Indiana University Athletics
Indiana University Head Women's Basketball Hiring Press Conference
4/19/2006 12:00:00 AM | Women's Basketball
April 19, 2006
ATHLETICS DIRECTOR RICK GREENSPAN
Opening Statement:
I am really delighted to be here today for a lot of reasons. First and foremost, this will be the second time I have seen my wife. The last time was at Coach (Kelvin) Sampson's press conference. So, it is nice to see Jenny. Thank you all for being here.
Approximately 10 days ago, it was announced that our head women's coach had decided to accept a comparable position at another institution. From that point forward, we engaged in an aggressive search to identify the best and brightest coaches with a sincere interest in becoming the next Hoosier coach. We sought a candidate with a passion for their work, loyalty to their beliefs, a competitive fire that could inspire our student-athletes that both she and her staff will recruit, and we looked for a winner. A winner in life. Somebody whose values are rock solid and are compatible with the mission of IU Athletics and this fine University.
Throughout this process, the maturity, the dignity and the poise of our women's team has been so very positive and I thank them. They have worked with my athletic administration to demonstrate leadership in maintaining their academic work, their physical strength and their skill development. I don't know if I have ever been more proud of the way a team has handled themselves during a transition. Thank you. I really appreciate that.
Today, it is my distinct pleasure to introduce to the Hoosier Nation, Felisha Legette-Jack. That is a mouthful. I have quickly learned to call her Coach Jack. She is referred to that way by all who know, care for and respect her. She joins us from Hofstra University, where she has been the head coach for the previous four years, and took that program to the postseason for the first time in school history, recorded the second-most wins in school history, she graduates her athletes, inspires a strong academic achievement level and demonstrates a commitment to women's basketball in many ways every day.
Coach Jack has served as a player and coach in the Big Ten and Big East for 16 seasons, and was an assistant coach on a gold medal-winning 2003 USA Basketball Championship team in Croatia with Ohio State coach Jim Foster. She was a gold medal-winner as an assistant coach on the 2005 USA Basketball U-19 Championship team in Turkey, where she worked with Coach (Gail) Goestenkors of Duke University.
Her experiences as a nationally acclaimed player at Syracuse, as an assistant coach at (Boston College), Syracuse as an assistant, Michigan State as an assistant, as well as her head coaching experience at Hofstra provide a great platform for greatness for her and for IU.
Coach Jack served as a team captain at Syracuse from 1986-89. She was a Big East Rookie of the Year, a three-time All-Big East Conference selection, a two-time Kodak All-American honorable mention, been inducted to numerous halls of fame, been the Colonial Athletic Association's Coach of the Year and many more accolades too voluminous to detail now.
Rarely do you meet an individual with the energy, enthusiasm, purpose, work ethic and kindness that Coach Jack has demonstrated. Under her leadership and with our support and yours, we will build a strong staff of assistants that will recruit in and out-of-state aggressively, effectively and with purpose. We will continue to build a women's basketball program that will be a point of pride and distinction for IU.
Coach Jack has signed a five-year contract with a base salary of $175,000 per year with incentives and proper perquisites. Now, please join me in welcoming the new Hoosier women's basketball coach, Felisha Legette-Jack.
Coach is here with her husband, David, and will be joined in the days ahead by their seven-year-old son, Maceo.
HEAD WOMEN'S BASKETBALL COACH Felisha Legette-Jack
Opening Statement:
First, I want to give honor to God who is ahead of my life. I really have so many people to thank, and I will forget some of them. I hope they understand in my heart, their help has made this situation happen. First, I would like to thank my husband and my son. I met David on a blind date, and we were both so focused on what we were trying to do that we forgot that we needed somebody to love us. We found each other 11 years ago. I was an assistant coach at Syracuse and he was doing his volleyball thing. We said whoever's career took steps first, we will follow that career. It happened to be mine. I will tell you, you don't find a lot of men that rally behind their wives and do such a fantastic job of supporting. This would not have happened without this man next to me. I want to thank him publicly for being here by my side. Thank you.
I would like to thank Hofstra University and its fine administration. Stuart Rabinowitz, the president, Jack Hayes, the athletics director and Harry Royle, who is the gentleman that hired me and was the athletics director at the time. They gave me a chance as a young coach to show what we can do as coaches. I had been an assistant coach for 13 years prior to becoming a head coach. They gave me my chance. They gave me a great platform to work on. They gave me a fine institution with a fantastic academic school, and a program that really wasn't established. They knew that women's basketball wasn't where it needed to be. They gave me all the resources that they could at Hofstra that I needed to help move that program along. I really respect what they have done as an institution and an athletics department. They gave me and my family an opportunity to do what we needed to do to grow a young women's basketball program.
I am a person that really works from her heart, and I need to share with you that I have left a fine group of young women at Hofstra University. I am a little sad, but extremely excited because this is a great opportunity. There are some people back there that I am going to miss. So, for the next couple of days, you guys are going to have to help me through that. On the other side of the page, there is a president here named President Herbert that said it was time for me to take it to the next level, and he allowed me to become your new head coach here at Indiana University. I am very grateful and humble for this opportunity. Rick Greenspan, I will tell you what, he came after me. He put the full-court press on me. He is fantastic. He has a sense of humor, and he allows me to be my old crazy self. He and his administration have been fabulous. There is a chief around here, Terry Smithson, who really helped me in so many ways. I know it is going to be fun. I really want to thank everyone that allowed this opportunity to take place.
I am going to continue to talk, and I hope that I don't show that heart side of mine too much, because I know that you dream and you dream of these dreams. This is where I want to go in my future. When that dream stops, you have that faith. Then God steps in and he takes that dream to another level, and he presents you with an opportunity to be a head coach of the Mecca of women's basketball of the future - Indiana. Indiana is where basketball rocks. I am just letting you know how excited I am to be here. I just know that all glory goes to him. I didn't dream this big. Rick gave me an opportunity to come here. I am so grateful.
Everyone knows that old saying that it takes a village to raise a child. It is going to take an entire community to raise a championship contender in the women's basketball program. I know that we have done some fantastic things as coaches. It is going to take all of us. If each of you go out there and get 700 friends, bring them over to practices and bring them over to games to hang out with us. It is not going to be fun at the beginning. We will get hit in the chin and hit in the stomach a couple times, but what you are going to see is the CAP approach. You are going to see character. You are going to see great academic achievement, and you are going to see fantastic basketball players that step on the floor and play with passion. They may beat us, one of those Big Ten schools once or twice, but when they are finished with us, they will know they have been in a fight. We are going to put our hearts and our minds into this. When you put your heart on the line, you give it all you have.
We are excited about this opportunity. We are excited about the support we are going to get from this community, because this is Hoosierland. This is where basketball began. I know they say some things about Massachusetts and all that invention stuff, but we know we raised the game here in Indiana. I just want to thank you for all of your support. I am going to thank you now for the support I know that you are going to bestow on us as we take on this challenge of raising a championship team. We didn't come here just to coach basketball. We didn't come here to just win a couple of games. We came here to win championships. I am just along for the ride. Let's go to work. Thank you very much.
On her style of coaching:
I think that every coaching style is an amoeba. You have an idea, and my idea is to run the floor, push the ball up and score 80 points a game with full-court defense. You want to run the floor and be aggressive. You also want to get around that match-up zone that you guys see from Michigan State, but I have to find out from these young ladies what kind of style we are going to have here. I have great ideas. One thing about me, I said to President Herbert, I am a work in progress. I don't have all of the answers. They are going to have to present some of the answers for me. I have to find out what they want to do, and how hard they are willing to work. This is going to be a team approach. It is not going to be a dictatorship where I tell everyone what you are going to have to do. I want to run. I want to stop people. I want to score a lot of points. I want to make this game fun, but if we have to slow it down and play match-up and score 65-70 points to win basketball games, the bottom line is we want to win basketball games.
On what she said to the team:
We talked about a lot of things and some things we are going to keep to ourselves. I said that `Life happens.' For three years, life has been happening with these young ladies in ways that haven't always been fun. They have three different coaches in three years. Sometimes, it doesn't seem fair. What they are building in themselves is character. When it gets tough and we are down by two against Michigan State, we are going to dig deep and realize that we have been through some tougher things than this. Let's find a way to get this game won. When we are up by four, how are we going to hold on because of the character that we have developed from what we have been through the last three years.
We talked about things that they want, what they need, and what I am going to bring to them. We spoke about passion, purpose and being able to look in the mirror and know that we have finished doing everything that we do, whether it is in practice or going out to speak with kids to know that you give it all you have. If you can give it all you have on every single moment that you are doing something, you can look in the mirror and those eyes won't lie. You are going to be the one that judges yourself. The only person that is going to know is going to be them. We are going to come together and get them to trust me, because they don't know me yet. They are going to have to buy in. The quicker they buy in, the better off we are going to be on getting this thing in a winning way. You can't just give trust to people. You have to earn it. I am going to work with these young ladies and earn their trust.
On the process of coming to Indiana:
I knew what was going on with the last coach. I saw in the paper that she got the other job. I called a friend of mine and asked her what her thoughts were, because she is one of my mentors. I wanted her thoughts on of me being part of this process of being a head coach at Indiana. She said, `Quite frankly, I was saying your name a couple of days ago on a short list of people that Indiana would like to consider.' How cool is that? We were connecting, but from a distance. I think Tuesday, I had a conversation with my athletics director. He shared with me that Mr. Greenspan asked permission to speak with me. Rick and I spoke on Wednesday. He shared with me his interest, and I shared with him my desire. We went a 100 mph from there. You think I am joking? Rick was on every side of me. I thought he moved in at one point. If you are going to be here, you are going to have to pay rent. He hired me so he wouldn't have to pay rent. It kind of went fast. I went out recruiting last weekend. I have been sleeping three hours a night. You are out recruiting, and are still not sure if you are going to take this opportunity. You are still working for Hofstra. You are talking to your husband and coaches and sharing your thoughts on the process and responsibilities. Rick and Tim Fitzpatrick flew to meet with me in New York. We flew back here, and met some fantastic people in the administration and faculty representatives. We met with President Herbert for about two hours. I will tell you what, I am hiring President Herbert in a few years as an associate because he knows the game of basketball. We talked about the academia questions, and then he asked about the 2-3 match-up. I then spoke with Mr. Greenspan about how interested I am in the program. He communicated with the President and he gave me a call the next day and offered me this opportunity. I told my kids and my administration yesterday. Today, I am here.
On Indiana's signees:
I have not spoken with them, yet. I have spoken with the people that are here. I will contact them sometime today to find out what their thoughts are. We certainly want them to be here. We are going to fight like heck to get them here. We want them to feel like a part of a new family. Our thought process here is if you don't want to be at Indiana University playing on the women's basketball team, you are not really serious about the game. We will look to convince them that this is the place they need to be.
FORWARD Whitney Thomas
On Coach Jack's hire:
I feel good. I really like her attitude and philosophy so far. I want to know more about her.
On playing for three coaches:
It is tough, but I have a great group of teammates. We have all gotten together and this has made us a lot stronger.
On Coach Jack's aggressive style:
I like that. I did that when I was younger. That is what we like to do. I'd like to bring that back.
GUARD Nikki Smith
On first impressions of Coach Jack:
I just got to meet with her for about a half hour. First impressions are great. She is very passionate and very dedicated. She absolutely loves the fact that she is here. I can't wait to sit down and talk to her individually and get to know her a bit better. I am very happy.
On playing for three coaches:
It has been very hard, because every coach has their own system. It is hard to buy into a coach when you don't know them very well. Like what Coach Jack said, everything is about building character. We are going to need to go into this with an open mind. We are all very happy about the situation.
On Coach Jack's aggressive style:
I am open to anything right now. This summer is going to be really important for us. We will need to get into great cardiovascular shape and improve on a lot of our weaknesses. We are just excited to see what she has to offer for us.
GUARD Leah Enterline
On first impressions of Coach Jack:
I really like her. I really like her personality. She is very personable. She came in and talked with us. It wasn't like she stood up and laid down the law. She sat down and told us a little about herself, and then we had a chance to converse with her. It was really nice. You can sit down and enjoy that.
On the team's thoughts about the future:
We are very excited. Like I said, we did this last year. This is a form of motivation. It is a whole new system. We enjoyed last year, and this year is going to be even better.
On playing for three coaches:
It is a tough transition. The first one we went through was kind of tough. I was a sophomore when we made the transition. I never thought that I would have more than that head coach. Now, we made the change. It went really well. We had a great year last year. We had a taste of success. We are excited with the new coaching staff. It is going to be exciting.
