“Champions don’t stop after winning” and other notes from MVC Media Day
"Nothing that they did well last year is gonna help them this year"
Murray State’s women are coming off their most successful season ever. Their 25 wins were the most in school history, they won their first Missouri Valley Title, and made the NCAA Tournament for the first time since 2008 with their highest seed ever as an 11-seed.
But they’ve not been just a one-year wonder: Rechelle Turner’s Racers have had three 20-win seasons over the last four years, even more impressive when you consider the program only had five 20-win seasons previous to Turner.
So how are the Racers looking to extend their recent run of success, and what are some of the big topics across the Missouri Valley conference?
The women’s coaches in the MVC held their annual media day this week, here’s what caught my attention from the annual press conference.
The message to the Racers: “It’s a brand new start”
Turner started her portion of the press conference admitting that coming off a championship season is “kind of new to me and our staff and our program.” The Racers are working to balance cherishing their title while ensuring players understand “it’s a reset” and that “nothing that they did well last year is gonna help them this year,” while additionally, “nothing that we did bad” would carry over either.
“We just talked to them about how champions don’t stop after winning,” Turner continued. “They grind to stay on top. So we just grind it out every day, getting a little bit better.”
Turner believes Katelyn Young’s coaching could be game-changing
Murray State’s all-time leading scorer Katelyn Young has joined the coaching staff after spending part of a season with Australia’s Knox Raiders. Turner called it “unbelievably great for our program” and noted the “instant credibility” and “instant respect”
“It’s just unbelievably great for our program, not only because of what she brings with her basketball IQ, but because of being a great human. So she just brings that to our staff.”
Turner talked specifically about Young’s impact with the Racers’ post players, and the impact she had before she ever accepted an assistant coaching position.
“A lot of these kids that she is now coaching have been her best friends for several years,” Turner said. “And to see her to be able to take what she was already doing, didn’t realize she was coaching along the way, but take that and the things she learned as a player and the expectations of this program and put them into words and actions that our players really latch onto has been something special.”
Murray State’s offensive system proved the concept, but it’s a ‘whole new group’ this year.
Turner took a “big risk” changing the entire offensive system over the past few season, and it paid off spectacularly.
“The unknowns are scary as a coach and a program, but as we gradually saw the first year we tried to do it, we shows a little progress and then it just really took off and our players really grabbed onto it and it just gravitated into something really special for us last year.”
However, with key players like Young and Ava Learn gone, Turner expects to “stress defense a little bit more’ this season.
“Obviously we have our lead guards back, which make it a bit easier, but every post player that plays a second for us when the season starts has never played in a Murray State uniform before.”
Multiple coaches, including Turner, are proponents of NCAA Tournament expanding to 76 teams.
Belmont was a team that found themselves on the outside of the NCAA Tournament last year, one that believes they could have benefited from a larger field. And head coach Bart Brooks thinks there are more like his Bruins.
“There’s definitely enough quality teams out there to expand to 76,” Brooks said. “I think there’s probably teams that are left out every year that deserve to get in. Like us last year, we thought we deserved to get in. There’s other teams around the country that probably deserved to get in that didn’t make it.”
Turner echoed the sentiment, saying that “last year Belmont should have got in” and supports “more Missouri Valley teams being in the tournament.”
This really deserves a bit of a deeper dive, but one thing that’s largely been clear for quite awhile in NCAA Tournament seedings is the huge value of ‘big wins,’ over consistency, which gives a huge advantage to major conference teams who, simply due to scheduling, have way more opportunities. It’s how an 18-win team, like Virginia Tech, is considered a ‘snub’ for the tournament while a 25-win Belmont team in the 7th strongest conference in the nation isn’t. And the result is creating scheduling paradoxes.
“You schedule tough teams because you got to beat at large teams to get at large consideration,” Brooks said. “But sometimes you schedule teams that 99 out of 100 times are going to beat us by 30, and that hurts your metrics.”
The gambling question looms large
The potential NCAA rule change allowing Division I athletes to bet on professional sports is mixed. Turner noted it’s probably “not as prevalent on the women’s side” but emphasized the need to educate players on “ramifications.”
Missouri Valley Commissioner Jeff Jackson expressed concerns about student-athlete mental health.
“We have to be really careful as we navigate that to make sure that we’re putting our student athletes first and that we understand the ramifications.”
The portal effect is real
UIC has brought in 10 new players, Illinois State 7, while Evansville has 11 of 13 players as underclassmen. Illinois State’s Kristin Gillespie emphasizing building team chemistry as crucial.
“You know, team chemistry is something that we’re really going to have to work on and build,” Gillespie said, “because, you know, when you have that many new people, it takes a little while to gel.”
MVC not eyeing expansion...for now
Jeff wrote about this more in detail but the MVC’s commitment to staying at 11 schools appears solid for now. Jackson said the conference feels “really good about how we are made up right now” but remains open to “special opportunities” that could improve competition and student-athlete experience.
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