The Whalen Effect

[hungan1]

What do you think of Whalen and her coaching staff so far?

She has good instincts. She seem to be a quick learner and a great teacher. She knows how maximize her players' potential and use their strengths to the team's advantage.

I love the change in Defense over last year.

[UpAndUnder43]

What do you think of Whalen and her coaching staff so far?

She has good instincts. She seem to be a quick learner and a great teacher. She knows how maximize her players' potential and use their strengths to the team's advantage.

I love the change in Defense over last year.

I like what they are doing on both ends of the floor. She hasn't coached much but has been involved in 1000s of games. She is a consummate professional and the players really seem to like her. Doesn't get rattled, seems to understand the flow of the game and doesn't interrupt it. She'll only get better as she gains experience.

Really though it comes down to recruiting. If she is an excellent recruiter the team will be excellent. If she is a bad recruiter the team will not be good

[hungan1]

I like what they are doing on both ends of the floor. She hasn't coached much but has been involved in 1000s of games. She is a consummate professional and the players really seem to like her. Doesn't get rattled, seems to understand the flow of the game and doesn't interrupt it. She'll only get better as she gains experience.

Really though it comes down to recruiting. If she is an excellent recruiter the team will be excellent. If she is a bad recruiter the team will not be good

This.

[tripledouble]

Way too early to tell if Whalen will succeed as a coach. (I say this as someone who for years suggested that the Gophers hire her when her playing days were over.) I like what I've seen so far in the team's new interest in playing defense. I like the fact that they have re-incorporated post players into the offense. And I like the fact that this team seems to have some toughness to it. I don't like the flow of the offense so far. A lot of that may be due to personnel with the graduation of Wagner and the injury to Hubbard. But even when Hubbard returns, this team is going to have to get into a better flow offensively. I think Whalen is right when she says the offense is trailing the defense at this point in the season and hopefully that will correct itself. Whalen's success as a coach will probably not be determined by X's and O's. As UpAndUnder pointed it, it will probably be determined by how well she recruits. She has what appears to be a good group of recruits coming in next year, but she is going to have to do even better if she wants to take this program to national prominence. As much as I criticized the previous Gopher coach, she was able to recruit some impact players such as Pitts, Bello, and Hubbard. Although it's interesting to note that none of those players was from Minnesota and it seemed that Stollings hadn't established a lot of connections with Minnesota high school players. Time will tell for Whalen...I wouldn't yet anoint her the the Coaching Hall of Fame, but I also wouldn't bet against her.

[hungan1]

She has yet to go through her first grind in the Big Ten. But, we need to take it one game at a time. Their next test is Boston College on the road. Then the rest of the non-conference and on to the Big Ten.

If she does make it into the NCAA tournament, that will be a big step into attracting better recruits and hope to be better in succeeding years.

The important thing is, she needs to establish her reputation among her peers by winning and winning more often. Make the NCAA Tournament every year. Recruiting won't come easy. She has a good trajectory career-wise and has great basketball savvy and knowledge. She has that quiet charisma and rapport with the young players. It could very well be that she will be on a fast track at attracting better recruits and subsequently be in the conversation of Final Four and National Championship appearances sooner. Gopherholer standard expectations.

She has to earn it.

The reality is, it will take some time. That is, making a national title aspiration a reality as I have said in Post #39.

Worth repeating: In summary, here are the number of years it took the most prominent coaches in D1 Women's Basketball to win their first national championship:

Muffet McGraw, Notre Dame - 14 years
Gino Auriema, Connecticut - 10 years
Pat Summit, Tennessee - 13 years
Brenda Frese, Maryland - 4 years
Kim Mulkey, Baylor - 5 years
Dawn Staley, South Carolina - 9 years

The younger coaches seem to get there faster.

Lindsay Whalen brings a lot of hope and promise.

[GringaGopher]

Thanks for posting this review of the time it took previous coaches to succeed at the highest level. It's a good reminder of the reality of building a program. Also, 5 of these 6 coaches are still with the same teams and have well established records .

[hungan1]

Thanks for posting this review of the time it took previous coaches to succeed at the highest level. It's a good reminder of the reality of building a program. Also, 5 of these 6 coaches are still with the same teams and have well established records .

We hope that Lindsay Whalen stays with the Gophers for the long haul with the hope of building a dynasty some day.