Kellie Harper discussion/debate thread [merged]

[pasadenavol]

Please stop with the "hire a former Lady Vol" bs! Have you not learned your lesson or been paying attention the past decade???

 

[BigOrangeMojo]

Memphis is 3-5 and they suck. Oh by the way MTSU beat us by more than they beat Memphis. It's bad.. Very bad.

They played Memphis twice. The first time was at MTSU and they ran Memphis off court by 20+. That is best comparison since we played Memphis at home too...

I know the 2nd game was closer

 

[knoxvol52]

This comparing CRB and CKH...is ridiculous..
Reason being the Men's team has never been a Blue Blood....CRB gives this University BB respectability...with hopes of winning a Championship... occasionally..

The Women's team has always been the measuring stick and letting coaches like Holly and Kellie drag it down is uncalled for....

 

[VolsAgainstTheWorld15]

At this rate, if she makes it to the end of this season, then the message is loud and clear: UT no longer gives a rip about its women’s basketball program.

Losses like this are unacceptable. What makes it worse is that I’m not all that shocked by the result. Just shows how bad of a place the program is in when a loss to MTSU isn’t all that surprising.

Without Jackson, there isn’t a game on the schedule this team can’t lose. What an indictment on CKH that being absent of one player makes the difference between winning and losing to a Conference USA team that was coming off a double digit loss to Belmont.

For the sake of the program, I hope even the blindest of Lady Vol fans who refused to see last season that CKH needed to be fired now see that change is desperately needed.

 

[volbound1700]

At this point, I am on the fire Harper bandwagon as well. Wow.

 

[MAD]

Y’all convinced me. I take back the hire Candice comment.

 

[bobbyutvol]

Sorry Kelly but you can't recruit you can't coach our in way over your head. If something is not done now Lady Vols program is done. Pat is rolling over in her grave. The program Pat built has been ruined in a few short years. Candance Parker would be my first call in the morning. Par spent 40 years building this program into a powerhouse and it has taken 8 years to destroy it. This is just sad. Do something now.

 

[VolsAgainstTheWorld15]

Sorry Kelly but you can't recruit you can't coach our in way over your head. If something is not done now Lady Vols program is done. Pat is rolling over in her grave. The program Pat built has been ruined in a few short years. Candance Parker would be my first call in the morning. Par spent 40 years building this program into a powerhouse and it has taken 8 years to destroy it. This is just sad. Do something now.

We all love CP, but this job is too big for someone who has never coached before. We need to get out of this idea of hiring former players. Hiring former players brought us Holly and Kellie. Plus, leadership is always slower to fire former players if things don’t go well.

If this program has any hope of getting back to being elite, it starts with firing the current coach sooner rather than later and replacing her with an elite coach, regardless of where he/she went to school.

 

[glv98]

If this program has any hope of getting back to being elite, it starts with hiring an elite coach, regardless of where he/she went to school.

Absolutely need an elite hire, which means it may take a minute. Which means firing KJH 9 games into the season would be foolish. The fire now/hire CP folks are just looney.

To be fair, KJH has just had rotten luck with major injuries since she's been here. Even had a pandemic lol. She's had neither the roster nor the coaching chops to overcome that, especially with an injury as devastating as the one to Rickea has been.

 

[pasadenavol]

Look at what's happened to some of the leading programs of women's basketball back in the day - Old Dominion, Louisiana Tech, Virginia, Texas Tech, Stephen F. Austin. If something doesn't change and we don't start getting some enthusiasm in the Lady Vols BB program, we will end up like they did. We need an exciting product on the court to reignite interest in the program. It can be done. Look at SCar prior to Dawn's arrival - they went from 300-1000 in attendance to a packed arena for ranked match ups. It starts with the coaching staff. Time for Danny to do his research and pull out the checkbook...

 

[VOLnMiami]

Kelly needs to go....And go now to maybe salvage this season...This is an absolute train wreck...It breaks my heart to see this once proud program in shambles the way it is.

 

[VolsAgainstTheWorld15]

Absolutely need an elite hire, which means it may take a minute. Which means firing KJH 9 games into the season would be foolish. The fire now hire CP folks are just looney.

To be fair, KJH has just had rotten luck with major injuries since she's been here. Even had a pandemic lol. She's had neither the roster nor the coaching chops to overcome that, especially with an injury as devastating as the one to Rickea.

She has had a few unique circumstances to face, but as far as Rickea goes, while the injury certainly isn’t CKH’s fault, it’s 100% her fault that she’s not recruited and developed enough talent to overcome RJ’s injury. I wouldn’t expect us to be able to knock off top 15 caliber teams regularly without RJ because losing a player of her caliber is a huge loss, but it’s inexcusable that we aren’t even good enough to beat MTSU without her.

 

[glv98]

Kelly needs to go....And go now to maybe salvage this season...This is an absolute train wreck...It breaks my heart to see this once proud program in shambles the way it is.

So KJH is gone tomorrow. Who's the coach?

 

[AntiochVol81]

Absolutely need an elite hire, which means it may take a minute. Which means firing KJH 9 games into the season would be foolish. The fire now/hire CP folks are just looney.

To be fair, KJH has just had rotten luck with major injuries since she's been here. Even had a pandemic lol. She's had neither the roster nor the coaching chops to overcome that, especially with an injury as devastating as the one to Rickea has been.

This is nice explanation buts its recruiting and player development as to why we haven’t been able to overcome RJ injury..

 

[glv98]

She has had a few unique circumstances to face, but as far as Rickea goes, while the injury certainly isn’t CKH’s fault, it’s 100% her fault that she’s not recruited and developed enough talent to overcome RJ’s injury. I wouldn’t expect us to be able to knock off top 15 caliber teams regularly without RJ because losing a player of her caliber is a huge loss, but it’s inexcusable that we aren’t even good enough to beat MTSU without her.

I don't disagree. In fact, the shocking lack of recruiting the last few years is probably a worse problem than in game coaching for KJH. That said, it was reasonable to think portal pieces like Jewel and Jill would have helped more. That may be a lack of development thing, another sore spot.

 

[VolsAgainstTheWorld15]

Kelly needs to go....And go now to maybe salvage this season...This is an absolute train wreck...It breaks my heart to see this once proud program in shambles the way it is.

I agree. I think most casual fans do agree. The die hards who financially support the program the most will ultimately be the ones to decide CKH’s fate, though. My guess is that they will want to give her every opportunity to turn the season around. This is the problem with hiring former players: leadership/boosters are reluctant to pull the trigger on the people who were instrumental to the program’s success back in their playing days.

 

[glv98]

I agree. I think most casual fans do agree. The die hards who financially support the program the most will ultimately be the ones to decide CKH’s fate, though. My guess is that they will want to give her every opportunity to turn the season around. This is the problem with hiring former players: leadership/boosters are reluctant to pull the trigger on the people who were instrumental to the program’s success back in their playing days.

Again, fire now, hire who?

 

[pasadenavol]

Absolutely need an elite hire, which means it may take a minute. Which means firing KJH 9 games into the season would be foolish. The fire now/hire CP folks are just looney.

To be fair, KJH has just had rotten luck with major injuries since she's been here. Even had a pandemic lol. She's had neither the roster nor the coaching chops to overcome that, especially with an injury as devastating as the one to Rickea has been.

Kellie has absolutely had rotten luck with injuries, and I agree she doesn't have the coaching to overcome that. But the biggest problem is recruiting.
Pat learned that recruiting is paramount from her father. I think his quote to her was "You can't expect to win the Kentucky Derby when you show up with a bunch of mules." That's Tennessee for 'if you want to be the best, you have to have the best players' - Pat applied that principle, and that's the main reason she was so successful.
HS recruiting is foundational. Even if some end up transferring after a year or so, you have to show that you can recruit at a high level. We haven't had a top 20 HS recruiting class the past 2 years. Let that sink in. Transfer portal can make up for some of that, but you can't make it the foundation of your recruiting strategy...

 

[VolsAgainstTheWorld15]

Again, fire now, hire who?

You’d have to promote either Joy or Liza. Can’t imagine John would hang around if we gave Kellie the boot midseason. Perhaps it’s short sighted of me, but I can’t imagine one of them doing much worse than Kellie is right now. If nothing else, that would give one of them an audition. Perhaps they could parlay that audition into a head coaching job elsewhere if it goes reasonably well.

 

[Coach Jumper]

Getting to the part in the movie where fans start to believe Holly wasn’t all that bad. She was just easy to blame

Holly was weak and earned her blame

 

[Nute Gunray]

Just like her NCSU tenure proved, this is just too big of a stage for her. She was a great player and she's perfectly fine in the Missouri Valley. Just like all the warning signs were there with Pruitt, Fulmer just buried his head and chose to ignore them when he made this hire....

The next 3 months needs to be about making this exit as graceful as possible for all involved and having the next candidate lined up and ready to go....

The next candidate should be Shawn Poppie, HC at UTC.

 

[pasadenavol]

No way Kellie get fired before the end of the season. That's just crazy talk. Mid-season firing may be ok in football, but rarely happens. Kellie will get the rest of the season for sure and especially since they've had so many injury issues. But, Danny should definitely start his search now. Even when RJ comes back, I don't see them sniffing 20 regular season wins.

 

[Nute Gunray]

Sorry Kelly but you can't recruit you can't coach our in way over your head. If something is not done now Lady Vols program is done. Pat is rolling over in her grave. The program Pat built has been ruined in a few short years. Candance Parker would be my first call in the morning. Par spent 40 years building this program into a powerhouse and it has taken 8 years to destroy it. This is just sad. Do something now.

Shawn Poppie, HC at UTC.

 

[Putbacks]

Bill Laimbeer says he coming out of retirement.
(Did you know that Bill Laimbeer played a Sleestak on Land of the Lost while he was in high school?)

 

[knoxvol52]

AD White is a smart man, Will have his ducks in a row before he pulls the trigger on CKH....

Will he do it now NO...but will he in off season YES...

Unless we see a Christmas Miracle the rest of season...