July 27, 2000

John Sloop Named Women's Basketball Head Coach

Truman Director of Athletics Jerry Wollmering announced today that John Sloop has been hired as the new women's basketball head coach effective immediately.

Sloop has experience with some of the top names in Missouri college and high school basketball. Most recently, he has been serving as the men's assistant basketball coach at Truman for the past five seasons under Jack Schrader. During that time, the men's team made an NCAA Division II final four appearance.

"John Sloop has been involved with successful collegiate basketball programs for the past nine years, including the last five at Truman," Wollmering said. "He knows what it takes to be successful at Truman and will do an outstanding job leading our women's basketball program.

"I'm confident John will recruit quality student-athletes who can excel academically and athletically at Truman," Wollmering continued.

Sloop's duties at Truman have included recruiting, organizing practice sessions, on-the-floor coaching, strategy development, scheduling, travel arrangements, video and academic progress of student-athletes.

"I'm excited about the prospect of running my own program," Sloop said. "It's a tremendous opportunity. I'm looking forward to coaching players I'm already familiar with and have watched develop. We also have an excellent group of newcomers coming in which will make the transition a lot easier for me."

After he graduated from Maryville University in St. Louis in 1991, he served under Charlie Spoonhour for one season at Southwest Missouri State University before moving to St. Louis University with Spoonhour for the next two seasons.

Sloop was an assistant coach at Southwest Missouri State University during the 1994-95 season for Mark Bernsen. While at Division I SMSU, he assisted in nearly every aspect of the program, including recruiting, scouting and on-the-floor coaching.

He began his coaching career while still in college. After a career-ending ankle injury, he was hired by his former high school basketball coach as an assistant at Lafayette High School in St. Louis. While at Lafayette, Sloop also directed summer basketball camps for boys and girls in kindergarten through high school age.

In 1992, he served as head coach of the Springfield Kings, a girls 16-and-under Amateur Athletic Union team.

Sloop is working toward a master's degree in business administration and is a member of the NABC Assistant Coaches Board of Directors.

He replaces Karin Nicholls who resigned in May to take the head coaching position at the University of Texas-Pan American. The 1999-2000 Truman women's team posted a 17-9 record and hosted their first Mid-America Intercollegiate Athletics Association postseason tournament game after going 12-6 in league action.

Women's Basketball Releases | Women's Basketball | Truman Athletics