LadyGriz The Lady Caucasians

[Art Spooner]

Having known quite a few women’s coaches fo

Having known multiple Griz assistants over the years and one current that is a good friend, i can tell you it is not for a lack of trying. The facts are and this is no secret, is very difficult to recruit black women far from their homes, which typically are cities. Women’s recruiting is much more regionalized than men. The bigger issue for Lady Griz in the last 10 years is not locking down the local D1 girls, regardless of race or size. Robin elevated the program to a level higher than most would ever expect to happen again, he did it by consistently signing the top Montana girls from places like Fairfield, Malta, and Lewistown. The 6’4 player you describe has never and will never sign with the Lady Griz, that is just reality

He was able to be very successful because he arrived at a time when you could use predominantly Montana players and out coach your opponent. Athletic talent and coaching had not yet caught up with modern game. Slower, more methodical game then. More athletic now. Selvig would not dominate today using his recruiting model from the 80’s and 90’s. Right guy at the right time in the history of women’s college basketball. Couldn’t have the same success today unless he completely changed and I’m not sure he would. He stayed the course right up to retirement without any significant changes.

 

[alabamagrizzly]

That's a good name. Made me chuckle. Recall that my Alabama wedding is May 9. Dadeville. Probably won't get close to Huntsville.

No but you will be a short drive from Auburns campus if you're intrested in seeing that. The Lake Martin area is very nice but its prime snake season so be careful if outside around nature.

 

[billingsgriz]

Not all Black and Hispanic girls want to stay in the inner city in Seattle and Tacoma, Portland, SF and Oakland, LA and suburbs of these big cities. I think Nate would be well served to hire an assistant coach of color from such a city and turn her loose recruiting these nearby big cities like Travis has. Neither our football team nor our men's basketball team would be competitive without our Black student athletes, and unless we put effort into recruiting these girls they're not just going to show up in Missoula. To steal a line from the Kevin Costner classic " Field of Dreams," if the LG recruit these girls, they will come to Missoula, obviously not all of them but some of them, and they will help improve the LG's speed and athleticism and make our women's bball team more competitive and successful !!!

 

[wyomingriz]

He was able to be very successful because he arrived at a time when you could use predominantly Montana players and out coach your opponent. Athletic talent and coaching had not yet caught up with modern game. Slower, more methodical game then. More athletic now. Selvig would not dominate today using his recruiting model from the 80’s and 90’s. Right guy at the right time in the history of women’s college basketball. Couldn’t have the same success today unless he completely changed and I’m not sure he would. He stayed the course right up to retirement without any significant changes.

He was able to be very successful because he arrived at a time when you could use predominantly Montana players and out coach your opponent. Athletic talent and coaching had not yet caught up with modern game. Slower, more methodical game then. More athletic now. Selvig would not dominate today using his recruiting model from the 80’s and 90’s. Right guy at the right time in the history of women’s college basketball. Couldn’t have the same success today unless he completely changed and I’m not sure he would. He stayed the course right up to retirement without any significant changes.

As he should have, it worked right up until he retired. Not completely disagreeing with you but the game hasn’t changed that much in the last 10 years. Selvig made NCAA 2 of last 4 years and 7 of last 13, I would argue it was still working. Obviously there are many issues with the state of out program, however, like I said in my previous post, the biggest issue in my opinion has been the lack of attracting top Montana girls. The talent pool is still there however, MSU, EWU and others are landing them.

 

[Griz in Texas]

Having known quite a few women’s coaches fo

Having known multiple Griz assistants over the years and one current that is a good friend, i can tell you it is not for a lack of trying. The facts are and this is no secret, is very difficult to recruit black women far from their homes, which typically are cities. Women’s recruiting is much more regionalized than men. The bigger issue for Lady Griz in the last 10 years is not locking down the local D1 girls, regardless of race or size. Robin elevated the program to a level higher than most would ever expect to happen again, he did it by consistently signing the top Montana girls from places like Fairfield, Malta, and Lewistown. The 6’4 player you describe has never and will never sign with the Lady Griz, that is just reality

I hear what you're saying, I've heard it said for years, but I don't buy most of it still.
I'm not at all taking away from anything Robin Selvig did, if you win 865 times at anything, that is special and you deserve the accolades, but if you can recruit black females to Moscow, Cheney and Laramie, you can get those same kids into Missoula and open the door.
When women's basketball in the NCAA was in its early years, I feel this was possible, if you gave the kid the opportunity the right one would take it. I am not convinced, as you suggest, anyone really tried too much. No one ever talked about it, it was all about getting the in-state players.
Note to football - winning the Montana recruiting battle could land you here
It just seemed like we had a pipeline that kept bringing the best two or three AA or A players and a bunch of 5'4" white girls. All in all, if you wanted to keep the team ivory soap, there were some scrappy white girls out there on those courts too I am sure that may not have gotten a lot of attention that nobody tried to recruit, but our team stuck to small town Washington for an out of state recruiting area. That's why we are where we are today and I don't see that we recover from that now. It was pretty obvious when you had a player with the talent of Karen Deden leave Missoula to go to Washington that that level of player wasn't going to play here.

 

[Triwest]

I hear what you're saying, I've heard it said for years, but I don't buy most of it still.
I'm not at all taking away from anything Robin Selvig did, if you win 865 times at anything, that is special and you deserve the accolades, but if you can recruit black females to Moscow, Cheney and Laramie, you can get those same kids into Missoula and open the door.
When women's basketball in the NCAA was in its early years, I feel this was possible, if you gave the kid the opportunity the right one would take it. I am not convinced, as you suggest, anyone really tried too much. No one ever talked about it, it was all about getting the in-state players.
Note to football - winning the Montana recruiting battle could land you here
It just seemed like we had a pipeline that kept bringing the best two or three AA or A players and a bunch of 5'4" white girls. All in all, if you wanted to keep the team ivory soap, there were some scrappy white girls out there on those courts too I am sure that may not have gotten a lot of attention that nobody tried to recruit, but our team stuck to small town Washington for an out of state recruiting area. That's why we are where we are today and I don't see that we recover from that now. It was pretty obvious when you had a player with the talent of Karen Deden leave Missoula to go to Washington that that level of player wasn't going to play here.

Demographics Montana is 1% or less being Black which means only about 7000 total i entire state. Based on general state demographic break down only about 3000 black females in State. The majority of black state residents are in 4 counties, Cascade, Yellowstone, and Missoula and Gallatin counties. As far as current University enrollment currently available there are only 118 black students 59 male and 59 female. Not sure what this says about recruiting.

 

[wyomingriz]

I hear what you're saying, I've heard it said for years, but I don't buy most of it still.
I'm not at all taking away from anything Robin Selvig did, if you win 865 times at anything, that is special and you deserve the accolades, but if you can recruit black females to Moscow, Cheney and Laramie, you can get those same kids into Missoula and open the door.
When women's basketball in the NCAA was in its early years, I feel this was possible, if you gave the kid the opportunity the right one would take it. I am not convinced, as you suggest, anyone really tried too much. No one ever talked about it, it was all about getting the in-state players.
Note to football - winning the Montana recruiting battle could land you here
It just seemed like we had a pipeline that kept bringing the best two or three AA or A players and a bunch of 5'4" white girls. All in all, if you wanted to keep the team ivory soap, there were some scrappy white girls out there on those courts too I am sure that may not have gotten a lot of attention that nobody tried to recruit, but our team stuck to small town Washington for an out of state recruiting area. That's why we are where we are today and I don't see that we recover from that now. It was pretty obvious when you had a player with the talent of Karen Deden leave Missoula to go to Washington that that level of player wasn't going to play here.

Deden kind of makes my point, 6’4 that could hold her own against dudes. That class of player has, is and always will be out of our league. Understandably we can’t keep that caliber in our own state, that’s out of out control, but how can you expect the program to get them from the city?
The low hanging fruit has been in our own back yard and we have failed miserably in the last 10 years. Over and over we miss, I see today the Gunlock girl is heading to MSU, another miss, broken record, too many to name any more. I am not saying that is the only the only piece to winning championships but it is a start. Also, who are these 5’4 white girls, you said a bunch of them. Skyla Sisco, Tory Hill? Short but not that short, I think you might be exaggerating just a little

 

[Hoops watcher]

Six by my count prior to this year.

Vicki Austin 88-89
Keeli Burton-Oliver 22-23 (not under Selvig)
Gina Marxen 22-24 (not under Selvig)
Shaunte Nance-Johnson 08-10
Katerina Tsineke 21-23 (not under Selvig)
Tianna Ware 08-12

I made this argument for years while he was here, if he was such a great coach, why couldn't he recruit outside of the small schools that he seemed to love so much as part of his own roots.

He did a great job with giving the Native American girls from Montana the opportunity to play Division I basketball. You would have thought he could see that getting crushed by USC in back to back years in the 80's would have given the clue, but what I remember from that vividly was media question to one of the Lady Griz before the game where they asked to the effect of 'when was the last time you went up against anyone who was 6'4". The reply, 'this morning at practice.'

The real question should be, when was the last time we had any player who was 6'4" who had the physicality to play against that kind of physicality that you find in the women who grew up playing against boys in the inner cities and such where this is just part of how you learn to play the game. Certainly though, my opinion was that this is the crossroads where Robin could have learned what he needed to elevate the program to the next level and he chose to recruit heavily out of Fairfield, Lewistown and Malta instead.

Everybody was getting crushed by Miller and the McGees in the early 80's. Watched out ladies beat numerous PAC teams back in those days.

 

[GrizPony]

My daughter's high school team is the Lady Bucks. Explain that.

Transitioned?

 

[GrizPony]

Why is that?

Because a "lady Grizzly" is a sow.

 

[alabamagrizzly]

Transitioned?

Im still not sure if thats allowed yet in Alabama.

 

[Allezchat]

Ok

Neither our football team nor our men's basketball team would be competitive without our Black student athletes,

Its just not the same thing when you look at talent pool and demographics as a whole across the US and Canada but I don't think anyone will ever convince you otherwise.

Look how many Canadian white girls play in the Big Sky. Look how many Canadian white guys. I can't name any but I'm sure there is. There's obviously a need to find more players than there is in men's bb. There's way more of all ethnicities in the pool so you have more African Americans to choose in men's.

 

[SoldierGriz]

Apples to oranges to some degree...I get it.

But, having been stationed all over the US:

Go to Fort Stewart, Georgia or Fort Jackson, SC and you will find black Soldiers all over the place...every rank and both genders.

Go to Fort Riley, Kansas or even Fort Carson, CO and you will find far fewer.

Why? Soldiers are given (some) choices regarding their duty assignments.

I think this dynamic plays out to some degree with the Lady Griz and recruiting...

Or, perhaps I have no clue on this topic - which would be mostly accurate.

 

[MTbest]

Demographics Montana is 1% or less being Black which means only about 7000 total i entire state. Based on general state demographic break down only about 3000 black females in State. The majority of black state residents are in 4 counties, Cascade, Yellowstone, and Missoula and Gallatin counties. As far as current University enrollment currently available there are only 118 black students 59 male and 59 female. Not sure what this says about recruiting.

Here's a link to an academic study having to do with the complexity of recruitment and retention of Black athletes, both male and female, "Recruitment overhaul of Black athletes in college sport". Interestingly enough, there appears to be some key identifiable challenges, some included in this blog You might want to skim, and like a lot of us skip to the latter portions of this research based work "results/findings", etc. What is insightful are narratives from Black athletes describing their own experiences: https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/13573322.2024.2374014#abstract

 

[Jordan_20]

He was able to be very successful because he arrived at a time when you could use predominantly Montana players and out coach your opponent. Athletic talent and coaching had not yet caught up with modern game. Slower, more methodical game then. More athletic now. Selvig would not dominate today using his recruiting model from the 80’s and 90’s. Right guy at the right time in the history of women’s college basketball. Couldn’t have the same success today unless he completely changed and I’m not sure he would. He stayed the course right up to retirement without any significant changes.

Montana does not have a lack of women's basketball talent. We routinely send players to mid-major and P4/5 schools. The two newest transfers we are getting are from Montana coming via big basketball schools.

 

[MTbest]

Montana does not have a lack of women's basketball talent. We routinely send players to mid-major and P4/5 schools. The two newest transfers we are getting are from Montana coming via big basketball schools.

Looks like a pattern for Big Sky athletics, we've been vigilant enough to take stock of those big-league players of whom are very good but "not ready for prime time". Maybe we're the deposition locale, of after market parts. I say that even though we recruit rich talent in all the right ways, we see the talent, target them and bring them in right out of high school. Let's not forget either, recruited to a top school means for the most part better academics, top coaches and to get that all for free.. as good old St Nick said, "ho ho ho who wouldn't go"! And then we created NIL and the Portal...a convenient spin the bottle occupation.