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Tag: marquette basketball

  • Tyler Summitt Now Head Coach at LA Tech

    It’s been reported that Athletics Director Tommy McClelland will introduce Tyler Summitt as the latest head coach of the Louisiana Tech women’s basketball team. Summitt, son of legendary Tennessee Lady Vols head coach Pat Summitt, is to become the sixth head coach in Lady Techster history.

    A press conference in the Jarrell Room of the Charles Wyly Athletic Center is scheduled for noon on Wednesday, and is open to all Louisiana Tech fans. Media has been asked to arrive and get set up by 11:45 a.m.

    Tyler Summitt, 23, played two seasons at University of Tennessee, and went on to serve as a student assistant coach under his mother Pat for the Lady Vols. Summitt then worked as an assistant coach under Terri Mitchell at Marquette for two seasons, overseeing the team’s offense.

    The storied Lady Techsters program has won 3 National Championships and has competed in 13 Final Fours, 23 Sweet Sixteens and 27 NCAA tournaments. The Lady Techsters have included 3 Wade Trophy winners, 5 olympic medalists, 6 members of the Women’s Basketball Hall of Fame, 16 All-Americans and 21 WNBA players. The program boasts an all-time record of 1029–247, with a .806 winning percentage, which is the second-best all-time winning percentage of any NCAA Division I program.

    Here’s a clip entitled The Pat Summitt Story: Tyler and Pat Summitt:

    Fans took to Twitter regarding Summitt’s new coaching gig:

    Tyler Summitt posted to Twitter, possibly referring to his new job:

    Pat Summitt, 61, presently serves as the head coach emeritus of the Tennessee Lady Vols basketball program, and holds the all-time record for wins for a coach in NCAA basketball history, for either a men’s or women’s team in any division. During her tenure from 1974 to 2012, Summitt won eight NCAA national championships, and is the only coach in NCAA history with over 1,000 victories. In August 2011, Summitt announced that she had been diagnosed with early-onset Alzheimer’s disease, and stepped down from head coaching duties.

    Image via Twitter

  • Ben Howland Was Contacted By Marquette For Head Coaching Job

    Buzz Williams recently left as the coach of the Marquette basketball team, and they have already been working on his replacement. Ben Howland, a former coach of UCLA, has been contacted, and has shown interest in the position.

    Ben Howland has expressed interest, and has already met with Marquette in regards to their recent opening as the head basketball coach. He has been a coach for many years, and is among a handful of NCAA Division I coaches to take three different teams to the NCAA tournament.

    Howland has previously coached UCLA, Pittsburgh, and Northern Arizona, taking each of them to the tournament. He was most recently the coach of UCLA, lasting from 2003 until 2013, and then he became the first men’s coach in college basketball history to be fired shortly after winning an outright power-conference title.

    Buzz Williams was the coach of Marquette for six seasons, and after departing his position at Marquette, he has been hired as the coach of Virginia Tech. Ben Howland took the Bruins to three consecutive Final Four appearances from 2006 to 2008.

    According to ESPN, a handful of others have also emerged as candidates including that Syracuse coach-in-waiting Mike Hopkins and former Marquette player and assistant Brian Wardle, who is currently the head coach at Green Bay, are also in the mix. Dayton’s Archie Miller has also emerged as a candidate, according to sources.

    Over the course of his tenure at UCLA, Ben Howland achieved a record of 233-107 in a decade with the Bruins. However, following the Final Four appearances, the team failed to advance past the second round, and did not make the tournament in 2010 or 2012.

    Sources have also said that Howland is eager to return to coaching, and that he holds the Marquette program in high regard. Returning to the Big East, and having the opportunity to return to a program that prides itself on its basketball program is intriguing for the former coach of the Pittsburgh Panthers.

    Ben Howland has not coached in the Big East in many years, and while it has changed dramatically in recent years, it is a conference that he has experience with. He has not received an offer yet, meanwhile UCLA made the tournament this year as a No.4 seed. Following the dramatic change in the Big East, Marquette surprisingly struggled, and were unable to even make the semifinals of their tournament.

    Image via Youtube