Only Jim Foster would make the final decision of his 40-year coaching career while standing on Cape Reinga, the northernmost point of New Zealand.
The Tasman Sea to the west and the Pacific Ocean to the east meet at that cape, and it has become a favorite vacation stop for the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga women's basketball coach and his wife, Donna, during recent offseasons.
So as he stood there a couple of weeks ago, watching this colossal convergence of water bodies while standing atop a cape he often refers to as "my favorite place in the world," Foster said to himself, while meaning no disrespect to Chattanooga's most famous water source, "I like the Tennessee River, but that ain't it."
Just like that, the five-year swan song of the most nationally decorated coach in UTC athletic history - architect of 903 wins at four Division I schools (those schools reaching the NCAA tournament a total of 30 times under his watch), a member of the Women's Basketball Hall of Fame, a model most excellent of what all coaches should strive to be - came to a close, his official retirement appropriately announced inside McKenzie Arena's Hall of Fame Room on Tuesday afternoon.
It wasn't only Cape Reinga, of course. A man as worldly as the 69-year-old Foster, a man who knows as much about fine art and finer wine as he does about X's and O's, found multiple reasons to call it quits.
"My sons Christian and Andrew both wanted me to retire," Foster said. "They said they wanted to hang out with me more."
There was also, perhaps most important of all, Donna to consider. They've been together from the beginning, when he was making all of $3,000 a year to "pursue my passion."
He's made much more than that in the years since, but he's also moved his family from Philadelphia (St. Joseph's) to Nashville (Vanderbilt) to Columbus, Ohio (Ohio State), to Chattanooga.
"It's time for her," he said, "to say where she wants to move."
He also had just watched one of the really good guys and coaches in the Southern Conference - Western Carolina's Larry Hunter - pass away last week, just two months after retiring from the Catamounts men's team.
"Coach Hunter's death," Foster said, "that sort of thing wakes you up. What's real? What's real?"
What's certain is that it will be real hard to replace Foster, though the perfect hire for first-year athletic director Mark Wharton is already on staff: Katie Burrows.
As Foster noted, "Katie's a lifelong resident of Chattanooga. She's been a head coach at the high school level. She's been an assistant here for two successful coaches (Foster and Wes Moore). She played here and hit the biggest shot in school history (to help beat Rutgers in the NCAA tourney). I think she's more than ready to be a head coach."
A suggestion for one of her first moves should she get the job: No one embraced the late UTC super fan Henry "Where's the defense, Mocs?" Davenport more than Foster, who made him a part of his own family at Vanderbilt after meeting him here at the SEC women's tourney in the early 1990s. One of the only things Foster didn't accomplish here was starting a Henry Davenport Invitational, which was long his goal.
In honor of Foster, the school needs to explore starting the Henry Davenport Classic by starting a long home-and-home series, one game a year, against Vanderbilt.
"Yes, the Henry Davenport Classic," Foster said with a grin, "because Henry was definitely a classic."
But Foster was the ultimate classic, a one-of-a-kind treasure that we come across far, far too seldom these days in the coaching world or anywhere else.
Asked the two things she most learned from Foster, Burrows said, "Patience and wine."
During his remarks, Wharton observed, "I'll miss the black sweater. I think we all will."
He also said of Foster, "He's the most genuine man. He cares about his players. He cares about his staff. You are in awe of what he's done."
What he and Donna will do next is uncertain. They'll certainly travel to see children and grandchildren and dear friends, including former LSU and Vanderbilt head football coach Gerry DiNardo and UConn women's coach Geno Auriemma, whom Foster swears has a far better wine collection than he does.
In fact, he intends to toast his retirement with Auriemma sometime in the fairly near future.
"He was there in the beginning," Foster said, "so it's only fitting that he's there at the end."
Yet no one should fear this is the end for the Foster's time in the Scenic City. They've made too many friends, found too many things to embrace, everything from Sofie's boutique to the Hummingbird Cafe to the Lookout Winery and Pizzeria in Guild, Tenn.
But if anyone needs an overriding reason to miss Foster as a coach and educator, repeat for them this quote from him Tuesday: "Cutting down nets is great. Watching people grow up is better."
Contact Mark Wiedmer at mwiedmer@timesfreepress.com.