carmel questions still?

[Not-so HeavyD]

Cutie,

 

All kidding aside, that is a great post.....and it is exactly for the reasons that you mention that we take pride in our programs. We feel like we have some tremendous coaches in West Tennessee that "do more with less" and get the kids to believe in their systems, which gets harder and harder to do in this day and time.

 

I can still remember going to Harding Academy and playing the team that had Juana Brown and Nikki White on it.........man they were good. What ever happened to Lesa Mears anyway??

[caramelcutiepie]

Cutie,

 

All kidding aside, that is a great post.....and it is exactly for the reasons that you mention that we take pride in our programs. We feel like we have some tremendous coaches in West Tennessee that "do more with less" and get the kids to believe in their systems, which gets harder and harder to do in this day and time.

 

I can still remember going to Harding Academy and playing the team that had Juana Brown and Nikki White on it.........man they were good. What ever happened to Lesa Mears anyway??

Last I heard, which was a couple of years ago, she was coaching at Treadwell. I haven't heard anything lately but she was a super coach! One of the least known but one of the best that ever coached in Memphis, although her coaching stint was short...she did some amazing things in a few short years.

[trojanbob]

Let's be honest about the Harding Academy thing. Mears had the Celtic organization totally behind her pushing players into that program. Eddie Clinton was a big Harding supporter and was the reason she was hired there. Having taught at Harding and knowing more about mears than I want too, along with her failure to make the state tournament with the talent she had, I don't believe you can say great coach. She did not have a dozen go division one either. Her players where fundamentally sound. Don't over state accomplishments.

[caramelcutiepie]

Let's be honest about the Harding Academy thing. Mears had the Celtic organization totally behind her pushing players into that program. Eddie Clinton was a big Harding supporter and was the reason she was hired there. Having taught at Harding and knowing more about mears than I want too, along with her failure to make the state tournament with the talent she had, I don't believe you can say great coach. She did not have a dozen go division one either. Her players where fundamentally sound. Don't over state accomplishments.

She did have over a dozen...I should know, I played with them. Consider the ones before Juana and Nikki like Tasha King (Kansas), Laura Cianciola (St. Johns) Julianne Signiago (Ole Miss) Nikki kendrick (Arkansas) and Tarol Page (Austin Peay) just to name a few.

 

If you worked there, you should know this. Maybe they were there before you got there. I know I was.

 

Knowing what happened in her situation (rather not discuss), I'm not throwing a pity party for her and I'm not saying that she is the greatest "person" in the world. I'm just giving her credit for being a good coach. You say don't overstate what she has done, Freeze was at Briarcrest at the same time and never won a State Tournament (not to mention even never making it to state or regionals for that matter) while playing in a "non-D2/pre-D2 league". Mears beat some of the top teams in the city, Northside being one of them while having some of the top players in the city on that team (Marquita Mackey, Rashida Allsgood,etc). That was during the regular season, but do you think that Freeze could have won all of his many state tournaments in D1 girls basketball in the state of Tennessee?? I don't think so...and like I said, he was coaching before the change took place and lost to Kirby and other teams in the city who were not even top teams. Although Harding did have the backing of the Celtics, so what? It's not any different than what Briarcrest is doing with the Waves/Blackhawks feeder system and if you say something bad about Coach Clinton, I'll have to come and find you myself.

[trojanbob]

Went to schools and actually playing for schools are different things. Nothing bad toward Coach Clinton, I taught all 3 of his kids. You are right about feeder programs. Yes he would have at least one at Briarcrest. Nope you weren't.

[caramelcutiepie]

Went to schools and actually playing for schools are different things.  Nothing bad toward Coach Clinton, I taught all 3 of his kids.  You are right about feeder programs.  Yes he would have at least one at Briarcrest.  Nope you weren't.

I know that going to schools and actually playing are different. Let's just keep it simple and say that all of these girls signed scholarship offers and played at least one year, most staying the whole time (except for King and Cianciola). The point that I am trying to establish if not for the nitpicking, is that they were all talented players who could go on to play at the next level, also pointing out the feat that a coach at such a small private school accomplished.

 

Most other coaches in our area have never sent so many players big time like she did, feeder program or not. I was already at Harding in elementary school (before playing for the Celtics) but I still think that it was a good idea for the others because in some cases, you take kids from urban parts of the city and put them in an exceptional academic environment that a private school has to offer and they excel in both athletics and academics and are better prepared once they get to college and usually do well on the ACT. I know it worked out fine for me...I was very prepared and learned a lot as a result of going to private school for most of my time in school. Some public schools are very good also, but I'm just speaking of my experience...it also worked well for Juana and Nikki, who got degrees from very good universities UNC and Kansas.

Edited February 9, 2004 by caramelcutiepie

[trojanbob]

Not sure what part of that was about but that is my biggest grip with the privates. They test to get in if you aren't from their own program. Most of the time thier own students couldn't pass the entrance exam and if it is religiously oreinted then shouldn't it be viewed as a mission field and reach out to all.

[caramelcutiepie]

Not sure what part of that was about but that is my biggest grip with the privates. They test to get in if you aren't from their own program. Most of the time thier own students couldn't pass the entrance exam and if it is religiously oreinted then shouldn't it be viewed as a mission field and reach out to all.

I maybe shouldn't say this, but I went through the testing process as well and I feel that the testing process is used as a control measure to keep large numbers of certain groups of people out of those schools. Once I got there, there were kids who I had a hard time believing they actually passed anything, let alone the entrance exams. Briarcrest is really bad about this and there's no coincidence that most of the African American students (the few that actually go there) are athletes. There are very small numbers of "regular" kids. Very small.

[trojanbob]

that is my point also...