Jhasmin Player out as UM WBB Asst.

[mainejeff]

New job: Loyola Marymount Asst.

Everyone has a right to find a new job, make more money, move to an area where they will be happier, etc etc.

That being said the timing on this absolutely sucks! (what else is new at UM-Zero! )

The coaching staff was just announced on Aug 16. on www.goblackbears.com and it included the returning Coach Player! Also, Player just returned from a European recruiting trip a few weeks ago. What a waste of money that was for UMaine! I'm sure that LMU is happy that they didn't have to finance their European recruiting trip.

This all being said....Player seems like a terrific person & coach. Believe it or not...I am happy for her personally. But guess what.....I am a University of Maine women's basketball fan......not a Coach Player fan.

It will be interesting to see who Vachon fills this position with? I'd look to her father for this season if he is healthy enough.

[turkeyman]

Terrible news. Player has worked extremely well with Coach Vachon. As both a WNBA and European pro, she was a living example for the players. She seemed to have settled in extremely well here. I can virtually guarantee no one will read a tweet from her at Loyola that she saw deer grazing on campus that morning. But she tweeted that from the Maine campus a couple of years ago. Said that was the sort of thing she loved about UMaine.

I wonder if Player's not having been appointed associate head coach had anything to do with her decision to leave. No way to tell whether she will continue to pursue for Loyola the kids she was recruiting for UMaine. When Sharon Versyp came here from James Madison, she recruited and signed Kim Corbitt, whom she has been recruiting (unsuccessfully, at least partly because JMU did not have an engineering school) for JMU. When Versyp left, she took incoming freshman Kelly McManmon with her to Indiana University, where each stayed only one year. McManmon went on to play at St. John's in Queens.

Loyola has no Europeans on its roster, so Player may be the opening gambit for LMU to start plowing that field, as well.

I think a good head coach needs one assistant among the three with whom she can really let down her hair and talk and work frankly and rely on for virtually anything. For Richard Barron, it was Amy Vachon. For Vachon, it was Jhasmin Player.

As MJ suggested, maybe Coach Vachon should offer the assistant job to the former head coach at Cony. I'll bet they would have a great rapport.

The Whoopdirt website lists a few assistant coach appointments every day at all levels. But the pickings get pretty thin this time of year. My guess is that most assistants who come in this late last only a year or so. Garett Sherman was appointed last summer, now is AD at UMFK. We've had several over the years who were late-comers, early-goers.

Good luck to Amy Vachon finding a qualified coach after school has started.

Bob Neal
New Sharon

[CoachA]

Pretty sure she's going to have to hire another minority coach.

[MaineBBFan99]

Pretty sure she's going to have to hire another minority coach.

???

Ok, I'll bite. Please explain.

[CoachA]

It's kind of an unspoken but take a look at all men's and women's basketball staffs in Division I. Within the head coach and 3 assistants and a Dobo (director of basketball operations) there is at least one minority hire as well it should be in looking at the make up of the team with minority athletes. And before anyone jumps on this...this is not a racist statement...it's for the best experience for all athletes in their relationship to coaches.