The year was 2003, and the Piedmont girls basketball team was in dire need of a head coach with just three weeks before tipoff. When Bryan Gardere got the last-minute call to coach just for one season, he accepted it, unaware it would mark the beginning of over 22 years of unimaginable success.
Raised in Piedmont, Gardere said he played high school basketball at PHS before playing two years of college basketball at a junior college in Utah. He then continued his basketball career at Kansas Wesleyan University. Two years later, he played professional basketball in Europe and South America before taking the job at Piedmont.
In just his first year coaching high school basketball, Piedmont went from winning 13 games the prior season to 30 games. That 2003-2004 team was ranked #1 in the country by USA Today.
Throughout his time at Piedmont, Gardere has led the program to six NCS titles, back-to-back state championships, and ten state quarterfinal appearances.
In addition to coaching at Piedmont, Gardere said he runs youth camps and coaches for the Women’s Premier Basketball Association (WPBA) Bay Area Blaze.
Girls basketball player sophomore Savannah Dennig said that Gardere has drastically improved her play.
“When I first came to Piedmont, I wasn’t a very strong shooter, nor a dribbler. But over time, Coach has relentlessly told me to continue practicing dribbling and has given me great drills to do that, and ways to improve,” Dennig said. “That has really helped me improve as a player.”
PHS girls basketball assistant coach and former PHS basketball player Ameela Li said that beyond basketball, Gardere cares about each player deeply.
“It’s just his relatability and wanting to actually care about the player, both on and off the court. For a lot of coaches nowadays, it’s all about what’s on the basketball court, but then they don’t even care about what you’re doing, your extracurriculars, your interests, all that,” Li said. “But he really does genuinely care, and always makes an emphasis to check in with his players that graduate from Piedmont and beyond to college and into their adult life.”
Throughout his time here, Gardere has sent 65 PHS graduates to play college basketball, with 12 currently playing in college.
It was monumental for Li, who now plays for Gardere in the WPBA, to accomplish her dream of playing college basketball with Gardere’s support.
“He really instilled confidence in me to play basketball at the next level, to get a full ride scholarship in college, which I didn’t think I was going to be able to do coming into high school. That was huge for me,” Li said.
Gardere said Li’s success is exactly the kind of outcome that makes the job so fulfilling.
“When I get to go watch former Piedmont players play in college or beyond, that’s probably my biggest joy. It’s like winning the lottery,” Gardere said.
Spending over two decades at Piedmont, Gardere said that his coaching style has evolved to a mixture of old-school and new-school, with an emphasis on being a “player’s coach”.
“He’s different from other coaches in the way that he’s not an X’s and O’s type of guy. More so he wants you to get a feel for the game in a natural sense,” said PHS JV girls basketball coach Jzane Cavalli-Money.
With many high-stakes games, Gardere said he has made it a team tradition to foster positivity among his players.
“About seven to eight years ago we started doing affirmations with the team. They’ll go in a circle and say something positive about someone else,” Gardere said.
Gardere said that these affirmations have proved to be uplifting for players.
“It reminds you that in your head you’re having these challenging moments, but someone else is telling you did a great job,” he said.
Gardere said that his most special memory coaching at Piedmont was the success of the 2023-24 team. With only six girls cleared to play, the team defied expectations, winning over 20 games and making it far in the Open division.
“We didn’t have a rolled ankle and everyone literally played the whole game, every possession of the game,” Gardere said.
Beyond basketball, Gardere said he teaches lessons to his players he hopes they will carry with them throughout life.
“I really believe that basketball, and not just basketball, but all sports can give you the tools to life,” Gardere said. “It’s not whether you win or lose today, [what matters is] if you learn how to work hard, if you learn how to give everything you have, be super competitive, and to be a great teammate. That’ll probably carry you a lot further than the wins and losses,” Gardere said.
When it comes to his legacy, Gardere said he aims to have impacted his players by inspiring them to pay it forward, whether in basketball or another career. Li said she did just that by coming back to be assistant coach at Piedmont.
Reflecting on her experiences working with Gardere, Cavalli-Money said that she hopes Piedmont basketball players will realize how fortunate they are to be coached by Gardere.
“Bryan is an amazing person as well as an amazing coach,” Cavalli-Money said. “If you are coached by him, you’re part of the lucky few.”
