Maybe Josh Pastner WASN'T A Better Pick, Eh?
The Chronicle's Michael Murphy, who compounded his newspaper's breakdown on its Cougar coverage last weekend with this bit of idiocy, tries to make amends today with a nice piece on head coach Tom Penders. The article doesn't really break any ground -- and indeed, recycles quotes from other articles without giving any credit to those articles (but who knows -- maybe they came from a press conference) -- but still, it's positive coverage for a coach who deserves it.
Murphy's article mentions Penders' "baggage," but I would suggest he also has the "baggage" of having won everywhere he's been, including Columbia. Yes, Columbia.
And the way he's embraced the Cougar tradition and gotten fans to buy into the program after the last disastrous decade or so is impressive. Even more impressive considering the guy has a bad ticker.
As far as Murphy goes -- if he's going to be a punk and use his column effectively to blast good Cougar fans, maybe he also ought to acknowledge them when he borrows from their nearly week-old discussion of a potential UH-UT NIT matchup?
Finally, speaking of punks, has anyone talked to John Lopez lately about his earlier assertion that John Lucas, David Rose, and Josh Pastner were all demonstrably better head coaching candidates for UH than Penders? I'd like to hear what he has to say about that.
Posted by Kevin Whited @ 02/12/05 16:31 | Sports | Technorati
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Comments
Having won everywhere doesn't outweigh baggage such as messing with a student's academic records and relentlessly keeping down a program's graduation rate. On the other hand, Houston's graduation rate for men's basketball players is already so low that Penders couldn't make it any worse.
Being both a Rice and UH alumnus, the hiring of Penders was one of those occasions that confirmed my choice to give all my support to Rice.
Posted by Jonathan Sadow @ 03:27 on 02/13/05
I put "baggage" in quotes because a lot of people like to say a lot of things about Penders that they can't always substantiate.
So far, the guy's been an exemplary hire for UH, including his constant cheerleading for Guy V. Lewis's admission to the hall of fame.
I can't imagine Josh Pastner bringing any sort of passion to that cause.
As for graduation rates in major college athletics -- okay, it's scandalous for the most part. That isn't a creation of Tom Penders. And I'd wager his Columbia kids graduated (but that'd be a blind wager -- I could be wrong). :)
Posted by Kevin @ 11:27 on 02/13/05
I think your wager is safe purely on the basis of no athletic scholarships in the Ivy.
Posted by Ethan @ 20:22 on 02/13/05
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