A few weeks ago, when her Scarlet Knights were mired in a losing streak and playing the kind of selfish, lazy basketball she does not tolerate, C. Vivian Stringer kicked them out of their locker room, took away their uniforms and made them earn their way back.

That strategy would have been applauded by her parents, who taught the Rutgers University women's basketball coach and her siblings to value faith, family and hard work without complaint while they raised their children in a Western Pennsylvania coal town.

To understand what has driven Ms. Stringer, who will be 61 on March 16, to the heights she has achieved, consider first her roots as a Fayette County coal miner's daughter.

Her upbringing in that community, in the home of parents who never said, "I can't," would forge a life of remarkable success.

"I don't think you give yourself a chance if you don't come to work hard every single day and I won't accept it," said Ms. Stringer, a coach with more than 800 college victories and four Final Four teams. Her Rutgers squad yesterday advanced to the quarterfinals of the Big East tournament in Hartford, Conn. by defeating Seton Hall, 79-45.

"We'd walk miles when I was young if I had to in order to contribute something to help our family out because we didn't have much," she said. "That's the least I can ask of my players, to do what it takes to help each other out and to lift each other up."

Her journey began in tiny Edenborn, a village in German Township, about 40 miles south of Pittsburgh.

Ms. Stringer's father, Buddy Stoner, like many other men in her community, worked long hours in a dank, cold mine to provide his family with a roof and food. Her mother, known as Bird, taught her and her five siblings to appreciate what they had and to cherish every moment spent with family.

Through it all, Ms. Stringer said she never heard either of her parents make excuses, never heard her father -- who moonlighted on some weekends as an organ player at the Crawford Grill in the Hill District -- use the words "I can't."

That attitude carried through his life even after both of his legs were amputated at the knees as a result of a circulatory disorder. That's why she refuses to allow her players to give anything less than their best.

That decision to deny her players their uniforms and locker room until they stepped up their work ethic and commitment to playing defense is a ploy she often uses for motivation, particularly for teamsthat are loaded with freshmen.

"I tell every player I recruit, this isn't a place where you are going to wear silk shirts or bring that kind of mentality to the court every day," said Ms. Stringer, who graduated from German Township High School -- now a part of the Albert Gallatin School District -- and went on to a stellar basketball career at Slippery Rock University.

After graduating from Slippery Rock in 1970, she earned her master's degree and then built Cheyney State College, now Cheyney University of Pennsylvania, into a national women's basketball powerhouse from 1971-83. A volunteer coach for her first 10 seasons, she had no budget for scholarships or recruiting.

In 1983, she left Cheyney, a traditionally black school near Philadelphia, for Iowa, where she built the Hawkeyes into a Big Ten and national power. She came to Rutgers in 1995 and has led the Scarlet Knights to two Final Fours.

Ms. Stringer also won a gold medal as an assistant coach with the U.S. Olympic team in 2004 and has had 10 of her players drafted by WNBA teams.

Her teams have been built on three principles: hard work, defense and toughness. Her teams at Cheyney often practiced against the men's team -- which was coached by her close friend and mentor, John Chaney -- and played very much the same style of basketball for which Mr. Chaney (best known for his Temple teams) is famous.

That didn't change at Iowa or at Rutgers, where the Scarlet Knights are usually at or near the top of the Big East in defensive categories.

"I've coached against Vivian's teams for years and years," said University of Pittsburgh coach Agnus Berenato. "And you always know this: When you play them, you'd better be ready to fight and you'd better be ready to play hard because they are going to be physical and they are coming after you.

"They are a reflection of her -- tough, strong-willed and passionate."

From a coach who didn't get paid and had to drive her team in a broken-down prison bus, Ms. Stringer has become one of the highest-paid coaches in her profession.

"There is no question that my upbringing, the blue-collar mentality of Western Pennsylvania where I was raised, is why we do things the way we do them here and the way we've always done them," Ms. Stringer said.

"The players understand that this isn't for everyone. You're going to work harder than you think you can and you're going to be pushed to reach your potential. But that's the only way I know how to do things.

"It is the same way I was raised, you don't embarrass your parents or your family by doing the wrong things, you do the right things because that's how a family works," she said. "It didn't matter what we had or didn't have -- we took care of it and we were proud of it, and I expect the same attitude from my players."

That philosophy has made Ms. Stringer, whose 2008 biography "Standing Tall: A Memoir of Tragedy and Triumph" was a best-seller, a role model and mother figure to many former players and colleagues.

"Coach Stringer is genuine, one of the most genuine people I know," said Debra Walker, who played from 1979 to 1982 at Cheyney. "And we were treated like family.

"She was tough, she was hard on us, she pushed us, she motivated us -- and we loved her for it because we knew she was doing it to get the best from us," said Ms. Walker, now a postal worker in Detroit.

"That's why to this day, my teammates and I and coach are very close, because we didn't just learn about succeeding in basketball, she taught us how to succeed in life," she said.

"I often hear about how she hasn't won 'the big one' and that's false. She wins the big one every day because so many of us wouldn't be where we are if it weren't for her pushing us all these years."

Christine Grant was the athletic director for women's sports at the University of Iowa from 1973-2000 and lured Ms. Stringer from Cheyney.

"When she came to us, a lot of people were skeptical about her resume because she had so much success, she got to a Final Four, she had won like 80 percent of her games and did so without a budget at Cheyney," Dr. Grant said. "But she was quickly embraced by Iowa, and not just because her teams won, but because people in Iowa shared and appreciated her values, her sense of community and family."

Dr. Grant said Ms. Stringer had three goals when she was hired at Iowa -- to win the Big Ten, which the Hawkeyes did six times in her 12 seasons; to get to a Final Four, which they did in 1993; and to fill the then-newly built 15,500-seat Carver-Hawkeye arena, which they did that year for a game against Ohio State.

"I don't know that she's ever failed at anything she's put her mind to," Dr. Grant said.

Ms. Stringer, whose Scarlet Knights (19-11) will play Louisville at 6 p.m. today in a game televised by ESPNU, is in her 38th season. She is only the third women's basketball coach to have achieved 800 or more wins. With two more victories this season, she would join Tennessee's Pat Summit as the only women's coaches with 30 or more 20-win seasons.

She is also the only coach to have guided three different programs to the Final Four -- at Cheyney in 1982; at Iowa in 1993 and at Rutgers in 2000 and 2007. She was inducted into the Women's Basketball Hall of Fame in 2001, and three weeks ago was named a finalist for induction into the Naismith Hall of Fame.

Next week, her Scarlet Knights likely will be selected to compete in the NCAA tournament for the 11th time in 12 years.

But victories and NCAA tournaments are only a small part of what makes Ms. Stringer's journey extraordinary.

Her first battle with racism came in high school, when she was cut from the cheerleading squad. With a shove from her father and the help of the NAACP, she fought -- with another black student -- for spots on the team.

In 1981, Ms. Stringer's daughter Nina was stricken with spinal meningitis, which left the girl reliant on a wheelchair and unable to speak.

In 1992, at the height of her coaching success at Iowa, her husband and the father of her three children, Bill Stringer, died of a heart attack. Her nephew, Korey Stringer, was an offensive tackle for the Minnesota Vikings but died during training camp in 2001 of heatstroke.

She has had other struggles -- notably the high-profile dispute in 2007 with radio personality Don Imus, who insulted her team with a racial slur and was subsequently fired by CBS Radio.

Yet from that ordeal, Ms. Stringer said, her players learned inestimable lessons.

"I'm sure they don't know what many of us went through, but how could they if we don't tell them?" she said. "It is up to us as parents, as teachers, as role models to educate them and that's what I see as my most important role.

"I want them to respect themselves and I think what happens is, with the progress we've made, we forget sometimes that there is still work to be done."