By BOB TOMPKINS, Written for the LSWA
Kathy Stewart Holloway’s life has been marked by unprecedented achievement as a woman in high school sports once ruled by men.
Yet, she points with love to two men who, behind the scenes, helped her along the way.
Her father, Jack Stewart, a car salesman, put up her first basketball goal on the side of a building on the family property in Lecompte when she was a tyke. It was a target, set then at a lower achievable height, but she always aimed high at whatever goal she pursued. That attitude was motivated by her father’s constant encouragement to “do your best.”
Her husband, Charles, who was the director of business affairs and comptroller at LSU Alexandria for 35 years before his death 19 years ago, was the other most influential man in her life. She turned to him for advice before any big decision in an extraordinary career as a coach and administrator.
A string of prestigious honors stands as testimony to her many local, statewide and national accomplishments, the latest of which is being among 12 elected to the 2026 class to be inducted into the Louisiana Sports Hall of Fame in Natchitoches.
Holloway is going into the LSHOF among the Class of 2026 celebrated during three days of festivities Thursday, June 25-Saturday, June 27, with seven events (six in Natchitoches, bowling in Alexandria). For participation information, visit LaSportsHall.com or call 318-238-4255.
She is the 25th recipient of the Dave Dixon Louisiana Sports Leadership Award and will be enshrined in the Hall as the fourth female Dixon winner.
The classic story of Holloway’s disciplined but quiet push into a male-dominated hierarchy at the Louisiana High School Coaches Association came during an All-Star weekend in Baton Rouge in 1982 when, as she said, “football coaches controlled everything.”
Yet, some of the iconic coaches of the day like Charlie Brown of Neville and Red Franklin of Haynesville (both since elected to the Louisiana Sports Hall of Fame) asked her when she was going to run for president (of the LHSCA).
“At a Friday night barbecue before a Saturday All-Star football game, I was standing by myself and this guy said, ‘Are you going to vote for me tomorrow (for president)?’ I said, ‘Yeah, if you vote for me when I run.’
“He said, ‘There ain’t ever going to be a woman president of this association.’”
One year later, at the suggestion of then LHSAA commissioner Frank Spruiell, Holloway ran for second vice-president (which virtually assures automatic succession to first vice president then president). No one ran against her. So, she was the first female to ever to hold each office, being the first LHSCA female president in 1986.
In 1992, she made history becoming the first female president of the National High School Athletic Coaches Association. In 1998, she was elected to the Louisiana High School Sports Hall of Fame and in 2012 was inducted into the NHSACA Hall of Fame.
In 2021 Holloway was honored by the NHSACA, becoming the first winner of an award named in her honor, the “Kathy Holloway Women of Inspiration Award” given annually to females promoting high school athletics.
Her road to prestigious positions and honors started at her home in her youth.
The oldest of three children of Jack and Edith Harrison Holloway, Kathy started shooting and dribbling a basketball as soon as she could walk, and from the start, her father, set the bar high.
“For him,” said Holloway, “everything we did, it was ‘do your best.’”
Young Kathy took that message to heart and has lived by it to the present day.
She enjoyed a stellar playing career at Poland High School, leading her team to the Class C state championship in 1965 and being named the most valuable offensive player of the tournament. She coached girls’ basketball at Tioga for 23 years (1969-92), mentoring four high school All-Americans, 13 all-state players, 5 LHSCA all-stars and achieving 10 playoff appearances, two Sweet 16 appearances and two state runner-up finishes. Fifteen of her players got college athletic scholarships.
One of the team managers during Holloway’s time as Tioga’s girls’ basketball coach is Dr. Joan Brunson, a family medicine physician who is the president of the medical staff at Rapides Regional.
“It doesn’t surprise me that she went on to accomplish the things she did,” Brunson said of Holloway.
“Kathy is a person that would never give up,” Brunson said. “She would think of ways to do things more efficiently. She was good at restoring confidence in her players when they were having a difficult time.”
The 78-year-old Holloway, who was a math major at LSU, wasn’t only skilled in basketball. In the same year she led Poland to the state title, she became the district president of the Future Homemakers Association of America, which, undoubtedly made her mother proud. Her mother, who lived to age 96, was a homemaker who made all the clothes for her children, cooked all the meals and did the gardening around the house.
“Mom would call me to supper,” Holloway recalled, “and I had to make 10 in a row before coming in. I don’t think I ever coached anybody that practiced shooting as much as I did.”
That includes four All-Americans: Jan Nugent (1969-72), Kay Ford (1972-75), Julie Wilkerson (1976-79) and Tara Curtis (1984-88). Ford and Wilkerson played for Louisiana Tech and Curtis played for LSU.
For the first nine years of the Louisiana Tech Lady Techsters basketball program, at least one player from Tioga was on the team, be it Marilyn Robinson, Ford or Wilkerson.
Wilkerson, an attorney, remembers Holloway’s innovation as a coach.
“She started a ‘jump’ layup,” said Wilkerson, “getting us to do a jump shot as our layup. She didn’t need to holler; she just looked at you with the kind of look that you knew you were not doing what you needed to be doing. And it was never about individual honors with her. She stressed team.”
Her son, Stewart Holloway, the pastor of First Baptist Church of Pineville, is supporting her as she is the director of his church’s “Upwards Basketball” K-6 program. It’s part of Upward Sports, founded in 1995, and the world’s largest Christian youth sports provider. It lists its mission as “promoting the discovery of Jesus through sports.”
Kathy is in her 15th year as the program director, and the participation has mushroomed from around 90 players to 300.
“Looking back, sometimes I think, ‘How did this happen?’” Holloway said. “I think of Robert Frost’s The Road Not Taken. Itook the road to Tioga. God just takes care of you and opens doors. If I hadn’t been here, it wouldn’t have gone this way, I guess. I’m thankful for being available to do the things I love to do. I like people. I like getting everybody to work together.”