Heartbroken Stan Van Gundy discloses his wife Kim, who died in August, committed suicide

Former head coach and announcer, Stan Van Gundy unexpectedly lost his wife Kimberly Van Gundy last August. For the last nine months, the former HC did not publicly address the situation. However, recently as Van Gundy made an appearance on Dan Le Batard‘s podcast, the announcer opened up about tragic details about his wife’s sudden death.

On the most recent episode of the ‘South Beach Sessions’ podcast, Stan Van Gundy revealed that Kim died by suicide. The former Pelicans HC had been dealing with grief for losing his wife after being married for 35 years.

She took her own life, Dan… I’ll never… I don’t care how long it goes, I can’t imagine that I’ll ever get over that. It was devastating. 

Van Gundy met Kim when he was 24 years old and the couple were together for almost four decades. The 64-year-old spent all of his adult life with his wife and went through every major change together. Kim’s sudden absence from his life was something Van Gundy never imagined despite being aware of her mental health issues.

I never, ever envisioned that I was going to live any day in my life without Kim. Never envisioned that. I knew she was, you know, going through a tough time, but I still never envisioned that happening.

Even after eight months of her passing, Van Gundy still struggles with the idea of never seeing his wife again. The commentator revealed that he is trying to remember everything about his spouse especially the values she had. Van Gundy is aiming at making his wife proud as he called the loss ‘huge’.

NBA players went to visit Stan Van Gundy after his wife’s passing

Van Gundy has coached many NBA players in his long career. His wife had been with him since 1984 which was eleven years before Van Gundy landed his first NBA job as an assistant coach. Since then he has been the head coach of four NBA teams and was even the president of basketball operations for the Detroit Pistons.

The players under Van Gundy’s coaching certainly shared a close bond with the coach. During the podcast, the former coach revealed that players came to visit him for weekends after his wife passed away. The visits helped Van Gundy while going through a rough time.

I’ve had these players come down, which is one of the kindest acts for guys that I coached 40 years ago, to spend the weekend for me, and they all asked very genuinely ‘How are you doing?

Van Gundy coached for four decades including his college coaching career. The former coach has continued to work for TNT after his wife’s death. The announcer is currently calling the ongoing Western Conference finals.

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