By: Drew Aggus
Sundance (Sunny) Wicks has one of the most unique names on campus. To go right along with it, Wicks, the men’s basketball coach, also has one of the most unique personalities on campus.
With a name as uncommon as Sundance, one may think that his parents did it for a very particular reason. Instead, he claims it comes from a combination of numerous things, including Sundance Sparkling Fruit Juice, Robert Redford’s role of “The Sundance Kid,” nearby Sundance Mountain and neighboring Sundance, Wyoming, and even the fact that his dad’s car had a sun painted on top of it, which he called “the Sundance mobile.”
“I got picked on as a kid [for my name], but now, it’s a cool talking point,” Wicks said. “I always tell my parents that they need to come up with a better story for why they named me Sundance.”
Wicks, a native of Gillette, Wyoming, played high school basketball under Wyoming high school’s winningest basketball coach of all time, while playing against big-name players, such as Jamal Crawford. Subsequently, he played college basketball at Division-II Northern State University in Aberdeen, South Dakota. Following his exceptional career there, he played professional basketball in Sweden’s top basketball league for a year.
Wicks described himself as a “junkyard dog” during his playing days.
“I shot threes, rebounded and played really hard,” Wicks said. “You couldn’t slide a cardboard pizza box under my feet when I took a jump shot, so I wasn’t extremely athletic, but I thought I played the game the right way. I respected it, and I played really, really hard every single possession.”
One of Wicks’ bigger attributes, as a coach, is his ability to help players develop their game, but Wicks remains very humble in this regard.
“I can push them, and I can help them find a different, better, or more efficient way to do something, but the guys who make themselves great have something special inside of them,” Wicks said. “I always say that I’ve never made a player great, because at the end of the day, they made the choice to come in to the gym every single day.”
Wicks has helped many big-name players develop their games. This includes basketball stars like Kawhi Leonard, Isaiah Thomas, Marvin Bagley III and Xavier Silas, who recently made his NBA debut.
“Those guys were so good already,” Wicks said. “They push you so far out of your comfort zone, because you’re trying to find ways to make them better.”
Wicks enjoys coaching at Division II more than Division I, simply because of the “purity” of the game.
“I love Division II, because, not that it’s impossible, but there’s no pressure for a kid to go to the NBA,” Wicks said. “You can still win championships, and a championship is a championship at any level.”
Not only does Wicks aspire to be a large mentor in his players’ lives, but he claims that all of his coaches played huge roles in his life. He can still name every coach he’s ever had, dating all the way back to middle school, and he said that he has learned something from everybody who has coached him.
“I can learn something from anybody at any stage in time,” Wicks said. “If you really are open to learning, it’s insane to think about how many people can impact your life.”
Sundance Wicks is a unique person, one who is well-liked all over campus. If Western’s men’s basketball team is as open to learning and remaining humble as Wicks is, the program has a Sunny future.