How about a great story of not having things handed to you and stepping up to do the right thing? Coach Box, you’re gonna make a lot of fans here.
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“but when you’re 19 and have two toddlers (Darius and William) you need to step up.”
And he did step up!
Nice story.
I couldn’t help but think how different his life story is from that of the majority of Miami students. I hope they get to know it.
Indirectly, this article is also an indictment of Sayler and his handling of the transition.
My kind of guy…we should all wish this guy success…he has more than paid his dues !!!
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This is a story of perseverance in the face of odds that say a completely different ending.
Coach Heoppner used to recite the poem “DON’T QUIT!” Coach Box is the example of what happens when you don’t quit.
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He said in the interview that people do not expect a quick turnaround. I don’t agree with that. Coach Duffy showed just how quickly things could be turned around. We had a very poor coach
I don’t expect a quick turnaround, but I do expect a better team. I mean a better decision making team on the floor and better in game decisions from the bench. I don’t know enough about the talent on the roster to make predictions, but would be extremely happy if we won a bunch of games.
Duffy had Dickerson, Kluesner, Reid, Hoff and Purvis. I don’t think we have that kind of talent on this roster.
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It’s a low bar, but our recent women’s basketball hires have stepped into much better situations than our other major sports. Wright got a decent program from Fantanarosa, Duffy had Wright’s good recruits tbat he didn’t do anything with, and Hendrix inherited the momentum of Duffy. Would take those relative positions over what Martin, Owens, Steele, and now Box/Steele have to take over.
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I found this interesting and shows Hendrix’ team wasn’t devoid of PLAYER talent:
“Seven players — including the top five scorers and top five rebounders — transferred to other programs, including the University of Dayton, Oregon, Wichita State and two went to Clemson.”
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I got cut off this morning in the middle of writing this post as I was waiting to pick up my car from getting worked on and never got around to finishing my post. Sorry about that . I really feel that this school is a sleeping giant in MAC women’s basketball. All we really need is a great coach who want to stay and build a program. Just like what has happened in field hockey and softball and what our volleyball coach has put together a couple of times in her long career. There is some talent on this roster but very little depth. We might do OK this year if things work out for us, but I expect an influx of good recruits over the next couple of seasons. I think we have 2 excellent freshman who can be the foundation we build around over the next couple of years.
I would just say that I am not writhing off this season as a lost cause. There is some talent on the roster. We need to stay healthy and win the close games. I just think there were so many things wrong with our offensive fundamentals, our defensive principles, and our time and score strategies that we greatly handicapped our team over the last 4 seasons. Just like when Duffy came in, I expect those issues to all disappear and that our staff will provide out players the best opportunity to win, which we have not seen over the last 4 seasons.
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And a really late start to the transition.
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Here’s the “down the road problem” with women’s BB at places like Miami.
Excluding hockey because it is basically a small number of schools with a small TV footprint, the reality is that the top three coaching salaries in college athletics are found in FB, men’s BB and women’s BB…The further reality is that winning at a G5-type school usually gets the coach a better-paying job at a P-5 program and, even there, there is upward financial mobility based upon continued winning.
Megan came to Miami as an assistant…and turned the program for the better immediately. This got her an immediate better job offer ($$$$$$$$$$$) courtesy of Marquette.due in some large measure because Miami couldn’t match what Marquette was offering her. If Box works his magic (and I hope he does), a bigger program will come calling and offer him a contract that Miami will be unable to match.
Regarding field hockey, softball and volleyball, those sports’ salary levels are typically small enough for Miami to keep coaches in those sports for longer than in the big three revenue sports…though I would expect that the Miami women’s softball coach will be poached in the next year or two if she keeps winning…some P5 school will be able to outbid whatever Miami pays her and we can assume that “When Money Talks, Coaches Walk.”
I have also used the “Solich Rule” as my rare exception to a winning coach being poached: The rule basically concludes that if you win big at a P5 school, bank lots of green, have gotten let go for any number of reasons, are perhaps at an age when you do not appeal to the younger set but still want to coach, you can step down to a smaller program than where you were, get a decent MAC-level salary…(half a mil ain’t chicken feed) and still live well while enjoying life in a smaller college town sans the pressure of the big time environment you just left.
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