Former Athletics Director and Head Men’s Basketball Coach Dennis Vinzant was posthumously inducted into Midwestern State Athletics’ Hall of Honor in 2007.
Vinzant assumed athletics director and basketball coaching duties in 1956 after arriving the previous year as an assistant football coach on Dick Todd’s staff in 1955.
Midwestern dropped football in 1956, forcing Vinzant to make the jump to the hardwood.
Vinzant produced a 250-145 record in 14 seasons at the helm of the Midwestern men’s basketball program. Under his guidance, the Indians advanced to the NAIA national tournament in 1960, ’65, ’66 and ’67.
His Midwestern teams endured only two losing seasons.
Vinzant retired from administrative and coaching duties to return full time to the class room in the spring of 1970. He had served 38 years as a coach.
Vinzant’s coaching career began at Greenville High School after earning his bachelor’s degree at Texas Tech in 1931 and later received his master’s from East Texas State University, which is now known as Texas A&M-Commerce.
In 1936, he joined the coaching staff at East Texas State as head basketball coach and assistant in football, becoming head football coach in 1942.
Vinzant led the Lions to a Lone Star Conference football championship in 1942 and his basketball teams won four conference titles and posted a 88-55 record.
In 1946, he left East Texas State for Tulane, where he served as an assistant coach in football and baseball until arriving at Midwestern in 1955.
Vinzant, who was inducted into the Texas A&M-Commerce Hall of Fame as a basketball coach in 1999, died June 22, 1976.
