STEWIE talks to espnw about winning 4

[Huskies Rule]

http://espn.go.com/espnw/athletes-l...-future-uconn-breanna-stewart-aims-make-4-row

 

[JudgeSCR]

Excellent piece! One of the side benefits of being a UConn fan is getting to have a front row seat to the blossoming of these women. We get to watch them hone their basketball skills under the watchful eye of the coaching staff. We also get to see them mature before our eyes ... also in significant part due to lessons and demands of the staff and program.

We have one more year of Stewie and Moriah. Both as lovely and thoughtful in an interview room as they are talented and breathtaking on the basketball court. They have gained a lot from their UConn experience. We may have gained more.

 

[SallyH]

Telepathic, huh? She missed the obvious question, then. Are you going to win it?

 

[Barkin' Out]

Telepathic, huh? She missed the obvious question, then. Are you going to win it?

Is it really in question?

 

[RSHERMVIKES]

It is quite unique that Geno, CD and the rest of the coaching staff work hard to find the TOTAL package in their recruits! Not only are they great BB players, but they also are great students, talk intelligently, dedicated individuals, and great team-mates!
The current players on the team are asked their impressions of recruits if they think they will fit in with their future team!
There's a story on Rebecca Lobo, her freshman year, speaking to a team-mate, which CD overheard, about the weird fans and the crazy attention they give the team, and CD got in her face that you better not disrespect the fans, they support you and the team and are the reason UCONN is UCONN! Rebecca since has always been very vocal about UCONN's fantastic fan base!

 

[UcMiami]

It is quite unique that Geno, CD and the rest of the coaching staff work hard to find the TOTAL package in their recruits! Not only are they great BB players, but they also are great students, talk intelligently, dedicated individuals, and great team-mates!
The current players on the team are asked their impressions of recruits if they think they will fit in with their future team!
There's a story on Rebecca Lobo, her freshman year, speaking to a team-mate, which CD overheard, about the weird fans and the crazy attention they give the team, and CD got in her face that you better not disrespect the fans, they support you and the team and are the reason UCONN is UCONN! Rebecca since has always been very vocal about UCONN's fantastic fan base!

And indeed snuck into a Sports Illustrative cover picture disguised as one of those said 'weird' fans!
140401120949-breanna-stewart-single-image-cut.jpg

 

[RockyMTblue2]

The current players on the team are asked their impressions of recruits if they think they will fit in with their future team!

Mo saying, yeah, I'm ready to find Lou for the 3! Likin' that, I am.

 

[Huskies Rule]

It is quite unique that Geno, CD and the rest of the coaching staff work hard to find the TOTAL package in their recruits! Not only are they great BB players, but they also are great students, talk intelligently, dedicated individuals, and great team-mates!
The current players on the team are asked their impressions of recruits if they think they will fit in with their future team!
There's a story on Rebecca Lobo, her freshman year, speaking to a team-mate, which CD overheard, about the weird fans and the crazy attention they give the team, and CD got in her face that you better not disrespect the fans, they support you and the team and are the reason UCONN is UCONN! Rebecca since has always been very vocal about UCONN's fantastic fan base!

Absolutely. (Is that Sherm-an, as in Sherman and Peabody?)

I think Geno and CD have no choice but to recruit kids who are the "total package." When you are talking about recruiting kids who scored 20, 25, 30 points per game in high school, who were the celebrated stars of their teams and their schools and their communities... and they are going to be required, if they come to UConn, to all of a sudden become a totally unselfish part of a TEAM, to screen and pass so your teammates can score, to play great defense every minute you are on the court. As a freshman, there will be many games that star recruit won't start- heck, won't even get off the bench! How many kids could deal with that and understand why it was necessary? To have to make so many adjustments to a new team, by a kid who was forever told she was the greatest thing since sliced bread. That's really tough. And then to have this new coach who doesn't worship every basket you score, but rather who screams like a banshee when you don't do things HIS way. That's got to be so uncomfortable for most kids, requiring a level of maturity most youngsters don't possess. I suspect a lot of talented high school players wouldn't know how to do that, and wouldn't want to. 'Team before individual' is something many top high school athletes don't appreciate.

As CD said in one of the Geno Auriemma Project episodes, "It used to be, when we were really bad, almost any player could help us. Now, the pool of players who can help us, and who we want at UConn, has shrunk." Indeed, it is a special kind of kid, that "total package," that Geno and CD want...and get.

[Oh, yes- as a member of the Board of Trustees, Rebecca is one smart cookie who knows full well the importance of being kind to us weird and crazy fans ]

 

[UcMiami]

As CD said in one of the Geno Auriemma Project episodes, "It used to be, when we were really bad, almost any player could help us. Now, the pool of players who can help us, and who we want at UConn, has shrunk." Indeed, it is a special kind of kid, that "total package," that Geno and CD want...and get.

HR - I think this was specific not the 'total package' you speak of but of the skill level also required at Uconn. In the early days, a Bent or Irwin would have been expected to start as a freshman because they had better skills than any of the returning players (or at least most of them.) Now, they may never start a game except senior night, and they do not form the nucleus of recruiting targets but more the edge of it. In 1991 no friend would have questioned why Gardler would choose to commit to Uconn since she would never start, in 2006 that did happen.

 

[RockyMTblue2]

HR - I think this was specific not the 'total package' you speak of but of the skill level also required at Uconn. In the early days, a Bent or Irwin would have been expected to start as a freshman because they had better skills than any of the returning players (or at least most of them.) Now, they may never start a game except senior night, and they do not form the nucleus of recruiting targets but more the edge of it. In 1991 no friend would have questioned why Gardler would choose to commit to Uconn since she would never start, in 2006 that did happen.

I'd remind you, of sage one, UcMiami, that it took about 6 weeks from start to finish for UConn to sew up Molly Bent, with the definitive expression of coaching lust being "we have no one like her." Irwin needs no damning with faint praise either. I see no reason to drop either one of these recruits into your op ed piece.

 

[UcMiami]

RMTb2 - I am on record as saying I find Irwin a very intriguing prospect, and I really know nothing and have seen nothing of Bent, but it is also true that you can count I think on one hand the number of recruits Uconn has offered scholarships in the last 15 years that were ranked outside the top 50 entering their senior year - they are rare. In the first five years of Geno and CD's reign, I suspect they were the norm and the Lobo type of national recruits were the rarity.
I am just pointing out that the quote from CD was about the level of player that can help Uconn in 2015 is a very different level from 1990. Not that the 'whole package' aspect of recruiting has changed.

 

[easttexastrash]

Is it really in question?

That's probably what Tennessee fans said when Holdsclaw was a senior. Taking nothing for granted.

 

[RSHERMVIKES]

Kara Wolters constantly says she played at the perfect time for her! She admits she would be coming off the bench for 5-8 minutes a game if she played now! The game has progressed so far that she would be too slow to keep up with today's "Big Girls"! Her skill set was competitive just not her speed & quickness!