Ramon Asa Mears was born in Dover, Ohio. He played basketball at Cadiz High School until he was diagnosed with tuberculosis in his sophomore year. With the disease in remission, he played his junior and senior years at Cadiz. Upon graduating from high school, he worked six 12-hour days a week in the steel mills until he had saved enough money to enroll at Miami of Ohio. He walked on with the basketball squad and was offered a scholarship for his senior year. (He declined the scholarship, preferring to be able to say that he worked his way through college.)
He coached at the high school level before becoming head coach at Wittenberg University (Springfield, Ohio). Under Mears, the Whittenberg team won 121 victories in 144 games and three NCAA college-division national championships. He joined UT in April 1962 as head basketball coach. At Wittenberg, he had used the pep band, majorettes, and the team’s entry onto the arena floor through a giant paper replica of the school’s mascot to increase fan appeal. At Tennessee he also combined showmanship with excellent basketball. He introduced the playing by the pep band in the stands, had the team enter through a giant “T,” lowered the house lights and had drum rolls sound as the Vols took the court, featured a unicycle rider who shot baskets, had the team perform complicated warm-up exercises that showcased ball handling, and finished his first season (most of which was led by Assistant Coach Bill Gibbs) 13-11 with a two-game sweep over Kentucky.
Mears started the Orange Tie Club and the wearing of orange and white at athletic contests, and he even had a bear wrestled during halftime at one game. As part of a 1960s promotional campaign, he introduced the term Big Orange Country to Tennessee. He was sometimes referred to as the “Barnum of Basketball.” During his 15 years (1963–77) as head coach, Mears’s teams were 278 to 112 (.713 winning percentage). The Vols won three conference titles: 1966–67, 1971–72, and 1976–77, and played in three NCAA tournaments. He coached 12 All-America players and 27 All-SEC performers. In 1969 a street, Ray Mears Boulevard, was named for him.
He suffered from exhaustion in 1962–63, and the pills he took to combat it led him to turn the team over to Assistant Coach Bill Gibbs and take a vacation. In 1962–63, he had another breakdown and underwent shock treatments at a Virginia psychiatric hospital. After leaving UT he served as athletics director at UT at Martin. On February 10, 1990, the west multipurpose room in Thompson-Boling Arena was named the Ray Mears Room, celebrating his contributions to Tennessee basketball. On March 1, 2006, during halftime of the UT-Kentucky basketball game, a banner celebrating his years as head coach (1963–99) was hung from the rafters at Thompson-Boling Arena, and in the same year, Coach Bruce Pearl agreed with Mears to wear a signature orange blazer at the Vanderbilt and Kentucky games.