Spring Break
Out of the Pouch
Dan Stroud
Issue date: 1/14/08 Section: Sports
Men's head basketball coach Matt Brown came to the university with great fanfare, one year removed from the experience of coaching back to back NCAA tournament squads at West Virginia University.
On the women's side of the round ball, head coach Candace White-Whitaker had her interim tag lifted in the spring and was touted for the impressive coaching bloodline she arrived with and would be able to offer to a young team.
The teams however have struggled to find their place in the new and improved Summit League at the beginning of the season. Until Saturday evening's sweep of Southern Utah University, neither squad had garnered a league victory. Their combined record in the conference is now 2-8.
Both coaches are feeling the pressure to perform; it can be easily read all over their faces after each loss. They both surely realize that high expectations come with the territory and they put themselves in the eye of the storm when the keys to the gym were accepted.
None of what has occurred this season looks or feels like the promise Mr. Hall offered Feb. 19, 2007. But is it fair to hang one's hopes on these words after such a short period of time?
Rome wasn't built in a day. You build a foundation one brick at a time. Patience is a virtue. These are sayings that have been passed down from generation to generation.
But we live in a "now" generation.
The Missouri football program had been mostly poor, mediocre at best for the past 25 years heading into this past season. The program had been built and torn down four times over this period with the hirings and firings of Woody Widenhofer, Bob Stull, Larry Smith and Gary Pinkel, the current coach.
Each tenure started the same way, with a great deal of promise and the expectations that followed. Widenhofer, Stull and Smith failed to get the job done. Pinkel was often maligned for his coaching techniques and his seeming inability to win the big game.
At the end of each of the past three seasons, talk was rampant that he should be replaced, that the program, though heavy in solid recruits, was dormant once again.
On the women's side of the round ball, head coach Candace White-Whitaker had her interim tag lifted in the spring and was touted for the impressive coaching bloodline she arrived with and would be able to offer to a young team.
The teams however have struggled to find their place in the new and improved Summit League at the beginning of the season. Until Saturday evening's sweep of Southern Utah University, neither squad had garnered a league victory. Their combined record in the conference is now 2-8.
Both coaches are feeling the pressure to perform; it can be easily read all over their faces after each loss. They both surely realize that high expectations come with the territory and they put themselves in the eye of the storm when the keys to the gym were accepted.
None of what has occurred this season looks or feels like the promise Mr. Hall offered Feb. 19, 2007. But is it fair to hang one's hopes on these words after such a short period of time?
Rome wasn't built in a day. You build a foundation one brick at a time. Patience is a virtue. These are sayings that have been passed down from generation to generation.
But we live in a "now" generation.
The Missouri football program had been mostly poor, mediocre at best for the past 25 years heading into this past season. The program had been built and torn down four times over this period with the hirings and firings of Woody Widenhofer, Bob Stull, Larry Smith and Gary Pinkel, the current coach.
Each tenure started the same way, with a great deal of promise and the expectations that followed. Widenhofer, Stull and Smith failed to get the job done. Pinkel was often maligned for his coaching techniques and his seeming inability to win the big game.
At the end of each of the past three seasons, talk was rampant that he should be replaced, that the program, though heavy in solid recruits, was dormant once again.
Be the first to comment on this story