Out matched in every way last night. My buddies and I have been throwing around a trivia question as of late. Can you name an NBA all time top 50 player who has been a great coach? Can you name a top 50 college player from his generation who has won a national championship? The only one we could think of was John Wooden. I guess the parallel I'm drawing is to Swoopes and her chances for success and to be a truly great coach.

I don't know how good they were, but I'm pretty sure Knight and Billy Donovan made the Final Four as players.

Were you at the game? Mostly seemed like a size disadvantage to me.

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correct on Knight and Billy but I wouldn't say they were top 50 players of their respective eras. It's a hard question to come up with examples for. I think its hard to be a good let alone a great coach when you have never sat on a bench and had to watch others play. That perspective is a key ingredient to success.

I was at Bruno's a little to get primed to watch Loyola basketball. It might be a regular experience this yr. I sat up in the end zone and watched the off court going ons. That was educational last night. I'll make sure I come over on Monday

I watched the whole, miserable thing. The play that summed it up for me was when one of Georgia Tech's enormous players stood smack in the middle of the lane, flatfooted, and made a rebound and put back with three Loyola players hanging off her. I had to look up their roster and compare it to the box score to figure out which player it was (couldn't see her number for all the white jerseys and arms), and it was evidently Nariah Taylor, a 6'5" junior center from Indianapolis. She had nine rebounds and seven points in only 16 minutes. And Taylor wasn't just tall, she's big all around (women's players don't list weight, but she had to be 240).

I thought their best player was probably Vuckovic, who's listed as a 6'3" sophomore forward, but she seems to play mostly outside like a shooting guard. She had an amazingly quick release on jump shots, and she was 7 of 9 from the field and 3 of 5 behind the arc for 17 points in 20 minutes, before fouling out.

One early play was also telling-- a GT guard used a quick first step to get by Molly Crosby for a layup, and the speed/quickness gap was obvious and glaring. They were going to start doing that all night. Crosby started, but was then yanked after only five minutes. In terms of physicality and athleticism, I think only Simone Law from our team might have a chance at making their starting five.

From a coaching standpoint, not reporting the jersey change was an obvious error. Maybe there could have been an early time out called to make adjustments, settle down the players, and get things straight before it totally fell apart. I think the speed/quickness/athleticism gap might be a learning opportunity for down the line. The free throw shooting was miserable (even worse than the men's game), as Loyola left 15 points at the line (including at least three missed front ends of 1 and 1s). The way you counteract an advantage on athleticism and talent is through coaching and drilling fundamentals, and Loyola was not ready or able in terms of positioning, boxing out aggresively, double teams, and screening shooters. That needs some serious work.

The good news is there are no Georgia Techs in the MVC. Overall the league is very comparable to the Horizon in women's basketball, except the Horizon usually has one excellent team that is ranked, while the MVC has much more parity and better teams at the bottom of the standings. It should be easier to rise to the top of this league given the parity and lack of domination by one program. In the end, I think Loyola will learn from games like this and benefit when league play starts and there are no 6'5", 240 pound centers and 6'3" shooting guards with instant releases off the catch and shoot.

I saw most of the second half and that rebound play or one just like it stuck with me as well. There was just no stopping that for us.

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Bill Russell won two NBA titles coaching the Celtics. Larry Bird reached the NBA Finals coaching the Pacers. Hell, Maurice Cheeks won an NBA Championship with the '83 Sixers before coaching.

Tommy Amaker (definitely) and Danny Manning (the way it looks so far) are having pretty good NCAA coaching careers.

Many very good (but not great) college/pro players have been excellent coaches: Larry Brown, Pat Riley, Phil Jackson, Jerry Sloan, Doc Rivers, Lenny Wilkens, Danny Ainge, etc.

Since 1989, Loyola's women's basketball team has had exactly two seasons with a record over .500, zero 20-win seasons, and only once finished as high as 3rd in conference play. The women's team was 71-200 (.262) in the entire decade of the 1990s, with six consecutive seasons of 20 losses or more-- and 13 of those 71 wins in that decade came against two schools: Chicago State and UIC. From 2000 to 2010, the team had five 20+ loss seasons, including seasons of 4-25, 7-21, 8-23, and 8-21-- and again, a large chunk of the few wins came against schools like Robert Morris, St. Xavier, and fellow HL doormat Youngstown State (by the mid-late 00s, we weren't even beating Chicago State or UIC on a regular basis anymore).

The goal of the Swoopes hiring was to build for the long term off an outlier of a very good season in 2012-13 as Loyola was headed into the MVC, and dramatically turn around the reputation as an achingly terrible program. Already, before the ball tipped off for her second season, the schedule is amazingly better. Compare the 2014-15 schedule to the 2010-11 schedule. We're getting a much higher quality of recruits and transfers than we ever got before.

Have I seen anything to really impress me with X's and O's yet? No. But getting through last season as well as we did (as few as seven dressed for some games because of illness/injury), winning the tournament game in St. Charles, the recruiting improvement, the scheduling improvement, and some of the work done trying to improve attendance is pretty impressive to me, especially for a newcomer. The only two Loyola head coaches who had an overall better first season than Swoopes in the past quarter century (men's or women's) were Whitesell and maybe Eric Simpson. Whitesell won 13 games, two HL Tournament games, and finished .500 in conference. Simpson went 15-15 (including wins vs. non-D1 St. Xavier, 1st year D1 SIU-E) with a 5th place finish in conference, but lost in the first round of the HL Tournament. Farmer, Rey, Burmeister, and Moser all had single-digit wins their first seasons; Kier Rogers, Shannon Reidy, Mary Helen Walker, Tracy Manuel, and Pam Roecker all had considerably worse first seasons than Swoopes.

we came up with Russell but ruled him out because by that time the Celtics were pretty self run and he never had the same kind of success when he coached the sonics and the kings. I would count him.
I like Cheeks because he never forgot he is a chicago guy. I thought he should have been in the NBA 50 but thats my own opinion that doesn't have much to back it comparatively. As a head coach he hasn't done much.
Bird I would count but he left coaching because he realized it wasn't in him. He expected the players to be like him and there is only one Larry Bird.
Being in the top 50 is an extremely high standard but she is considered the best ever. When you achieve that title it comes with its own baggage.
The rest of the guys prove my point about having that dual perspective. You come away with something different when you aren't the man all the time.
As far as Swoopes, I agree the jury is out. My experience has been her own agenda comes first and her team and Loyola comes second. She didn't go to the golf outing,the cubs game rooftop, and the tip off lunch. I have never seen her at any other Loyola games or events.
Grace Calhoun hired her and she has such a great eye for talent. Why didn't any other school even take a chance on her as a asst.
Her best attribute is her ability to get a schedule together. I believe its easy to get kids when you play good competition. That's a good thing to have but until she demonstrates that someone comes first before herself I have big doubts. I would love nothing better than to eat my words. I'm rooting for her but she has big odds against her and being a stats guy I wouldn't take the bet.
A side note: its great to just talk hoops again!!!!!!