I only have two things I disagree with Kim on or not a fan of. One, she schedules too soft for my liking in general. She is a damn good coach and has top 10 teams year after year, she could schedule better. Not saying you need to go crazy but some games on her schedules make no sense to me, you can play inferior teams without playing some of these.... bottom of the barrel teams.
Second, sometimes she doesn't handle losing well (snarky comments after games). She does handle it well at times complimenting other teams but then other times it doesnt come across well at all. I get it, she is super competitive in everything she does and when she gets super invested its tough to swallow a loss for her at times.
Outside of that she really is a pleasure to be around. Having been to many of her practices before, she comes across much differently on the sidelines than she is at practice and behind the scenes, she often is making jokes half the time. I'm excited to see what she does with this years team. Surprisingly, the chemistry appears to be really good right now and all the returning kids are loving it so far. I don't know how its going to turn out but its clear they have worked extremely hard this short time trying to change the perception of this program. They are already getting near 5000 season tickers and she has not coached a single game yet.
Agree with you on both counts. I thought exactly like you do about her preference to schedule cupcakes and twinkies to fill out her pre conference schedule every year. I was looking at that as a fan. She’s looking at it like a coach.
She knows exactly what she’s doing. She schedules teams she knows she can beat. They will give her team a run, give her freshmen and transfers ample opportunity to get plenty of playing time, all the while bonding with each other. All but one or two of these games are home games. She’ll play 1-2 ranked teams, but no more than two. She gets her team use to winning this way. Lots of “learning moments“ in these games for younger and inexperienced players.
One thing we must recognize and remember, there is a method to her madness. She begins conference play with 11-12 wins every year, Baylor either runs the table, or loses no more than one game in conference play every year. She usually gets a number 1 or 2 seed in the tournament.
Playing soft OCC schedules has not hurt her up to this point. Don’t look for her to change her M.O. now. It’s not going to happen. Kim’s point of view on this is, if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.
Her Baylor teams were always ready to play conference games once they commenced. LSU will not dominate the SEC the way Baylor did the Big 12. You can bet the farm on that. Kim will win basketball games this year. Even more so once she gets HER players on roster next year. I think LSU will be an interesting team to watch and follow this year.
