John A. with more from Jay Bilas

[pap49cba]

“With any coach, you look at their success within the sport they work, which presents its own particular universe to compare them. Geno has been as successful a coach in his game as there has ever been in any team sport. You look at the great winners of all-time in college sports, where do you look: Coach Wooden, Anson Dorrance (22 national championships in women’s soccer at North Carolina) Dan Gable (16 wrestling titles at Iowa). Geno is on the that list."

LINK

 

[EricLA]

Geno's heading towards being in a class completely by himself in WCBB. Summitt was the pioneer, but I'm looking forward to Geno surpassing her in every conceivable statistic, including total wins.

 

[UConnCat]

"To go head-to-head and to defeat one of the greatest program’s in this history of the sport [Tennessee] and not only match it, but eventually best it, is particularly impact-full.”

 

[winlots]

Geno's heading towards being in a class completely by himself in WCBB. Summitt was the pioneer, but I'm looking forward to Geno surpassing her in every conceivable statistic, including total wins.

ERIC: he has gotten to the win milestones a lot more quickly that Summitt, I believe.

 

[winlots]

“With any coach, you look at their success within the sport they work, which presents its own particular universe to compare them. Geno has been as successful a coach in his game as there has ever been in any team sport. You look at the great winners of all-time in college sports, where do you look: Coach Wooden, Anson Dorrance (22 national championships in women’s soccer at North Carolina) Dan Gable (16 wrestling titles at Iowa). Geno is on the that list."

LINK

PAP: Bilas seems to me to be one of the more keen commentators out there. And I think he was a waiter at Four Seasons for awhile.

 

[DobbsRover2]

ERIC: he has gotten to the win milestones a lot more quickly that Summitt, I believe.

To be fair to Pat (and we always bend over backward to do that), with win milestones you always have to base it on games coached, not years, and I assume you are meaning games. But Pat's teams only played 24 and 27 games her first two years, and it wasn't until her 5th year that UTenn started playing a schedule that had as many games as Geno's have had since the teams got good.

 

[chrissaran]

UConn 4 Tennessee 0 in Championship games. UConn 8-0 overall in Championship games. You can't do any better than that.

 

[EricLA]

ERIC: he has gotten to the win milestones a lot more quickly that Summitt, I believe.

You are correct. Geno, I believe, also has the highest winning %, except maybe for Leon Barrmore. But if he continues at his current pace, he will surpass him as well. Geno has achieved every win total and win milestone faster than any other coach in history. Awesome for him. And amazing as a UCONN fan...

 

[Buzzyboy]

To be fair to Pat (and we always bend over backward to do that), with win milestones you always have to base it on games coached, not years, and I assume you are meaning games. But Pat's teams only played 24 and 27 games her first two years, and it wasn't until her 5th year that UTenn started playing a schedule that had as many games as Geno's have had since the teams got good.

If you wanted to talk about a lack of competition, it was in the era that you referred to, the BEFORE GENO era. Women's basketball is so much better now than it's ever been and you don't have all the talent going to one team, like it did in the early days of Pat Summit's coaching career. Tennessee had wonderful facilities (even then) and a dynamic new coach and no one else was showing a whole lot of interest in women's basketball. There was just a handful of schools that were even a little competitive and so Ms. Summit had the pick of the litter, so to speak, when it came to recruiting top talent. She might have helped expand the women's game but she had every advantage in getting the best of the best to come to Tennessee. We all know Geno had no such advantage in getting the Huskies on the rise from many years of losing basketball, prior to his arrival. To see where he has brought the Huskies in the past 28 years is amazing.

 

[MilfordHusky]

That's lofty praise from a reputable source, but in my opinion, it's merited. There's a reason that USA Basketball wanted him back. He's the best.

 

[Geno-ista]

USA B ball probably wants Geno back as much for his personality, high profile than his obvious basketball prowess!!! He is such an ambassador for the game- I really think they need him to carry the torch- so to speak! And Jay Bilas is awesome. Great commentator also. Pat would also be in that group as well I would think.