Is Jamelle Elliott On The Hot Seat?

[JavaMan]

Cincinnati Basketball: Is It Time To Replace UC’s Women’s Head Basketball Coach Jamelle Elliott?

On Friday March 4th the Cincinnati Bearcats’ women’s basketball team wrapped up their 2015-16 season with a 70-61 loss to the eight seed East Carolina Pirates in the AAC Tournament and finishing with a 8-22 record. In the last seven years UC has only advanced out of the first round of their conference tournament three times and gone to a postseason non-conference tournament once. They’ve also compiled a 78-135 record (36.6%) during that time.

The common theme over those seven years has been head coach Jamelle Elliott. A former UConn player and assistant coach, I was hopeful she would bring some of Geno Auriemma’s magic to the Bearcats. At the time bringing her in made sense. If Cincinnati wanted to elevate it’s women’s hoops program like they had in football and on the men’s side, why not go after someone on the staff of one of the most successful teams in college basketball? It’s the same mindset that forces Nick Saban to replace his coordinators and assistant coaches practically every year.

Now, I understand women’s basketball isn’t as popular of a sport as football or men’s basketball at Cincinnati. The same goes for most schools outside of UConn, Notre Dame, or Baylor and in some cases baseball, lacrosse, or soccer can rank ahead of it.

MORE...

 

[warbler1055]

Sad but pretty even handed article. Constraints and budget are not known issues, she is what the record says she is as a coach.

 

[jcoton56]

She can hold her head high. I am sure the impact she has had on her young women has been extremely positive. Give her a roster like UT or Duke and I would expect we would see more positive results IMHO.

 

[EricLA]

She can hold her head high. I am sure the impact she has had on her young women has been extremely positive. Give her a roster like UT or Duke and I would expect we would see more positive results IMHO.

Agreed. She'd do a wonderful job at Texas or Duke. Although Alston is going very strong at UT right now...

 

[EricLA]

Agreed. She'd do a wonderful job at Texas or Duke. Although Alston is going very strong at UT right now...

Sorry I mistyped. Aston. No "L" in her name lol...

 

[huskeynut]

Balanced article. Not surprised that Jamelle is in the hot seat.

 

[UcMiami]

I think Jamelle is a fine coach and is probably a great influence on her charges, but she has been unable to recruit at Cincinnati for whatever reason and that has doomed the program to bad results. Yes with a Duke team she could probably get good results, but could she keep the stream of talent coming to Duke?

 

[ballhawk]

If women's basketball is to be taken seriously women's coaches need to be held to the same standard as men's coaches. Geno always says this. Would Jamelle's 36% win percentage over 7 years be acceptable in the men's program?

 

[Blueballer]

Jamelle has the same trouble Jen has at Hartford. How do you get high powered recruits to go to those schools? Just being in the same conference as UCONN is just not good enough, the school has to be attractive. There's lots of talent to spread around in the men's game but not in the women's.

 

[DaddyChoc]

Jamelle has the same trouble Jen has at Hartford. How do you get high powered recruits to go to those schools? Just being in the same conference as UCONN is just not good enough, the school has to be attractive. There's lots of talent to spread around in the men's game but not in the women's.

Jen needs a good local talent... maybe Mary Baskerville if she doesn't seem to have "UConn potential".

Jen's OOC schedule has been fun, in-conference is always a battle.

some of these local talents need to stop acting like they're better than they really are

 

[Blakeon18]

I don't know if this was realistic but I bet the Cincy big cheese had expectations of getting to the Dayton level under Jamelle...which
hasn't happened at all.

 

[UcMiami]

Jamelle has the same trouble Jen has at Hartford. How do you get high powered recruits to go to those schools? Just being in the same conference as UCONN is just not good enough, the school has to be attractive. There's lots of talent to spread around in the men's game but not in the women's.

But unlike Jen who is in the middle of a pretty weak state talent wise and is at a really small school in a true 1 bid mid-major conference, Cincinnati is located in a talent laden state in a talent rich region and is a much more sizable school with presumably much greater resources and has been in the 'Best' WCBB conference for a number of her years and is still in a much better conference. The school itself might be the pits and the facilities and support may be terrible, I have no idea having never been there, but it still dwarfs Hartford.

 

[malevocalist#]

I think Jamelle is a fine coach and is probably a great influence on her charges, but she has been unable to recruit at Cincinnati for whatever reason and that has doomed the program to bad results. Yes with a Duke team she could probably get good results, but could she keep the stream of talent coming to Duke?

Yes and a whole lot more.

 

[malevocalist#]

She needs to go to a program that attracts recruits period

 

[DaddyChoc]

But unlike Jen who is in the middle of a pretty weak state talent wise and is at a really small school in a true 1 bid mid-major conference, Cincinnati is located in a talent laden state in a talent rich region and is a much more sizable school with presumably much greater resources and has been in the 'Best' WCBB conference for a number of her years and is still in a much better conference. The school itself might be the pits and the facilities and support may be terrible, I have no idea having never been there, but it still dwarfs Hartford.

but Jen is.... Rizzotti, a UConn great! BTW Geno was in the same situation basically #SmallSchool early on

 

[UcMiami]

but Jen is.... Rizzotti, a UConn great! BTW Geno was in the same situation basically #SmallSchool early on

Uconn was never in the last 100 years been in the 'small' school category that Hartford occupies - state school with huge expansion post WWII long before Geno showed up. The program was crap, the facilities terrible, but still light years from Hartford and Geno's arrival corresponded to huge investments in athletics and women's sports specifically.

 

[DaddyChoc]

Uconn was never in the last 100 years been in the 'small' school category that Hartford occupies - state school with huge expansion post WWII long before Geno showed up. The program was crap, the facilities terrible, but still light years from Hartford and Geno's arrival corresponded to huge investments in athletics and women's sports specifically.

still not excusing Rizz for her poor team performances the last few years. She had quality players a few years back but that pipeline appears to be plugged