Good News, Bad News From The Weekend
posted by Scott Hood, 5/12/2008 12:48:00 AM
THE GOOD NEWS: Some of you, I’m sure, yawned when you first heard the news about South Carolina hiring Dawn Staley as the new head women’s basketball coach.
Then you found out what they were going to pay her and you jerked to attention. Hey, a guaranteed $650,000 per year has that kind of effect on people.
But here’s the deal: most of you don’t follow women’s college basketball at all. Okay, you know there’s Tennessee and UConn and Rutgers (only because of the Don Imus affair last year) and a couple of other teams.
Staley is one of the biggest names in women’s basketball, pro or college. In many respects, her hiring is analogous to USC snagging Steve Spurrier nearly four years ago. Both Staley and Spurrier are held in the same high regard among their peers in their respective professions.
Greatness is expensive. Eric Hyman wants the USC women’s basketball program to be great, just like he wants the football, men’s basketball, and baseball teams to be winners as well.
Unlike the fans, Hyman doesn’t play favorites. In his view, the women’s cross-country coach is just as important as Steve Spurrier. Of course, they’re paid differently, but money doesn’t determine who’s important and who’s not in the eyes of any credible Division I athletic director.
Hyman knew that if the USC women’s team was going to challenge the elite of the SEC, it needed a coach that could take the Gamecocks to that high level. Dawn Staley was that coach.
Coaches of Staley’s caliber don’t come cheap. Heck, she was already making $500,000 per year at Temple. But her record (six NCAA appearances in eight years) supported that type of wage scale. The opportunity to hire a truly great coach comes along only rarely.
Of course, some of you will say “I don’t care whether the USC women’s basketball team wins or not.” But, I can assure you Hyman cares a lot. And so do most members of the Board of Trustees, which quickly approved Staley’s five-year, $3.25 million deal Saturday morning.
While baseball is clearly the No. 3 sport (you could argue it’s No. 2) at USC behind football and men’s basketball, nationally that’s not the case. Women’s basketball is much more visible than baseball, and gets a lot more media coverage, and respect, from both major newspapers and cable TV.
College baseball is popular in the Southeastern United States and the West Coast, which is why most of the teams in the College World Series annually come from those regions.
But outside of those areas, college baseball is a blip on the radar screen. Most newspapers and other media outlets in the Northeast and Midwest do a very good job ignoring the sport.
So, if you’re willing to accept the reality that women’s college basketball is an established sport nationally, you’ll eventually come to appreciate the investment USC has made in the program by hiring Staley.
In my opinion, it was necessary to get someone of Staley’s talents if USC wanted to become relevant in the SEC, a league dominated by Tennessee, LSU, Georgia and Vanderbilt in recent years. Staley will unquestionably bring top-notch recruits to Columbia, just like I expect Darrin Horn will do the same for the men’s hoops team.
It will take time for both new coaches, but I think they will prove to be spectacular hires.
THE BAD NEWS: Well, it was another forgettable weekend for the baseball team in the Ozarks. Unfortunately, there have been too many of those this season, especially on the road.
With just one weekend remaining in conference play, USC finds itself on the outside looking in when it comes to the SEC Tournament. They’re currently No. 9 on the ladder. But only eight teams earn invitations to Hoover.
Houston, we have a problem.
Fortunately, a poor Tennessee (11-16 in SEC) team comes to Sarge Frye Field starting Thursday, and, based on the way the conference matchups fall on the final weekend (including Ole Miss at Kentucky), it appears USC will need to win just two of three games against the below average Vols to advance to the conference tournament.
Even if the Gamecocks get the opportunity to play in the post-season, that won’t neutralize the fact that 2008 has been a disappointing season for USC. They have three potential first-round picks on their roster. They’re lacking a stud No. 1 pitcher, but the staff has for the most part been adequate this season.
Based on the way the pitching staff performed this past weekend at Arkansas, USC should have won at least one if not two games. Then there was the blown six-run lead late in Game 1 on Friday night.
By my count, USC has dropped three conference games this season they had no business losing. The first came in the opening SEC game of the season when a solo homer with two outs in the bottom of the ninth tied the score before Vanderbilt won it in the 13th inning.
The second came April 26 when LSU rallied from a huge deficit to tie the score late before a comedy of errors in the bottom of the 11th inning allowed the Tigers to score twice for the win.
The third ‘give-a-way’ came last Friday night at Arkansas when the Razorbacks won the game in stunning fashion with a pinch-hit walk-off grand slam in the bottom of the ninth inning.
If you reverse the outcome of those three games, USC is 16-11 in the SEC and talking about hosting both rounds of the NCAA Tournament.
In short, if USC somehow doesn’t make it to Hoover, they will have no one to blame but themselves. Regrettably, the Gamecocks late season slump has likely cost themselves a chance to host a NCAA Regional. Even if USC sweeps Tennessee, I can’t see a 16-14 team being awarded anything except a bus ticket to somewhere else.
So, the Gamecocks will probably have to hit the road to make it as far as the College World Series in Omaha for the first time since 2004.
After watching USC go 4-11 in SEC road games this season, I’ll understand if there are more than a few skeptics out there.
College athletics mirrors life in that you have good days and you have bad days. This past weekend reflected that reality, as it was filled with plenty of good news and bad news for Gamecock fans to swallow.
THE GOOD NEWS: Some of you, I’m sure, yawned when you first heard the news about South Carolina hiring Dawn Staley as the new head women’s basketball coach.
Then you found out what they were going to pay her and you jerked to attention. Hey, a guaranteed $650,000 per year has that kind of effect on people.
But here’s the deal: most of you don’t follow women’s college basketball at all. Okay, you know there’s Tennessee and UConn and Rutgers (only because of the Don Imus affair last year) and a couple of other teams.
Staley is one of the biggest names in women’s basketball, pro or college. In many respects, her hiring is analogous to USC snagging Steve Spurrier nearly four years ago. Both Staley and Spurrier are held in the same high regard among their peers in their respective professions.
Greatness is expensive. Eric Hyman wants the USC women’s basketball program to be great, just like he wants the football, men’s basketball, and baseball teams to be winners as well.
Unlike the fans, Hyman doesn’t play favorites. In his view, the women’s cross-country coach is just as important as Steve Spurrier. Of course, they’re paid differently, but money doesn’t determine who’s important and who’s not in the eyes of any credible Division I athletic director.
Hyman knew that if the USC women’s team was going to challenge the elite of the SEC, it needed a coach that could take the Gamecocks to that high level. Dawn Staley was that coach.
Coaches of Staley’s caliber don’t come cheap. Heck, she was already making $500,000 per year at Temple. But her record (six NCAA appearances in eight years) supported that type of wage scale. The opportunity to hire a truly great coach comes along only rarely.
Of course, some of you will say “I don’t care whether the USC women’s basketball team wins or not.” But, I can assure you Hyman cares a lot. And so do most members of the Board of Trustees, which quickly approved Staley’s five-year, $3.25 million deal Saturday morning.
While baseball is clearly the No. 3 sport (you could argue it’s No. 2) at USC behind football and men’s basketball, nationally that’s not the case. Women’s basketball is much more visible than baseball, and gets a lot more media coverage, and respect, from both major newspapers and cable TV.
College baseball is popular in the Southeastern United States and the West Coast, which is why most of the teams in the College World Series annually come from those regions.
But outside of those areas, college baseball is a blip on the radar screen. Most newspapers and other media outlets in the Northeast and Midwest do a very good job ignoring the sport.
So, if you’re willing to accept the reality that women’s college basketball is an established sport nationally, you’ll eventually come to appreciate the investment USC has made in the program by hiring Staley.
In my opinion, it was necessary to get someone of Staley’s talents if USC wanted to become relevant in the SEC, a league dominated by Tennessee, LSU, Georgia and Vanderbilt in recent years. Staley will unquestionably bring top-notch recruits to Columbia, just like I expect Darrin Horn will do the same for the men’s hoops team.
It will take time for both new coaches, but I think they will prove to be spectacular hires.
THE BAD NEWS: Well, it was another forgettable weekend for the baseball team in the Ozarks. Unfortunately, there have been too many of those this season, especially on the road.
With just one weekend remaining in conference play, USC finds itself on the outside looking in when it comes to the SEC Tournament. They’re currently No. 9 on the ladder. But only eight teams earn invitations to Hoover.
Houston, we have a problem.
Fortunately, a poor Tennessee (11-16 in SEC) team comes to Sarge Frye Field starting Thursday, and, based on the way the conference matchups fall on the final weekend (including Ole Miss at Kentucky), it appears USC will need to win just two of three games against the below average Vols to advance to the conference tournament.
Even if the Gamecocks get the opportunity to play in the post-season, that won’t neutralize the fact that 2008 has been a disappointing season for USC. They have three potential first-round picks on their roster. They’re lacking a stud No. 1 pitcher, but the staff has for the most part been adequate this season.
Based on the way the pitching staff performed this past weekend at Arkansas, USC should have won at least one if not two games. Then there was the blown six-run lead late in Game 1 on Friday night.
By my count, USC has dropped three conference games this season they had no business losing. The first came in the opening SEC game of the season when a solo homer with two outs in the bottom of the ninth tied the score before Vanderbilt won it in the 13th inning.
The second came April 26 when LSU rallied from a huge deficit to tie the score late before a comedy of errors in the bottom of the 11th inning allowed the Tigers to score twice for the win.
The third ‘give-a-way’ came last Friday night at Arkansas when the Razorbacks won the game in stunning fashion with a pinch-hit walk-off grand slam in the bottom of the ninth inning.
If you reverse the outcome of those three games, USC is 16-11 in the SEC and talking about hosting both rounds of the NCAA Tournament.
In short, if USC somehow doesn’t make it to Hoover, they will have no one to blame but themselves. Regrettably, the Gamecocks late season slump has likely cost themselves a chance to host a NCAA Regional. Even if USC sweeps Tennessee, I can’t see a 16-14 team being awarded anything except a bus ticket to somewhere else.
So, the Gamecocks will probably have to hit the road to make it as far as the College World Series in Omaha for the first time since 2004.
After watching USC go 4-11 in SEC road games this season, I’ll understand if there are more than a few skeptics out there.
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