GAINESVILLE — Mike Holloway had come agonizingly close before.
This time, Florida’s iconic track and field coach finally delivered perfection.
The moment the bowling ball left his hand, Holloway knew.
“Halfway down the lane, I thought it was a strike — and it was,” he told the Orlando Sentinel.
Three consecutive strikes to close the game completed a long-awaited 300, bowling’s gold standard. Holloway even has a ring emblazoned with “300” to commemorate one of his favorite athletic accomplishments away from the track.
At Florida, though, perfection has looked different.
For more than two decades, the man best know as “Mouse” has built one of the most successful programs in college sports, piling up championships with a consistency few coaches in any sport can match.
The latest SEC title was the 20th of Holloway’s career. His program entered this week at the NCAA Outdoor Championships in Eugene, Oregon, with 14 national titles in the trophy case and realistic chances at adding Nos. 15 and 16.
Holloway especially likes the outlook for a women’s team that has spent years operating in the shadows of the powerhouse men’s program, winners of seven national outdoor titles — including in 2022 when the women also won.
Last month, Gators rolled to the SEC title by 20 ½ points over Alabama to sweep the conference cross country, indoor and outdoor championships. It marked the women’s first triple crown since the 1996-97 season under the late Tom Jones.
“The women have been doing this for a while,” Holloway said. “It’s just been because of the ultra success of the men’s program. People say, ‘What’s wrong with your women’s team?’ I’m like, ‘There’s nothing wrong with the women; they just happen to be on the same campus with the best team in the last two decades, that’s all.’
“It’s just that the shine is on them now.”
The spotlight rarely stays away from Holloway for long.
Everything at James G. Pressly Stadium/Percy Beard Track tends to orbit around the program’s 67-year-old coach, whose ability to identify talent, build culture and manage personalities has been the foundations of Florida’s success.
Florida track and field coach Mike Holloway addresses his athletes during the Pepsi Relays on April 4 at Percy Beard Track at James G. Pressly Stadium in Gainesville. (Rachel Rusch / UF’s University Athletics Association Communications)
“He understands people,” record-setting discus throw Alidda van Daalen told the Sentinel. “Before he recruits with them, he just can see if it’s a fit for the team or not, or if he likes their personality. You can be the greatest athlete to be stepping foot in Florida, but if he doesn’t like your attitude, you’re not coming here.
“I respect that from him, because that keeps a very good balance in our team.”
Holloway’s impact resonates throughout the athletic department.
“He’s just really driven, has an incredible work ethic and he never makes excuses,” athletic director Scottt Stricklin told the Sentinel. “Whatever he has to work with, he’s like, it’s our job to figure it out now. He’s got a kind of a can-do attitude, and that leads to a lot of success.”
Holloway’s ability to strike the right balance invariably shows during championship season.
Florida has produced Olympic champions Grant Holloway, Kerron Clement, Christian Taylor and Tony McQuay under his watch. More recently, distance runner Parker Valby recently rewrote the collegiate record books, while van Daalen continues to push the boundaries in the discus.
Her throw of 218 feet, 10 inches set an SEC Championship meet record, and her toss of 227-5 at the East Preliminary on May 30 is the longest throw ever recorded at an NCAA-sanctioned event.
“That’s kind of what we do,” Mike Holloway said. “This is kind of the Florida way.”
Yet some of his best coaching has come without transcendent stars.
The 2024 men’s team edged Auburn 41-40 for the national championship by winning on the margins. Ten different athletes carved out points, ranging from a runner-up finish to an eighth-place showing worth a single point — ultimately the difference between first and second.
The victory was another chapter in a remarkable run of success.
Florida as a whole has won at least one national team championship since the men’s indoor track and field title in 2010, a streak that now stretches through the men’s basketball title in 2025.
Ten different men’s and women’s programs have claimed national championships during that span. Track and field stood alone as the university’s sole title winner during six separate years: 2011, 2016, 2018, 2019, 2022 and 2024.
As the NCAA Championships begin, Stricklin and Gator Nation know exactly where to place their faith.
“In Mouse we trust,” Stricklin said.
The confidence comes from years of results.
It’s the same self-assurancedness Holloway eventually developed as a bowler after taking up the sport in 2012 when fellow coaches invited him to Ally Gatorz Bowling Center.
“We joined the league, and I wasn’t very good,” he recalled.
True to form, Holloway, a former hurdler and recreational basketball player, went to work. He raised his average from 150 to more than 200. A decade earler, Holloway was on pace for a perfect game when he reached the 11th frame, finishing with a 289.
“I missed my mark by about that much” he said, holding his thumb and forefinger centimeters apart. “I left the wall pin as the head pin, which is really hard to do.”
This time was different.
After burying the pocket twice to open the 10th frame, he arrived at the 12th free of mind.
“I go, ‘Hey, I can throw it in the gutter now. That’s a new PB, it’s 291,’ ” Holloway said. “That helped me relax.”
Florida fans can feel much the same this week.
The Gators’ championship streak is on the line, but it remains in the hands of a coach who has spent a career delivering when the pressure is greatest.
Edgar Thompson can be reached at egthompson@orlandosentinel.com