Incredible coach with a record that will never be equaled. She absolutely dominated the women’s basketball game her entire career. Inducted into the Hall of Fame in 2000. Her teams got me interesting in watching the women’s league.
She just retired in 2012. RIP Pat
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In her 38 years at Tennessee, Summitt won eight national titles and 1,098 games – the most by any Division 1 basketball coach, male or female. Her teams made an unprecedented 31 consecutive appearances in the NCAA Tournament./QUOTE]
Not to besmirch her record and her talents, but women’s NCAA basketball has no parity. The same schools win year after year, upsets in the tourney are virtually unheard of. So if you’re in the elite caste, you’re going to win a lot of games. But to her credit, she did something right to join the elite caste.
Pat Summitt was absolutely one of the greatest basketball coaches ever. It was so sad to hear of her retirement and diagnosis and now to hear of her death at just 64 years old.
I don’t think that word means what you think it means.
And I don’t think BobLibDem did anything other than say “her achievements aren’t so great but she did coach for years at that school”. He spent the first 3 of 4 sentences slamming Coach Summitt, her school, the league and all her competitors. He basically said “Yeah, women’s basketball isn’t anything worth paying attention to. Coach Summitt sure was part of it tho.”
And he’s wrong. Coach Summitt was absolutely one of the greatest basketball coaches ever.
And, if you’re even going to go there, at least get your nomenclatures correct: Pat Summitt didn’t “join” the elite caste in women’s basketball. She created the elite caste in women’s basketball.
Considering the length and breadth of her coaching tree (which includes no fewer than two other coaches who have gone on to coach their own teams to national championships), and some of the WBHOF and Naismith HOF players and coaches to come out of her program, she’s arguably the single most important figure in that sport.
an explanation or warning that should be remembered when you are doing or thinking about something
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I think it’s used correctly.
I think you are way overreacting to BobLibDem’s post. He pointed out that the competition wasn’t there. He didn’t say she was a bad coach, in fact quite the opposite. When people talk about Mike Tyson or Tiger Woods or Michael Jordan, there always healthy debate on “yes, but who were they competing against?” I don’t see why it’s inappropriate to make that point because it’s a NCAAW coach.
I just always appreciated Pat’s friendship and support. I was always impressed with how all of her former players spoke about her. You speak to people like Tamika Catchings or Chamique Holdsclaw, and they just talk about the role that Pat played in all of their lives on and off the court. You can just tell the impact that she had on those players.
Pat set the bar for Women’s college basketball. The other coaches had to constantly raise their game to compete. Title IX provided women’s athletics the opportunity and coaches like Pat Summitt elevated the sport from intramural to big time college basketball.
I would have loved to seen how she would do coaching in the WNBA. I guess Pat felt she made plenty of money at Tennessee and was a decade or so too old to start over in the WNBA.
One thing I have not seen mentioned, her teams averaged around 14k attendance. Most men’s teams don’t average that much. The Tenn men also draw about 14k. (their arena seats about 20k)