Samarie Walker excited about debut

[EricLA]

It seemed to me like this was a variation on the Britt Hunter story. Her parents were in love with a school and she went along with it, even though she had some misgivings about it. Then she got there and her fears were confirmed and she was unhappy.

i'm not so sure about that. i remember comments from her HS coach saying that UCONN was her dream school since 6th grade and that her idol was Tamika Williams. if i had to speculate, i'd guess that the demands of the team combined with the distance from home and her other personal homesickness issues both contributed.

bottom line people will believe what they want and i certainly respect anyone's opinion to either wish her well or not. i also agree with vowel's assessment as to how it went down. IIRC she didn't practice with the team for several days leading up to UNC and did not travel to the team to play them. i think she was struggling, tried to tough it out, Geno recognized it and tried to help but realized her commitment to UCONN was not where it needed to be.

i never felt any ill-will from Geno (or the team), just that UCONN was not the right place for her and with her homesickness and general malaise, it was more disruptive for team chemistry to have her stay. one thing that is important to remember is that the team has very high expectations for themselves and for each other. they obviously could tell something was wrong too.

in the past, Geno has vetoed recruits who were disliked for whatever reason by the team. i think it's important to note that the team has some say in everything as well. clearly not as much say as Geno, but chemistry is important and Geno has been a master over the years of managing that particular aspect (along with all the other things he's amazing at)...

 

[HuskyNan]

We are moving beyond fact, right through opinions and into speculation.