Winthrop made a splash on Thursday by naming Pat Kelsey as its new head coach. Kelsey was considered a rising star in the coaching ranks before stepping down as Xavier’s Associate Head Coach last season to spend more time with his family.
Only 35 years old, the former Wake Forest assistant saw first-hand what happened to Skip Prosser and no doubt saw what Urban Myer was going through. Now a year later, Kelsey feels he is ready to get back into coaching and what better a place than Winthrop?
Kelsey was known as a high-energy guy and certainly that is something that Winthrop fans have been wanting ever since Gregg Marshall left to go to Wichita State. It is curious that a day after Coach Marshall was named to the Big South Hall of Fame that Winthrop would name an energetic up and comer in the coaching profession.
He is known for a fast paced offense and a strong emphasis on defense. He also earned a reputation as an innovative marketer during his time at Wake Forest. He worked with current XU head coach and former Wake assistant Chris Mack and Wake marketing to produce the "Tie-Dye Nation" campaign, which still thrives today as the heartbeat of the Wake Forest fan base.
Kelsey is just the sixth head men’s basketball coach in Winthrop history (The Eagles began men’s basketball in 1977) following Nield Gordon, Steve Vacendak, Dan Kenney, Marshall, and Randy Peele.
Eagle fans should be encouraged by this hire and expect a news conference sometime mid-next week to officially welcome their new coach.
Thursday, March 29, 2012
Wednesday, February 1, 2012
Longwood Joins the Big South
The Big South officially welcomed the Longwood Lancers into the league last month bringing the current membership to an unprecedented 12 teams. Adding Longwood gives the league a very convenient four teams in each of its three states.
The Lancers have been a Division I independent for the last 4 1/2 years since moving up from Division II. Longwood has targeted Big South membership from the very beginning but it has taken the Big South some time to warm up to the Lancers. We can only assume the Big South was awaiting facility upgrades and proof of performance that Longwood would sustain at the DI level. With those questions now answered, adding the Lancers does make it a more balanced league (for how long is debatable).
What does it mean for Winthrop? It will make the Virginia trips a little easier, assuming your will make a VMI/Radford trip and a Liberty/Longwood trip. However, VMI doesn’t play volleyball or women’s basketball and Longwood does not play volleyball so for volleyball, no change at all, and Women’s hoops actually now has to make a second trip to Va. That it wouldn’t normally make.
Longwood will compete right away. The Lancers are very good in golf and soccer and historically have been competitive in women’s basketball and baseball. The real interesting question for the league is does the addition of Longwood mean that division play is right around the corner?
It is no surprise that the with the current 11 team lineup, the unbalanced schedule has upset a lot of coaches. Although it has worked in WU’s favor a couple of times, there are complaints that certain teams do not play the top teams and that is unfair for seeding purposes.
With division play, two-thirds of the league is broken up nicely into North and South. The Va. Schools to the North, the S.C. schools to the South, then it is just a matter of assigning the N.C. schools, the geography will not work out. If it were by geography Asheville and HPU are more Northern than GWU and Campbell, but those cannot be travel partners. So, although Asheville to the South and Campbell to the North or GWU to the North and HPU to the South would be a little strange, the travel partners have to stay together.
The next question is how many conference games do we play? Right now the number is 18 in Men’s basketball and 24 in Baseball. With divisions, MBB has to drop to 16 games (10 against your division, each team twice and 6 against the other division, each team once). Baseball to stay at 24 means you would play the teams in your division every year and then there would be three-teams in the other division you would not play.
It is all very interesting and I am sure the Big South brass will figure it out but for now, welcome Longwood and we will see you first on the soccer pitch in Fall 2012.
The Lancers have been a Division I independent for the last 4 1/2 years since moving up from Division II. Longwood has targeted Big South membership from the very beginning but it has taken the Big South some time to warm up to the Lancers. We can only assume the Big South was awaiting facility upgrades and proof of performance that Longwood would sustain at the DI level. With those questions now answered, adding the Lancers does make it a more balanced league (for how long is debatable).
What does it mean for Winthrop? It will make the Virginia trips a little easier, assuming your will make a VMI/Radford trip and a Liberty/Longwood trip. However, VMI doesn’t play volleyball or women’s basketball and Longwood does not play volleyball so for volleyball, no change at all, and Women’s hoops actually now has to make a second trip to Va. That it wouldn’t normally make.
Longwood will compete right away. The Lancers are very good in golf and soccer and historically have been competitive in women’s basketball and baseball. The real interesting question for the league is does the addition of Longwood mean that division play is right around the corner?
It is no surprise that the with the current 11 team lineup, the unbalanced schedule has upset a lot of coaches. Although it has worked in WU’s favor a couple of times, there are complaints that certain teams do not play the top teams and that is unfair for seeding purposes.
With division play, two-thirds of the league is broken up nicely into North and South. The Va. Schools to the North, the S.C. schools to the South, then it is just a matter of assigning the N.C. schools, the geography will not work out. If it were by geography Asheville and HPU are more Northern than GWU and Campbell, but those cannot be travel partners. So, although Asheville to the South and Campbell to the North or GWU to the North and HPU to the South would be a little strange, the travel partners have to stay together.
The next question is how many conference games do we play? Right now the number is 18 in Men’s basketball and 24 in Baseball. With divisions, MBB has to drop to 16 games (10 against your division, each team twice and 6 against the other division, each team once). Baseball to stay at 24 means you would play the teams in your division every year and then there would be three-teams in the other division you would not play.
It is all very interesting and I am sure the Big South brass will figure it out but for now, welcome Longwood and we will see you first on the soccer pitch in Fall 2012.
Thursday, January 12, 2012
Eagles travel to High Point for Big Matchup
Coach speak says that all games count the same and that any conference game is by definition a “Big Game.” So, for the Eagles tonight’s game at High Point is no different than say the game at Gardner-Webb on Dec. 3. Coach Peele used the +1 analogy for road wins, -1 for home losses, and even for home wins and road losses. I would be interested to see how that plays out for a season. But my point is this. Tonight is a big game. It is far more important than the Dec. 3, game at Gardner-Webb and here is why.On the Dec. 3, the Eagles were 1-0 in conference and coming off a win at PC. So splitting the opening trip was still considered a “good trip”. Today, the Eagles are 3-2 in the league and are playing well but beating Radford (0-5) and VMI (3-4) at home didn’t really give anyone a real read on the season. Winthrop is 0-4 at Millis Center under Coach Peele. High Point is 2-3 in the league and needs to win at home. A Winthrop loss, puts the Eagles back to .500 and says it is a middle of the pack team. A Winthrop win puts the Eagles at 4-2 heading into a winnable game in Lynchburg. The Eagles would jump into the top four in the league and set up a great stretch run with Asheville, Campbell, and Coastal Carolina.
This game tonight will go a long way to telling us if the Eagles are truly going to contend this season. You can’t be satisfied with winning at home and losing on the road and finishing at .500. Winthrop needs a “W” tonight and on Saturday and give the rest of the conference that, “Here comes Winthrop feeling” they felt for most of the decade.
Wednesday, January 11, 2012
New Year's Resolution
So, we have been a little slack on the ole Winthrop Eagle Blog but with the New Year comes new incentive. We have a new Social Media Clubhouse on winthropeagles.com and this blog is listed so hopefully that will be reason enough to do a little more blogging in the New Year.
We have a couple of other items to roll out this year. One is a new feature during basketball games and that will be the Live Chat . Now it doesn't sound like much but this could be a fun thing for people who can't make it to the game. Basically what will happen is someone from the media relations staff will be at the game just chatting it up with fans about what is going on in the game, around the team, or whatever.
So, be on the lookout always on Facebook and Twitter for new things to make your online viewing of Winthrop games a little more interactive. GO EAGLES!!!
We have a couple of other items to roll out this year. One is a new feature during basketball games and that will be the Live Chat . Now it doesn't sound like much but this could be a fun thing for people who can't make it to the game. Basically what will happen is someone from the media relations staff will be at the game just chatting it up with fans about what is going on in the game, around the team, or whatever.
So, be on the lookout always on Facebook and Twitter for new things to make your online viewing of Winthrop games a little more interactive. GO EAGLES!!!
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