Someone asked me the other day...how's the Brown team gonna do this season? Do you miss it? What's it like not coaching? On the first day of the Ivy League practice season, I thought that I'd answer these questions...
Q. The first question...how 's the Brown Team going to do this season??
A. Well I am biased about the Brown Team! I love the new class that we brought in, and I think that it was the best we've brought in in several years. The energy that players like Janice Yang, Sarah Robson, Britt Moorehead coupled with the scoring punch of Kaitlyn Keon will be formidable and potent. I predict that this class by the end of the season will have at least three times the points the whole team had last year! The grit of Lauren Vella and Shannon Flatley brings back the old school days of defenders like Cassie Turner and Cara Gardner Morey, and these defenders round off a great first year class. Our strategy over the past few seasons was to go with youth. The goaltending should be fantastic, and the rest of our young defenders (sophomores) should mesh well with Flately and Vella. The sophomore forwards should hold steady. Jolin will be solid and her up front on ice leadership will be key. We took our lumps the last two years--apparently pretty big ones considering the staff is gone ;), but we were building for the future. Our choice of playing youth instead of elder players was an investment that should pay dividends and will make this a breakout year for Brown Womens Hockey. So I'll answer my question with a question--How will the Brown team do this year?? My answer--how can they NOT be good!
Q.Do I miss it?
A. Well, when you do something in your life for 20+ years, and you have built all of your patterns around a season, and a year...when you have your energy on overdrive each day with competitive juices flowing and you are constantly in recruiting mode, you are thinking about how to manage 25+ players and staff, it is hard to slow down the biorhythms! Have I slowed down? Not really, but it has been great to recharge, to see a different perspective, to look to the future, and focus on figuring out the next step. I will do something really meaningful. What is that you might ask--I have several directions I am considering, but for now I am focusing on my family life and reconnecting with a sanity that I have not had in a while.
Q. Speaking of sanity or insanity ;) my final question--do I miss coaching?
A. I'll let you know... but I really won't know until the season starts. The people in the game have changed...society and the way parents parent their children has changed. Respect is getting more and more rare in the world and sport is a microcosm of society. Respect for coaches is non-existent. Or should I say respect for female coaches is non-existent! I don't miss that. Other things I don't miss--the negative recruiting, the dogged schedule of recruiting events that all programs need to be a part of, the parents who will do or say anything to get a scholarship or to get into an Ivy. The lack of loyalty. The lack of parents having perspective when it comes to sport. You hear stories about parents boasting about how their kids have no time for homework because they have so many sporting events they take their children to. How is this parenting? How have we let sport rule us? When did sport become more important than school?? Hockey tourneys start on Friday and u12's travel to Chicago to play a weekend tourney ofetn missing school. These type parents have failed children in sport and coaches are left to deal with childern who have been parented like this. Let me rephrase that... coaches who care about teaching character and teaching life lessons through sport pay for it because athletes and parents get away with treating coaches with disrespect in youth sport and now this behavior has creeped into college athletics. Since when did the athlete become the paying customer in college athletics? Since when did the pupil become the evaluator of the teacher? Any coach reading this knows what I mean...
So on this first day of practice in the Ivy League Womens Hockey, I wish all the Ivy teams good luck...
I wish the Brown team good riddance to Herbies.
And I wish and hope the Princeton women will enjoy a good ol' Brown first day of practice!
Great post coach. As usual, you are right on point. I am not totally aware of the reasons you are no longer coaching but I will say, if Brown does not know what they are losing - it will not be long until they have a rude awakening & realize they have lost not only a wonderful hockey coach but also a great leader, teacher and role model. Keep the words of wisdom coming - love it!
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