Career
He was the coach of the University of Kansas men"s basketball team from 1964 to 1983. He is the fourth-winningest coach in Jayhawks basketball history. Owens" overall Kansas record was 348–182 (657), and his Big Eight Conference record was 170–96 (639).
His 1971 and 1974 teams made it to the Final Four, and in 1968 the Jayhawks lost to Dayton in the finals of the National Invitation Tournament.
He coached five All-Americans: Jo Jo White, Darnell Valentine, Dave Robisch, Bud Stallworth and Walt Wesley. He was fired following the 1982-1983 season after the Jayhawks posted back-to-back losing seasons.
Kansas has not suffered a losing season since, and has only missed the National Collegiate Athletic Association tournament once since then, in 1988-1989 when the program was on probation for recruiting violations committed by Owens" successor, Larry Brown. A three-year letterman at the University of Oklahoma (1949-1951), Owens honed his coaching skills as head coach at Cameron State Junior College in Lawton, Oklahoma.
At Cameron, he amassed a 93–24 record and boasted four junior college All-Americans.
Owens then accepted an assistant"s position under Dick Harp in 1960, and was promoted to head coach when Harp resigned following the 1963-1964 season. Owens had a brief stint of coaching in Israel with Maccabi Tel Aviv at the 1989-1990 season, in which he was sacked in February 1990. Owens was inducted into the Oklahoma Sports Hall of Fame on August 3, 2009.
Ted Owens" coaching tree.
John Calipari, University of Kentucky
Bob Hill, Seattle SuperSonics.
