Time for Barta to pull the plug on Bluder

DesMoinesHawki

DesMoinesHawki

Well-Known Member
Just curious how long Barta will let mediocrity exist within the women's program. I don't follow the women's team too much but Bluder is someone who seems to have held onto her job about five years longer than she should have ... My world does not revolve around how the women's program performs but just unfortunate a mediocre coach can keep her job for this long with very average results ... You can't tell me the program can't find a different coach who can actually recruit players who aren't within a two hour drive from Iowa City ... At one time I actually did follow the women's team ... Stringer created a lot of interest around the program ... Now it seems like we are content with mediocre results ...
 
Er, I admit to not following the women's program that closely, but haven't they been to the NCAA's a couple times recently, with a couple of recent top 2 or 3 finishes in the league?
 
I'm really worried about the womens softball team too, if they don't win an NCAA championship in the next couple years I'm returning my season tickets and they need to fire the coach.
 
There's an argument to be made IMHO that Bluder isn't recruiting to play the aggressive, physical game that WBB has evolved into, current freshman class notwithstanding. We have and have had good players, but we are really bothered when we get bumped and slapped the way Purdue did to us Sunday (and pretty much always does), and it's been this way for several seasons. OTOH, simply recruiting a bunch of bruisers won't necessarily get you anywhere, as Indiana has demonstrated.

I'd guess that Bluder is safe as long as she keeps the Hawks in the top half of the conference. Has she matched Stringer's performance - obviously not.
 
DesMoinesHawki said:
Just curious how long Barta will let mediocrity exist within the women's program. I don't follow the women's team too much but Bluder is someone who seems to have held onto her job about five years longer than she should have ... My world does not revolve around how the women's program performs but just unfortunate a mediocre coach can keep her job for this long with very average results ... You can't tell me the program can't find a different coach who can actually recruit players who aren't within a two hour drive from Iowa City ... At one time I actually did follow the women's team ... Stringer created a lot of interest around the program ... Now it seems like we are content with mediocre results ...
Click to expand...

Your key sentence is "I don't follow the women's team too much"...
 
jeberhardt said:
I'm really worried about the womens softball team too, if they don't win an NCAA championship in the next couple years I'm returning my season tickets and they need to fire the coach.
Click to expand...

Actually coach Blevins had Stringer-level success up until the last couple of seasons. Some interesting rumors regarding what led to her retirement, I don't claim to know what actually happened.
 
Bluders teams are notorious for slow starts and strong finishes. While they are struggling this year I think she has had enough success over the years to get a pass.
 
They've definitely struggled this year, but in no way should Bluder be fired. Matching the success level of Stringer is asking a lot, since there are only about three other coaches who have done that. Ever.
 
I was fortunate enough to watch some Iowa women's practices and some of the men's practices (from about 2 plus years ago--Lick's last year). The women's practices, attention to detail, and togetherness was impressive; this is especially true when compared with what I saw during the men's practices.
 
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