Jerry Pimm

Jerry Pimm is a men's basketball coach who is best remembered for coaching at the University of Utah from 1974–1983 and the University of California, Santa Barbara from 1983-1998.

Playing for Montebello High School, Pimm earned the Helms Athletic Foundation's Central Section co-high school player of the year in 1956. He then played guard at the University of Southern California, where he earned all Pacific-8 Conference first-team honors twice and All-Coast Team honors once before graduating in 1960.

Pimm replaced former Utah coach Bill Foster, who had accepted the same position with the Duke University Blue Devils, in 1974 after serving 13 years as an assistant coach at the school. As coach of the Utes, Pimm led Utah to a 173-86 (.668) record, including four Sweet 16 appearances in the NCAA Tournament. The Utes also won 3 Western Athletic Conference basketball titles and only had one losing season during his stay. In the 1983 NCAA Men's basketball tournament, Pimm's Utes were seeded 10th in the west regional, but led by Pace Mannion, Utah upset 7th seed Illinois and 2nd seed UCLA before losing to eventual champion North Carolina State. However, the relationship between Jerry Pimm and the Utah Athletic Department became strained. Not seeing eye to eye, Pimm decided to leave the University of Utah for the University of California, Santa Barbara.

Prior to Pimm's career at UCSB, the Gauchos program had suffered through seven straight losing seasons. After a shaky start, which saw three more losing seasons, the Gauchos turned it around in the 1986-87 season, where they finished with a 16-13 record. The next season would be Pimm's best at UCSB. Led by conference player of the year Brian Shaw, the Gauchos went 22-8, including an 18-point win over Jim Valvano's North Carolina State team (with Chucky Brown, Charles Shackleford, and Vinny Del Negro), and two wins over Jerry Tarkanian's UNLV Runnin' Rebels (the second win coming when UNLV was ranked #2). UCSB earned its first ever NCAA Tournament berth, but they lost to the University of Maryland in the first round, 92-82.

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