Completed Event: Women's Basketball versus San Diego State on February 4, 2026 , Win , 57, to, 44
W Basketball
vs San Diego State
W 57-44
Grand Canyon University Athletics
Bill Yearnd with GCU players (from left) Maylinn Smith, Deanna Daniels and Jenna Pearson
Meet Bill and Rose Yearnd, Team Grandparents
1/12/2013 11:42:00 PM | Women's Basketball
Meet Bill and Rose Yearnd, Team Grandparents
FRESNO, Calif. – How big is the love of Bill Yearnd for the GCU women’s basketball program?
Big enough to have helped mend his own heart, that’s how big.
Bill, 67, a 6-foot-5 former college basketball player who works in institutional research for GCU, doesn’t do anything small if he does it at all. He and his wife of 30 years, Rose, have been de facto “team grandparents” for the Antelope women for three seasons now.
This season, they’ve endured a health scare for Bill in Anaheim and the death of Bill’s mother to attend the team’s games, home and away. Bill made the trip to Dixie State on Thursday and then to Fresno Pacific on Saturday without Rose, who stayed home in north Phoenix but followed the games online. (Memo to Rose: He’s eating well and getting his rest. I’m keeping an eye on him.)
Bill and Rose are known to the players for bringing snacks to the games and to Saturday practices. And, of course, for their vocal encouragement and support.
“They shower so much love on us, and they’re so genuine,” junior Jenna Pearson says. “When I think of them, I get those fuzzy, warm feelings you get with grandparents.”
The Yearnds’ devotion to the women’s team was borne out of their own loss. Shortly after their adopted son, Billy, died in the fall of 2004 at the age of 17, they saw the film “Pay It Forward,” in which a struggling schoolteacher challenges his students to lives of service.
The film made a profound impression on them, but the perfect opportunity didn’t present itself until they started going to GCU women’s games at the start of the 2010-11 season.
“We just decided on a whim to go to a game,” says Bill, the first coach for the girls’ basketball program at St. Mary’s High School in Phoenix, where he taught for 10 years. “That first game, we were there 45 minutes before it started, and there were only about three people in the gym. The team came out to warm up, and all three GCU coaches came over to shake our hand and thank us for coming.
“I’d never seen coaches do that before, certainly not before a game.”
A few games later, Rose won an iPod during an in-game giveaway, and Maylinn Smith, then a freshman, helped her learn how to use it. A bond was forming with the players.
“We had this tragedy,” Bill says, “and the team was helping us get through it. We decided to pay it forward and to help support the women’s program.”
In a way, Bill and Rose had come full circle. When Bill was at St. Mary’s, they had gone to basketball games on dates so that Bill could scout St. Mary’s opponents.
“When I was coaching, there was no prior experience for girls, no feeder programs (for high schools),” Bill says. “Girls knew none of the terminology, but they also had no bad habits to break. They had no habits, period, and were easy to coach because of that. They soaked it up and gave you everything they had.
“Now they’re so much more skilled and sophisticated. They know the basics of the game. There’s also a higher expectation level today that’s placed on the women’s game.”
It practically takes a crisis for the Yearnds to miss a GCU game, and that’s how they missed all three games for the women’s team in Anaheim in November during the Disney Tip-Off Classic. After watching the first game for the men’s team, Bill needed to be taken to a nearby hospital, where he remained for four days with a bleeding ulcer.
“The physician assistant looked like Samantha Murphy,” says Bill, who always sees life through the lens of GCU hoops.
He’s fine now, but the team was concerned and prayed for his health until his return to Phoenix.
“We’re used to hearing their voices (during games) and getting hugs afterward,” Smith says. “A lot of these girls are far from home, and it means so much to them. Bill and Rose sacrifice a lot in time and money to support us.”
Deanna Daniels Delivers at Dixie
You had to admire what junior Deanna Daniels did in contributing to Thursday night’s 73-71, double-overtime victory for the Antelopes at Dixie State. She had 14 points and 11 rebounds against the Red Storm, for whom she was the second-leading scorer in 2009-10.
“It just wasn’t a fit for me, the environment there,” says the 5-foot-10 Daniels, who averaged 11.7 points and 7.0 rebounds for a 17-8 Dixie team that included her Las Vegas high school teammate, Johnna Brown.
Brown is now a senior for the Red Storm and scored a game-high 28 points Thursday night. Daniels left Dixie State to play a season at Pima Community College before transferring to GCU. She missed most of last season with a serious knee injury but has returned as a solid contributor for the Antelopes.
“I’m happy I made the choice I did,” says Daniels, who put up 23 points and eight rebounds in 24 minutes of play in Dixie’s 93-88 victory over GCU three years ago.
Daniels’ brother David is a senior at Dixie State and attended the game Thursday night.
Email Doug Carroll at doug.carroll@gcu.edu.
FRESNO, Calif. – How big is the love of Bill Yearnd for the GCU women’s basketball program?
Big enough to have helped mend his own heart, that’s how big.
Bill, 67, a 6-foot-5 former college basketball player who works in institutional research for GCU, doesn’t do anything small if he does it at all. He and his wife of 30 years, Rose, have been de facto “team grandparents” for the Antelope women for three seasons now.
This season, they’ve endured a health scare for Bill in Anaheim and the death of Bill’s mother to attend the team’s games, home and away. Bill made the trip to Dixie State on Thursday and then to Fresno Pacific on Saturday without Rose, who stayed home in north Phoenix but followed the games online. (Memo to Rose: He’s eating well and getting his rest. I’m keeping an eye on him.)
Bill and Rose are known to the players for bringing snacks to the games and to Saturday practices. And, of course, for their vocal encouragement and support.
“They shower so much love on us, and they’re so genuine,” junior Jenna Pearson says. “When I think of them, I get those fuzzy, warm feelings you get with grandparents.”
The Yearnds’ devotion to the women’s team was borne out of their own loss. Shortly after their adopted son, Billy, died in the fall of 2004 at the age of 17, they saw the film “Pay It Forward,” in which a struggling schoolteacher challenges his students to lives of service.
The film made a profound impression on them, but the perfect opportunity didn’t present itself until they started going to GCU women’s games at the start of the 2010-11 season.
“We just decided on a whim to go to a game,” says Bill, the first coach for the girls’ basketball program at St. Mary’s High School in Phoenix, where he taught for 10 years. “That first game, we were there 45 minutes before it started, and there were only about three people in the gym. The team came out to warm up, and all three GCU coaches came over to shake our hand and thank us for coming.
“I’d never seen coaches do that before, certainly not before a game.”
A few games later, Rose won an iPod during an in-game giveaway, and Maylinn Smith, then a freshman, helped her learn how to use it. A bond was forming with the players.
“We had this tragedy,” Bill says, “and the team was helping us get through it. We decided to pay it forward and to help support the women’s program.”
In a way, Bill and Rose had come full circle. When Bill was at St. Mary’s, they had gone to basketball games on dates so that Bill could scout St. Mary’s opponents.
“When I was coaching, there was no prior experience for girls, no feeder programs (for high schools),” Bill says. “Girls knew none of the terminology, but they also had no bad habits to break. They had no habits, period, and were easy to coach because of that. They soaked it up and gave you everything they had.
“Now they’re so much more skilled and sophisticated. They know the basics of the game. There’s also a higher expectation level today that’s placed on the women’s game.”
It practically takes a crisis for the Yearnds to miss a GCU game, and that’s how they missed all three games for the women’s team in Anaheim in November during the Disney Tip-Off Classic. After watching the first game for the men’s team, Bill needed to be taken to a nearby hospital, where he remained for four days with a bleeding ulcer.
“The physician assistant looked like Samantha Murphy,” says Bill, who always sees life through the lens of GCU hoops.
He’s fine now, but the team was concerned and prayed for his health until his return to Phoenix.
“We’re used to hearing their voices (during games) and getting hugs afterward,” Smith says. “A lot of these girls are far from home, and it means so much to them. Bill and Rose sacrifice a lot in time and money to support us.”
Deanna Daniels Delivers at Dixie
You had to admire what junior Deanna Daniels did in contributing to Thursday night’s 73-71, double-overtime victory for the Antelopes at Dixie State. She had 14 points and 11 rebounds against the Red Storm, for whom she was the second-leading scorer in 2009-10.
“It just wasn’t a fit for me, the environment there,” says the 5-foot-10 Daniels, who averaged 11.7 points and 7.0 rebounds for a 17-8 Dixie team that included her Las Vegas high school teammate, Johnna Brown.
Brown is now a senior for the Red Storm and scored a game-high 28 points Thursday night. Daniels left Dixie State to play a season at Pima Community College before transferring to GCU. She missed most of last season with a serious knee injury but has returned as a solid contributor for the Antelopes.
“I’m happy I made the choice I did,” says Daniels, who put up 23 points and eight rebounds in 24 minutes of play in Dixie’s 93-88 victory over GCU three years ago.
Daniels’ brother David is a senior at Dixie State and attended the game Thursday night.
Email Doug Carroll at doug.carroll@gcu.edu.
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