with her 1,334th career win. Andrews ended her career with 1,416 wins in 52 seasons of coaching. Her teams have been to 16 state Final Fours and have averaged 28 wins per season. Some of Andrews’ honors include her selection to coach the 2004 McDonald’s High School All-America Game. She also was named the Walt Disney National Teacher of the Year in 1993. Andrews was inducted into the Texas Sports Hall of Fame as part of the Class of 2007 the same year she earned the NHSCA’s National Coach of the Year Award. Andrews was a 2010 inductee into the Women’s Basketball Hall of Fame located in Knoxville, Tennessee. She has been featured on the CBS Evening News, written about in the New York Times and was honored by the Texas Legislature on March 2, 2011. She told the Dallas Morning News in 2010 that along with winning the state title, one of her greatest career highlights was getting to coach her three daughters — Linda, Sissy and Lisa — who all were all-state players in high school and played at the University of Texas.
