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WBB: Lappe Buffs' top choice

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It appears the Colorado athletic department is looking to one of its own to fill the women`s basketball head coaching vacancy.

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A budget hire in so many ways:

1. She's not a proven winner. She hasn't coached long. She's never been a head coach at the D-1 level. I'm sorry, but 17-12 at Metro State qualifies you for a job in the best women's bball conference in the country?

2. This screams $$$ hire. She won't have $$$ requirements and therefore will come cheap. Good to see that this is the primary consideration now for new hires.

3. Ceal Berry recruited her and coached her, and is leading the search committee. Anyone surprised she got the job?

Hey, I don't know if Lappe can coach or not. But it seems to me we could get a great coach in here with a proven track record. We're going the opposite route it appears.
 
Yeah, this seems like a real reach to me. A young, unproven coach whom only has head coaching experience at the Division II level (which is a pretty big jump to Division 1 in basketball).
 
A budget hire in so many ways:

1. She's not a proven winner. She hasn't coached long. She's never been a head coach at the D-1 level. I'm sorry, but 17-12 at Metro State qualifies you for a job in the best women's bball conference in the country?

2. This screams $$$ hire. She won't have $$$ requirements and therefore will come cheap. Good to see that this is the primary consideration now for new hires.

3. Ceal Berry recruited her and coached her, and is leading the search committee. Anyone surprised she got the job?

Hey, I don't know if Lappe can coach or not. But it seems to me we could get a great coach in here with a proven track record. We're going the opposite route it appears.


Don't you think this is the exact same way the next football coach will be hired?

I think the chances of Jon Embree becoming CU's next football coach go up with every season ticket renewal form that gets thrown in the trash.
 
Don't you think this is the exact same way the next football coach will be hired?

I think the chances of Jon Embree becoming CU's next football coach go up with every season ticket renewal form that gets thrown in the trash.

do you think bohn would hire embree? he had a chance before and he chose hawkins. back on topic--- i am a bit surprised by this hire for wbb-- if they are going to pay in the 500-600k range, they can get a quality assistant from a successful major program or someone who has won a lot at a mid-major. they didn't need to go to d2...
 
Yeah, this seems like a real reach to me. A young, unproven coach whom only has head coaching experience at the Division II level (which is a pretty big jump to Division 1 in basketball).



If you can coach, you can coach. OU hired Norman High School's girl's basketball coach a few years ago. She has turned out pretty well.
 
If you can coach, you can coach. OU hired Norman High School's girl's basketball coach a few years ago. She has turned out pretty well.

Is that the coach that has had a lot of recent success at OU? I didn't know that.

The yellow flag for me is that her best season at Metro was her 1st season, and the team's record has regressed in her next 2 seasons.
 
If you can coach, you can coach. OU hired Norman High School's girl's basketball coach a few years ago. She has turned out pretty well.

They hired her in 1996 after she had won a couple state titles and there was a steep learning curve for her.

Lappe has compiled a 50-36 record at Metro, Drake was 47-42 during her time as an assistant there, and CSU was absolutely terrible during the year she was there.

She's a reach and is not ready to be the head coach of a Big 12 basketball team.
 
"Lappe, the only candidate CU has interviewed thus far, was targeted after a search that included prospects ranging from assistants at major college programs to head coaches at mid-majors and smaller schools"

This is the part that bothers me. Again we are interviewing one person. Unless they got a bunch of middle fingers from most candidates, how do you only interview one person? I know when I hire people I sure don't interview only one person, regardless of how impressive they are in an interview.

The degree we are continuing to slip behind the big XII is sickening. WBB is big business in the Big XII and we not even in the discussion.
 
do you think bohn would hire embree? he had a chance before and he chose hawkins. back on topic--- i am a bit surprised by this hire for wbb-- if they are going to pay in the 500-600k range, they can get a quality assistant from a successful major program or someone who has won a lot at a mid-major. they didn't need to go to d2...

I think his hands are going to be pretty tied.

The athletic department doesn't have any money.
The facilities are not that good.

No established coach is going to want to take the job. Which means they are going to have to look at coordinators / assistant coaches.

The $$ is going to be tight. They aren't going to be able to pay $1.5 mil right off the bat. In fact, I think the initial contract might go for under $1 mil.
 
I think his hands are going to be pretty tied.

The athletic department doesn't have any money.
The facilities are not that good.

No established coach is going to want to take the job. Which means they are going to have to look at coordinators / assistant coaches.

The $$ is going to be tight. They aren't going to be able to pay $1.5 mil right off the bat. In fact, I think the initial contract might go for under $1 mil.

I'm not sure if you're talking about wbb or football. Back to wbb though, I'm absolutely shocked that wbb coaches make as much as they do. At most institutions, they are not a money sport. In fact, I would highly doubt that even when Ceal was coach, the program did not generate money. I understand Tennessee, UConn, and some other schools' programs making money and having highly paid coaches. However, in general most wbb programs do not come out in the black at the end of the year.

Still, the salary situation is what it is, and CU can't compete. Yes, we can't get a marquee name, but still, are we that strapped for cash that we're going after a completely unproven DII coach? BB's points about her success are dead on. Lappe needs to prove more before given the program.

Right now though, I'm sick of Bohn's hiring, and after hearing about KMac's offense, I'm not sure he knows enough about bball to make a good hire. I understand that there is a hiring committee with Ceal on it, but still, Bohn has to influence the hire somehow. I can't imagine that Lappe is our top CHOICE...not candidate that we're left with, but CHOICE...like we chose her over other interested candidates...
 
Moved the thread to the Basketball forum for obvious reasons.

Here's some bio information on Linda Lappe: http://gometrostate.com/coaches.aspx?rc=72

Lappe72.jpg


Head Coach @ Metro State
2009-10: 17-12 (11-8 conference)
2008-09: 14-14 (12-7 conference)
2007-08: 19-10 (14-5 conference)

Assistant Coach & Recruiting Coordinator @ Colorado State
2006-07: 9-22 (3-15 in conference)
- Secured 11 recruits, including 2 Western Region Top 25 prospects

Assistant Coach @ Drake University
2005-06: 17-12 (13-6 in conference)
2004-05: 14-15 (9-11 in conference)
2003-04: 16-15 (13-8 in conference)
- WNIT berths in 2004 and 2006
- Top 50 recruiting class in 2005

Player @ University of Colorado
2002-03: 24-8 (11-5 in conference) #19 final ranking
2001-02: 24-10 (11-5 in conference) #9 final ranking
2000-01: 22-9 (11-5 in conference) #20 final ranking
1999-00: 10-19 (4-12 in conference) *redshirt for Lappe after appearing in only 2 games
1998-99: 15-14 (7-9 in conference)
- NCAA Tourney in 2001, 2002 (Elite 8), 2003 (Sweet 16)
- 2-year captain

Originally from Iowa, Lappe was inducted in 2009 into the Iowa Girls Basketball Hall of Fame.
 
If you can coach, you can coach. OU hired Norman High School's girl's basketball coach a few years ago. She has turned out pretty well.

tOSU hired some from 1-AA football coach and that seems ot be working...

I agree the hire is a reach though.
 
Hell, if we are going to look at DII candidates, why not make a call to Kellogg down at Fort Lewis? Two straight postseason appearances, including the national championship game this season. Relationships with in-state high schools (seven players at Fort Lewis from Colorado). Assistant at Montana State where they won the conference a couple times and also had an appearance in the WNIT. Before that, mens assistant at Western Texas A&M before that where they made the NCAA tourney one year.
 
Some of the positives I see with Lappe:

- CU captain during the last "glory days" of Ceal's career. Those ties would invigorate things and please a lot of the women who have ties to the program.
- Proven recruiter. (Her 1 CSU class beat us this year, fwiw.)
- Winner. (And her Metro teams are winning - her declining conference record is a bit of a concern.)
- Inexpensive. (Until she wins and increases revenue, why should a WBB coach be making more than our football coordinators when WBB loses money?)
- Colorado lifer. (If she wins, she's not leaving. And she's young, so we wouldn't have to worry about finding another coach for 20/30 years.)

Her resume is light. But if Ceal believes in her, I don't have a problem with going inexperienced in this case. Ceal's there working in the AD as Associate Athletic Director and will be an active mentor. We've also got Lisa Van Goor (CU Hall of Fame for WBB) working in the AD as Special Events Coordinator. There's a good support system there for a young coach. Sometimes you've got to take a risk when you believe in a person.
 
in general, i'm not a fan of "back to the glory days" hires. success rates on those seem microscopic to me. I'll give us a B overall on the Barnett hire (high highs, low lows)....and I guess Huggins at WVU recently...but mostly, you can't go home again whether it's Mike Shula, John Blake, John Robinson (rehire at USC) and on and on.

love Bufnik's optimism, but our Bohn era hiring committees sure like to interview just one person....and pull the trigger. is that due diligence? or: we just shoot from the hip and bowl 300 every time.

i have a friend who played D-1 women's hoops at UCLA and SDSU...from Denver and knew Nikki Weddle and a lot of CU players at the end of the Ceal era....and there a lot of problems. Ceal lost a lot of recruits toward the end. I mean that were here and left.
 
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Ft. Lewis has had pretty good bball programs for awhile now, at least in the time ive been up here, pretty good idea BB. Is Lappe the only candidate or just one of the candidates?
 
It wouldn't be an exciting hire, but it'd get me interested in the women's hoops program again. CU ties and played under Barry. Like someone already said both Barry and Van Goor are involved in the AD to mentor, a recruiting hot bed in Colorado, new practice facility coming, etc. etc.
 
Can we at least interview more than one person? The coaching "searches" are more like coronations in Boulder.
 
I hate Mike Bohn. Bz, which an obvious choice, is the only good hire at this point in time.

While Hawk might not of been the obvious choice, he was supposedly a great fit and the hot coach at that time... but agree, block out a few hours to conduct interviews.
 
I'm not a WBB fan but am a CU athletics fan. My first impression when I read this in the paper the other day was, "Huh?" I'll give her this: This year, she lost two starters and had one senior and still did OK in the RMAC. But still, I am disheartened by this. Not just for women's basketball, but for the overall direction of the athletic program. What does this bode, for instance, if Hawkins fails like most of you think he will? Are we going to dip into the bargain bag for a new football coach as well? I'm starting to believe that I've been living in the past when CU was a true player in athletics. You know, that brief period from 1985 to 2000, or so? I guess I've just been really naive to believe CU could get back to those days. Hell, we are even starting to suck in cross country.
 
Come on Bohn, do a real search. Lappe is a buff but there are better qualified people out there, find them.
 
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