Hall of Fame
A native of St. Louis, Mo., Linda Dollar becomes the second volleyball coach to be inducted into the MVC Athletics Hall of Fame, joining Iradge Ahrabi-Fard of Northern Iowa (2011).
With a career record of 758-266-21 in 24 seasons at Missouri State, Dollar ranked second at the end of her coaching days on the all-time list for wins in women’s college volleyball history.
She became the first women’s collegiate volleyball coach to reach 700 career victories when her team beat Bradley on Oct. 23, 1992.
In 24 seasons, she took Missouri State to 20-win seasons on 20 occasions.
Under Dollar, the Bears had a league-best 68-13 combined mark in the Gateway Conference and won the league tourney title in 1990, after six runner-up finishes. Missouri State also won four Gateway regular-season crowns.
Dollar was named the 1986 and 1990 Gateway Coach of the Year and the 1993 MVC Coach of the Year.
From 1972 through 1982, Missouri State reached the AIAW national tournament 11 seasons in a row. Before joining the NCAA in 1982, Missouri State was a power in AIAW, with a top national placing of fifth in 1981 and four seventh-place finishes.
Competing in AIAW Division I, Dollar’s Missouri State teams were regional champions in eight of her first 10 seasons, and until the AIAW terminated its national tournament in 1981, Dollar guided MSU to the event each season and logged six finishes among the nation’s top-10.
A 1970 Missouri State graduate, Dollar competed four years each in volleyball, basketball and softball, and also participated in tennis, field hockey and golf.
She was inducted into the Missouri State Athletics Hall of Fame in 1983 and received the MSU Outstanding Young Alumni Award in 1987. In the spring of 1994, Dollar was inducted into the Springfield Area Sports Hall of Fame, becoming the first female in that shrine. Dollar was also inducted into the Missouri Sports Hall of Fame in 2011.
During the summer of 1996, she served as a supervisor for men’s and women’s volleyball at the Summer Olympic Games in Atlanta.
She also served as the first Director of Compliance for Missouri State athletics from when she stopped coaching volleyball in 1995 until her retirement from MSU in 2002.
Dollar, who has served on the Board of Directors of the AVCA and the USVBA, received the AVCA Founders Award and the USAV Leader in Volleyball Award in 2000. Dollar completed a five-year term as the District V representative to the NCAA Division I Women’s Volleyball Committee in 2001 and chaired the NACWAA Volleyball Committee.