LOL. In less than 8 years Beth's mens team beat LSU, Florida, Texas A&M, Georgia, and Kentucky. Sit down clowns. She deserved to get her contract extended. I am sure she was paid out a plethora of bonuses over the years, which proves she achieved beyond her contracts expectations. The top programs all lose elite athletes to the transfer portal, but those male coaches are never accused of character issues. We have unrealistic expectations for woman to be "likable." When successful woman coaches are not unanimously loved by ALL athletes, they are harshly and unfairly judged (unlike their male counterparts). Beth had a successful program and was let go on some petty crap. She clearly was not supported or appreciated for her accomplishments.
Half the people on this thread would find an issue with Bill Hayward as a coach. Good luck finding another coach to fill this hole. They’ll never find someone to stroke your oversized egos enough to satisfy.
Well seeing how Bill Hayward died 75 years ago, I can see that as being an issue.
Bill Hayward's best runner Ralph Hill has only run 4:12 for the mile and 14:30 for 5000m. Time for Oregon to get an up and coming coach like that young Bill Bowerman.
Your comments are below the belt and ridiculous. Sounds like your describing every male coach in the industry...... if a woman is cut throat, let's gasp and grab our pearls. Was she supposed to be....a "mother figure" coach in the SEC??? Guess what.. the SEC IS CUT THROAT. Let's not forget that successful woman coaches have the same characteristics as male coaches. And yes, the Director of the program is supposed to step in and take photos with her team. Nothing to be "jealous" about; a Director gets credit for EVERYTHING their assistant coaches do. The Director sets the vision, gives the scholarships, hires the assistant coaches, and nothing is done without their approval.... so yes, those are her accomplishments as well! How quickly people forget that the Director empowers and makes ALL the accomplishments take place. She is not a a "figure head" or just a "distance coach;" she is the Director and had a nationally ranked program, top 3 SEC team, and a Bowerman winner. Only a handful of coaches in the nation have the same resume (and those coaches are living legends). If she was a male coach, she would of received endless praise and admiration. There are many male coaches who achieved way less and have endless job security. Imperfect men have been empowered to run the world since forever, but as soon as a woman makes a single “error” she is confirmed to be incompetent. Beth did a spectacular job at a bottom program. Again, there are very few coaches who have achieved her accolades.
Whoever wrote this nailed Beth in a nutshell. She just was not able to ever get it at all. Wants to blame the alumni or men or whoever because she did not produce on a consistent basis. Her top athletes were not fans. Just because the SEC is cut throat, does not mean the coach has to be cut throat to her own people. You can be that way toward the competition but not to your own team. You don't see these types of threads about the other female coaches. Its not about her bodyparts, its about her as a person.
BTW - Tennessee has had some great teams in the past - whoever wrote that they did not is an idiot
1. BAS is the director and personally coaches distance. Overall there she has had some success over the years with some distance, but the cc results have not been good.
2. She had issues at PSU before this and off and on minor things at UT.
3. There have been some great athletes at UT during her tenure - NCAA champions, etc...some say this should be expected at a school like UT on occasion.
4. Most seem to acknowledge she is not always warm and cuddly, with the phrase cut-throat being used a few times. Nothing wrong with competitive, but have to be respectful to own program and others.
5. Transfers and injuries happen everywhere...UT doesn't have any particular red flags showing up compared to other schools in this department.
6. What we don't know are the behind-the-scenes things...language that she uses at practice, how she handles money, how she treats academics, recognition (or propelling) of eating disorders (she has had problems with this in the past), etc...there are simply too many factors involved besides win/loss that letsrunners are not privy to.
7. For me, the timing says it all - to "mutually agree" to leave before the regional round is the eye-opener. There is absolutely no way something didn't happen that forced the timing of this now. One poster on a previous page suggested that she has been under scrutiny for a long time and something must have tipped everything over the edge so it had to be dealt with immediately. By not throwing her under the bus, she can get another job without issue and they can get rid of her without a lawsuit for improper firing (which tells me this was proper and she knows she would lose such a suit, otherwise, why would she leave Tennessee at this point in her career?)
You do realize that her women were 9th in the SEC Outdoor meet. And just 2 points ahead of 11th !!! Obviously, the AD expected more from her and that side of her program. ( throw in the fact that her ex-athlete just had a fantastic meet for Arkansas)
Many coaches leave programs without filing a lawsuit, because they know it will be death of their coaching career. Beth has a good enough resume to get hired again and a lawsuit makes it messy. Just because she didn't file, doesn't mean she didn't have just cause. And we don't know what took place, she could of been nicely paid out and let go without cause. Also, most AD make changes after conference meets so they have more time to make a new hire during the post season and can get the top candidates. This is normal and says nothing about what took place.
123itsme...can you name a single time when a coach has as many athletes going to regionals as BAS and "mutually agreed" to leave beforehand? Your take that "ADs remove coaches after conference happens all the time" or however you phrased it simply isn't true. Besides, it was a full week after conference and not the following Monday as would happen with a bball or fball coach.
Her removal reminds me that coaching at the college level is a tough profession. Much like someone looking to invest , say, in a car dealership, the secular trends here are poor. Football and men's basketball pay for everything. The NIL deals and the transfer protocol are going to destroy the NCAA and thus the funding mechanism for all minor sports. Until then, the politics of coaching increasingly reflects the general politicization of academics. It is just a tough career.
Everyone knew she was toast this time last year. Why is everyone acting so surprised? Nick Newman took the job knowing it was probably a one year gig. Amazingly he did so well that his athletes elevated the program to much higher heights which seemed like it might save her. Ken had the freshman sprinter do amazing things. He always seems to find one foreigner to run fast. John's folks are always solid. She should be happy that she squeezed two or three years more out of Tennessee than she should have. The writing has been on the wall for quite a while. She is happy with SEC 3rds and NCAA 3rds which are good but not the goal. This is her peak. She had time. JJ Clark - won NCAA year 3 taking over a horrible team Doug Brown - won NCAA in year 6 - one of best ncaa teams ever Bill Webb - won NCAA in year 6
Hopefully Mr. White is smarter than a lot of these other AD's who are just hiring based on diversity headlines. This is very important but you see where Tennessee is at. When they hired BAS they were under title 9 investigation and this played well to hire a female coach for a men's sport. It was a publicity stunt from a troubled AD and a feminist sports administrator. I believe that DW wants to win and he will seek out the best candidate regardless of color or gender, although I am not sure how many head coaches of color UT has, but I thinks its only 1.
One reason to "mutually agree" is because you have been told the contract will not be renewed and you want to accept another head coaching job very soon (like before regionals or NCAAs.)
When athletes get paid, in advance i might add, scholarships, and cost of attendance, and gear and tutoring, and massage therapists and chiros and high level doctors, and nutritionists and sports psychologists and on and on and on, and when they don't perform, and the coach tells them about it.....now the narrative is "the coach isn't sensitive to my mental health."
So yes, it is getting to be a tough profession.......division 3 has it right......good news is, once football and basketball get their way, it won't be long before every other sport is defacto D3 anyway.........until then, coaches, save your $$$, or find another skillset.
Florida does not seem to have all these issues. Maybe they could model after that. Athletes love it there and seem to thrive year after year. Mouse seems to understand you can be tough but not a backstabber. Oh and he can coach lol
D1 is not high school. it's not professional sports either. She came to TN and kicked a bunch of student-athletes off the team before the season even began, and some of them freshmen because they didn't "fit into her mission". treating a bunch of 18 year old college kids like that, giving hard working student athletes the feeling that the rug can be swept from under them for any arbitrary reason is really really bad coaching ethics. Kicking someone off the team should come with a reason. Some of these kids didn't even get a chance to compete or train.
These kids prepared to come to UT from all over and then were told they couldn't be a part of the team once they got there. There should be some rules protecting student athletes from these arbitrary choices. Glad Beth Alford is gone.
Help us build the best running shoe review site for a chance to win a LetsRun t-shirt.Help us build the best running shoe review site for a chance to win one of 10 LetsRun t-shirts.