Reply to thread

Message: [QUOTE="MSSportsGuy, post: 3287924, member: 6485"] Interesting stats overall. What's most shocking to me is that MSU is now ahead of Ole Miss, which reminds me how long it's been since they were relevant. Brief history: Mississippi State was abysmal in women's basketball. The conference was highly competitive yet the school didn't place any emphasis on the sport. When Sharon Fanning arrived things improved, just not every year. I was out of college by then but she managed to keep in state talent Latoya Thomas and Tan White home, both of whom had multiple offers elsewhere. They couldn't get over the hump though and while they made one S16 in 2010, that was it for Fanning's career and she retired a few years later. Enter Schafer who scored a huge win when he convinced Vivians, a player with even more national press than the previous ones, to stay in state and she teamed with William, McCowan and others to make the greatest multiple year run MSU has seen in any sport. Contrast this with Ole Miss. One reason why MSU was so bad is Ole Miss got the best recruits in the state and surrounding area under Chancellor. They made 3 or 4 elite 8s during his time there, never a FF. His 1992 team was ranked as high a #2 and it was probably the best team Ole Miss ever had but they lost in the E8 again. They were still pretty good (not as good) until he left for the WNBA in 1997. The program tumbled to the bottom of the SEC most years until former player and FL coach Carol Ross arrived. She had a hidden gem in Armentie Price who grew up less than an hour from campus. She had some solid players in that class and their senior year they had a good regular season but stunned defending champ Maryland in the 2007 tournament second round, then I watched on TV as Price and company ran the you know what out of Courtney Paris and Oklahoma in the S16 to win another shocker. Parker and TN dismantled them in the E8 and back to the bottom they went. It also proves that while Ole Miss won a lot of games in the 80s and early 90s, there are many more games played now so the wins and losses count up quickly. [/QUOTE]

Verification: First name of men's bb coach

Forum statistics

Threads: 164,440

Messages: 4,396,339

Members: 10,209

Latest member: gemini*trvl