State of the program

[Coach4pride]

Ok, tab and anyone else I have given my opinion to here are my thoughts on things right now.

We all know Villanova is a high academic school, ands it's not for everyone. But our pool of players is extremely small due to the fields our recruits choose. A lot of nursing, and business students. Nothing wrong with that, but they are not the easiest schools to get into at Nova.

Do you think that is used against us on the recruiting trail? Yes!
Schools say "Oh, we can take you, you can get in our program without a doubt, at Villanova...I'm not so sure." Etc. Our pool of players is small, thus HP is recruiting from all over the country. California, Ohio, Va. etc. You have to to find high academic kids that can play at a BE level. You miss on your 1st or 2nd target, then you are really down to slim pickings.

It is not for lack of trying. Nova was in the running for a sharpshooter out of NC last year. She ended up signing with UNC. Good player, but it would not surprise me if she is more than a role player there, where she could have been a big time contibutor at Nova. Time will tell, but I bet she will wish she had signed with VU before it is all over.). And we all know the EDD story. She could have possibly been big time here, but she went with the name school....and we know how that turned out.

I think we are heading in the right direction. The latest addition to the staff (Heather V.- recruiting coord.) seems to be doing a good job of trying to add athleticism to our team to compete with the Big East. Our latest class has 3 young ladies that supposedly will do that, but they will be Fr. so they will not jump in and take over.

I think HP really has overachieved in the early 2000's (which has set up some serious expectations). He was able to knock off the UConn's, make a Elite 8 run, get to the NCAA year before last led by a player that couldn't get on the court at Duke, etc. All with kids who could get in academically and graduate at Villanova, but wouldn't get off the bench at most BE/ACC schools. It is what it is, and he still needs to win, and I think he will. (I see Villanova a lot like Wake Forest in the ACC- super high academics competing in a tough neighborhood.)

HP had schools all over him after the Elite 8 run throwing a lot more money at him, but he stayed, he is loyal, he wants to win here.

So, to wrap up, I think we are going to need patience, let the staff recruit a few more classes with HV leading the way on the trail. We can't change the admission standards but if we did, you would see more talent walking through the door.

I didn't mean to be so harsh on tab, but I just don't think the standard "Fire the coach!" idea is the answer. HP knows his X's and O's, we just have to do a better job on the trail and I think we are headed that way. Hopefully things can be more positive on the boards for prospective players and parents to read.

Bash away!!
This post was edited on 1/7 12:33 PM by Coach4pride

 

[needatobaby]

Interesting. I personally do not believe that the academics has much to do with it. We attract smart athletes but our academics should not hinder us in recruiting athletes. I don't think anyone would say Stanford is a second rate school. Not ALL of our present players are rocket scientists. The average is built up by the Suheys who carry close to a 4.0 in engineering. Stunning!! 2 of the best players in Philadelphia this year are going to DePaul. I think Bruno has something to do with that.
Talk all we want, a student athlete comes to our games, watches Harry on the floor and has serious second thoughts of playing 4 years here. He has calmed down somewhat. Heather is a great addition and actually does recruit. Harry does not like to fly, and in fact rarely flies, even to our away games. Makes it hard for him to actively recruit on the road.

 

[needatobaby]

Sorry, didn't finish. To say Harry exceeded is baloney. His players have. The team that went to the NCAA couple years ago, as you say, led by a player that rode the bench at Duke, also had 2 other seniors Karcic and OConnor with getty. I would say all of them would have been playing on other BE teams. Maybe not starting but definitely playing.
The failure of a program starts at the top. Here the University is not going to fold, the AD is not quitting, so who is next. Sweeney was a top AAU player and highly recruited. She has not improved at all at Nova and I believe has worsened. There is no team leadership and team leaders are not developed. I can see some fire in the belly with Kane and hope she doesn't lose it. I worry if others read these threads but hopefully someone will realize it is not crazy ranting and actually come to a game or games. Tpenter is at most games and I respect his judgment. He has no personal interest but a love of college womens hoops. Coaches have to work and if you knew how much our head coach actually worked, you would put him in Congress!!

 

[tab]

Boston College, Notre Dame, Duke, Stanford have no problem getting students who can play basketball. The reasons that Villanova does not attrack recruits has been discussed on this board for years, academics, style of play, demeanor of the coach during the game ...... The bottom line is that the program has been in freefall the past few years with no change in sight. Women's basketball can draw fans with a successful program. This helps defray the cost of the program. Play 4 Pride you don't have to apologize to me. You are entitled to your opinion and I hope you are right about the direction of the program; however, I just don't share your optomism. Sometimes change is necessary.

 

[tpenter]

Wow! I don't usually chime in on the keep/fire Harry debate, but I did want to respond to needatobaby's kind words and respond to a point that tab made with regard to the financial viability of the women's game today.

I have little technical expertise on the game, made a few starts on my freshman high school team and hung up the converse high-tops long ago. My interest in the women's game started way back in college when I saw a premier player for my Division III school do things I didn't know women could do on a basketball court (Susan Highfill, I think she still holds the Virginia State career scoring record and was a close second to Carol Blazecki from Montclair on the national record for a number of years).

I followed the women via the newspaper and the few televised games, started attending the Final Four in the late 90's In those glory years of the early 2000's I felt that the women's game was following the path of the 1970'S men in terms of growth, with increaed attendance, teams other than UConn and Tennessee making their mark (Purdue and Notre Dame) and an increased level of play overall with more parity.

At that time I came to the realization that I should be supporting some of the local teams with my attendance. From ease of access that morphed into St. Joes and Nova. The Nova NCAA teams of 2002, 2003 and 2004 were fascinating to watch. The St. Joes team of 2004 a great disappointment in having a 19 win team from the year before return every single player and fail to win the Big 5, A-10 or qualify for the NCAA. Never have been a fan of Cathy Griffin since then. Harry's teams on the other hand seemed to always over-acheive against taller, faster, more talented and experienced teams. The ball control, time management and in-bound plays on display in the two UConn wins were a testament in developing the only game plan that would have allowed Nova to win those two games and actually excuting it. Kudos to Harry and the players that made that happen and I hooked my wagon to Nova from that point on.

As I see it, Harry's style of play requires intelligent players that can handle the ball, play tenacious defense and shoot the three ball. This is required of all five positions as we frequently have the post player out on the perimeter. Defensively we are pretty solid, but the offense doesn't seem to have all the parts to make it work. At this point in time we always seem to have two players on the court at any given time that are either not great ball-handlers or able to make the three with any regularity. The lack of speed and quickness prevents our offense from getting on track and when our offensive set does work to get the open shot we are not making them.

Given Harry's demanor and the style of play we are not going to be able to recruit a real big, nor a run and gun style of player and certianly not anyone with thin-skin. Thus we are limited as to the type of player that we can recruit. Nevertheless, the players that we get need to be quick ballhandlers and sharpshooters and we don't seem to be getting those either. Will the current redshirt frontliners and the current recruiting class turn things around? Time will tell. Will Harry's style of play ever change? Very unlikely. The Nova team has been hard to watch over most of the last five years, even when we win it has usually been ugly.

With respect to the overall strength of the women's game noted by Tab - as noted above, a decade ago I thought the women were on a track to match the growth of the men's game post UCLA. The final four was selling out bigger and bigger venues each year and the tournament changed to full neutral sites like the men. Unfortunately the past several years have regressed to the point where once again one of the big two win every year, the final four does not sell out and is reverting to smaller venues starting this year. The initial rounds of the tournament are going to have to go back to home team locales as the attendence is almost nil unless a home team is playing at the pre-determined sites.

Other than some of the Big 12 teams, a few Big East Teams and Tennessee, the attendance at most games are puny. Duke and North Carolina never seem to be able to draw a decent crowd even with good teams. Note that there was almost three thousand empty seats at the UConn Nova game just one game after their first loss in three years! They are the two-time defending national champion and can't sell out. The poor ecomony of the past two years has exposed that paying to go to a women's game is a very low priority luxury. The thousands of empty seats at the past three final fours has been really an eye-opener. The semi-finals last year were saved by an incredible last minute sales push from all of the Baylor folks coming in from Waco. I have come to the conclusion that other than a few top teams there is little hope of a financial self supporting women's basketball program. Teams in metropolitan areas like Philly just have so much more going on to attract any disposible income that even with a top-notch program the best average attendance would probably be no more than a few thousand people a game.

Wow! Time for bed. Maybe dreaming of a win of Rutgers tomorrow!

 

[tab]

I agree that there is a stagnation in growth of women's basketball which in large part is due to the dominance of certain teams (lack of competitive games); however, if a program is competitive within the Big East it would draw more than the several hundred, if that, we now draw. Even if we drew one thousand fans it would, at the reasonble prices we charge, mean a take of $10,000 times 12 games. This would defray some of the cost of the program. There are plenty of young women that are interested in collegiate women's sports. Our problem is marketing and product. We should be giving free tickets to inner city youth and suburban young women in order to cultivate this interest and develop a brand loyalty to Villanova. An effort has to be made to improve the product and the marketing of that product. Prior to the recent demise of the program I always thought that for the price the women's game was a great ticket for young women and their families. As an example, I read in the paper today that Temple's women played an away game at Charlotte. The game drew over 3,000 fans.
This post was edited on 1/8 7:48 AM by tab

 

[Uncle Don]

Why can't we recruit?Our program has fallen the past couple of years to a low level mid-major team.Did any notice the team is mostly blond pony tail 5'10" girls.WHY??

 

[Coach4pride]

That is going to change starting next year....

2011 recruiting class

 

[needatobaby]

Great discussion! I , for one, am happy that Coach4pride started it. A good step in the right direction. If only we could rule by committee!!

 

[whitecat]

Coach, we don't know from the brief summaries of the three recruits if they
are any better than the players we have. A good measuring stick would be what other teams were recruiting them. Even as the program started to decline we were competitive with some teams in the BE; it doesn't appear to be the case now. I have watched the LadyCats since the days before Shelly Penneyfather since our family had a home in the Philly burbs. And I would go out and watch them play> In addition, I have driven to such places as Providence and State College for games, and I live in the hills of central N.Y. When the talent level of teams was somewhat even, I thought HP could pull a play out of his bag of tricks, and we could steal a win. Those days might be gone.

 

[steve_vu9196]

The initial posters claim that our academic standards are a barrier for Harry is ludicrous and laughable.

 

[Coach4pride]

And for you to say it's not is even more ridiculous and laughable.

 

[steve_vu9196]

Notre Dame and Georgetown are in our league, in the top-25, and ALL their programs are way more difficult to get into than Villanova. Duke and Stanford are in the top-10 and way more difficult to get into than Villanova.

So you're telling me that Harry is only recruiting players that want to be nurses, and these enlightened young women just aren't up to snuff academically to get into Villanova, thus the program is failing.

Complete garbage.

Harry has brought this program from its infancy through some real high points. But the style of play he employs might have been nice when the overall talent level in the women's game was less, but that style is so boring and outdated that no girl with any significant talent would want to play it. The program is in the toilet, and if anybody cared, Harry would be gone already.

 

[Coach4pride]

Boy, talk about twisting words around.

I didn't say ALL of our recruits are business or nursing majors, but we have had several prospects in the past that had the VU admission standards used against us on the recruiting trail.

Ok, you name a few other high academic schools. Well guess what, the pool is shallow to get in those schools, plus the schools with lesser restrictions want those same players too. I credit Stanford, Duke, etc. They recruit well.

So the same style of play that had him making the tourney, making the Elite Eight, making Pat Summitt want to come and study it, has Harry on the road often because coaches across the country want him to speak at their clinics,....is outdated? Doesn't sound like it!

Time will tell if Heather V.'s influence as recruiting coord. will bring in more athleticism and talent. Looks like 3 signed on next year to help the program.

Here is an article regarding one of next year's recruits....

Burton leads the way

 

[tab]

Save us with the Pat Summit argument. If you can point to one game that Tennessee employed Harry's system then the argument would be valid. Coach your taking this all to personally. Try to be objective. I hope the changes you point our reverse the direction of the program. One of the problems is the passage of time before these changes have taken place. Even with the changes that you address there are other problems that exist which have been pointed out by tpenter and needatwobaby that must be addressed and they are obvious if you attend games.
This post was edited on 1/11 3:13 PM by tab

 

[whitecat]

tab,

Somewhere you mentioned in this thread the Pat S. trip to see Harry. Most coaches, including very successful ones, go to clinics/camps with a sound belief system, and they are only looking for a few drills or a set to put into their system.

During my teaching days I spoke at numerous conferences, and I was asked if I would send a copy of my curricula to many people. To mention but a few things I would respond that it could be adapted in certain ways, but it couldn't be adopted into a school system with far different philosophies.

I googled the names of the three new recruits, and found some things, but I found nothing about other schools that recruited them. At least they are not from the PCL girls' league where low scoring games are common.

 

[ace]

Whitecat
A little while ago we lost a recruit that picked Lafayette over us.
Why are we recruiting CAA type of players?
Posted from wireless.rivals.com[/URL]

 

[whitecat]

Ace,

I have a few ideas, and they have been on this board repeatedly the last few years. You know that I came down for a game or two a year when we were very good and even just competitive. You and I were sitting in front of Steve Mix when Courtney scored her 1000th point. Many other BE teams have significantly improved their talent level while we have not.

 

[tnj]

If Harry was the coach of the men's team for all these years and maintained his current overall performance he would have been gone a very long time ago. There is nothing left to say...

 

[tab]

You have to look at the positives. We outscored Providence in the second half.