Associate Head Coach The Texas Basketball roots of Travis Mays already run layers deep. He made his mark on the program as a dynamic scoring guard from 1986-90, and Mays also served three seasons as an assistant coach for the Women's Basketball program. Mays, now with 10 years of coaching experience in women's college and professional basketball, returns to the Forty Acres as associate head coach to Texas Women's Basketball head coach Karen Aston. Following two years coaching in the WNBA, Mays originally came back to his alma mater as an assistant to Hall of Fame coach Jody Conradt from 2004-07, and he proved himself as a gifted floor coach and recruiter. Mays moved to LSU and worked on Van Chancellor's staff from 2007-11. At both UT and LSU, Mays helped ink seven nationally-acclaimed recruits, and all seven of the recruiting classes Mays assisted in assembling were ranked among the nation's top-25, including four top-10 efforts and the No. 1 class in the nation for Texas in the fall of 2004. Most recently, Mays was an assistant coach at the University of Georgia. The Lady Bulldogs finished the 2011-12 season at 22-9 and advanced to the NCAA Tournament's first round. Mays remains one of the most electrifying players in UT history. A 2002 inductee into UT's Men's Athletics Hall of Fame, Mays is still No. 2 among the Longhorns' career scoring leaders with 2,279 points and was the first player to earn back-to-back Southwest Conference Player of the Year honors in 1989 and 1990. As a senior, Mays was a second-team Associated Press All-American. He averaged 24.1 points per game and led Texas to the "Elite Eight" round of the NCAA Tournament. Included in that NCAA run was a 44-point outburst against Georgia in the first round that still ranks 14th-most all time in "March Madness" history. His 23 free throws made and 27 attempts at the line versus the Bulldogs remain NCAA Tournament records. Mays was drafted by Sacramento with the No. 14 overall pick in the first round of the 1990 NBA Draft and was a second-team All-Rookie selection after averaging 14.3 ppg. Mays then played two seasons with the Atlanta Hawks, rupturing two tendons in his right foot. He recovered and enjoyed a successful eight-season career overseas in Greece, Israel, Turkey and Italy. A native of Ocala, Fla., he received his bachelor's degree in psychology from Texas in 1990. Mays and his wife, Mirella, have two children: daughter Cherrell, a freshman at Texas; and son, Trevor, 5. |
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