Woe is ME-AC?
Interesting piece on the MEAC on espn.com by Pat Forde.
Sadly, it covers familiar terrain, i.e. all the competitive disadvantages of being in the MEAC. The stuff about Butch Beard sitting there steaming on the sidelines as his Morgan State team gets crushed in another guarantee game was compelling.
The introduction of race in discussing how hard it is for coaches to move up out of the MEAC seemed a bit unnecessary. Forde uses the case of former Hampton coach Steve Merfeld, who is white, to illustrate that it might have been easier for a white coach to get a bigger, better job than one who is black.
Actually I think Merfeld's case just adds further evidence of the plight that all MEAC coaches - black, white or other - face. In 2001, Merfeld's No. 15 seed Hampton team pulled a shocking upset of Iowa State, the kind of victory that usually catapults a low/mid major coach to a new job in a higher conference with a fat paycheck. Instead, Merfeld got no job offers - at least none worth taking. The next year, Merfeld took Hampton back to the NCAA tournament, beating UNC during the regular season. His reward? A job at Evansville, a place that had just recently given serious consideration to killing off its basketball program. Gee, thanks guys.
However, I will say that Fang Mitchell's inability to move beyond Coppin State is one of the world's greatest mysteries. Perhaps race played a role in that injustice, but that doesn't mean it played a role in Merfeld's promotion, which was overdue and clearly deserved.
Comments (2)
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I read that story as well. definitely compelling, though I'd like to seen him talk to a few more people besides Beard -- who did make it big once, with the NJ Nets (OK, insert snicker here) -- and Merfeld.
Race is not preventing these coaches from landing mid-major or major D-I coaching jobs, it's those guarantee games. Coppin State's a MEAC title contender. But it was 0-9 out of conference against a schedule UNC or Illinois wouldn't dare play. Hard for the AD at, say Virginia, to offer a head coaching job to someone with a 10-20 record at a school in one of the lowest-rated D-I leagues. The only place to go from there, generally speaking, is to an assistant's position at a bigger school or to an unstable program like Evansville -- and even then, it takes two straight trips to the NCAA's to get an interview.
Posted on March 2, 2005 11:54 PM
Two very interesting and insightful "blogs"- probably worth an article in SI.
Also, please not GNR article on main page of DBR.com
Posted on March 4, 2005 12:56 PM