Centennial coach Karen Weitz wins 800th basketball game

Centennial High’s girls basketball players have received their share of accolades over the past two decades. On Tuesday, it was their coach’s turn.

The Bulldogs’ 74-38 home victory over Mater East gave coach Karen Weitz her 800th career win. The milestone victory kept her more than 200 wins ahead of Nevada’s second most successful coach, Bishop Gorman’s Grant Rice.

Weitz, who has also coached the boys team since 2023, said she had mixed emotions about all the fanfare.

“Tonight was super important,” said Weitz, who coached four seasons at Cheyenne before moving to Centennial in 1999. “When you’re younger, you never think anything like that will happen to you. It’s a great achievement, but it also makes you feel like you’re getting old.”

Weitz (800-148) won her first large-school championship with Centennial in 2002, going 34-0 and returning the state crown to Southern Nevada for the first time in 22 years. That began a record stretch of 15 titles. Only Class 1A Pahranagat Valley has more at 16.

“Winning that first state title was a big goal,” said Weitz, whose girls team has claimed nine of the last 10 championships. “I really wanted to bring (the title) back to Vegas at that time. I’m really proud of my players and all the people around me. We’ve had a ton of wins and that’s taken a lot of time.”

Weitz, who played basketball at Boise State and Scottsdale Community College (Ariz.) before becoming an all-American javelin thrower at UNLV, has received her share of honors. She has been named Nevada Coach of the Year five times, USA Today Coach of the Year twice, and MaxPreps Coach of the Year once. She also is a member of the Southern Nevada Sports Hall of Fame.

The coach said the key to her success is discipline.

“You have to have consistent discipline,” Weitz said. “You have to set a standard so you can grow as a group. It has gotten harder over the years because accountability has gotten harder.”

The coach briefly left Centennial to coach at the University of Pacific, where she served as an assistant coach and later an interim head coach during the 2005-06 season. She returned to Centennial with a greater appreciation for high school sports.

Centennial’s girls are 8-3 this season in competition that has included the elite Tournament of Champions in Phoenix, Ariz. The boys team is 5-7.

“Winning a (girls) championship is going to be tough this year,” said Weitz, whose team built a 53-22 halftime lead Tuesday on the way to the historic victory. “The dynamics of the team have switched. I don’t worry about other teams. I know where we need to be.”

How many more wins and titles might she compile? The coach is taking that year by year.

“Last year was the first year I didn’t coach year-round,” Weitz said. “So I’ll think about it day by day and month by month. There was a time when basketball was all I cared about, but you re-evaluate things as you get older.”