Whittier has gone 6-5-5 in 2018 and 3-8-5 this year, D Hanks is now going to hire his 3 assistant coaching staff in 3 years as well. So it’s not trending in the right direction. Carnegie Mellon had an injury plagued year last year, you don’t go from missing the tournament to making an athletic departments first final four by accident.
In regards to Whittier I think the 1st assistant left for Cal State LA for a large pay raise and the 2nd one was plotting behind D Hanks back just like he did to the old director at Fram so hard to blame him on those. The drop in record could be the recruiting classes brought in by the previous coach and Moraga as it takes a few years to get your classes in so I think hard to blame there. The 2017 run they beat Cal Lu who went down to 10 players in the game when they were up 1-0 and won in overtime on a GK mistake. The Pomona game I think was a tie and went to Pks. While still a great accomplishment a lot fell into place for things to workout. All that being said the staff at Carnegie Mellon did a great job and actually had the better chances to win the game yesterday especially in OT.
I would say that to put so much credit to either Whittier or CMU's 'success' on the asst. would be wrong. Socalsoccercoach talked well about the Whittier run... CMU has gone to the NCAAs 7 of Coach Yon's 10 years there (give or take)......he has also taken them to a sweet sixteen and an elite eight once before (according to his bio anyways...) so this run is not 'out-of-nowhere'. They are a very good team built over time, so let's not mis-place credit here. It is a program that has been built be a solid head coach. A good asst. will help that but is not the reason.
Wow!! https://hopkinssports.com/news/2019/12/9/johns-hopkins-announces-womens-soccer-coaching-change.aspx the wording and lack of quote from the coach indicates this wasn’t congenial retirement. for context remember that 2 of Hops 3 losses this year were to the National champ and the runner up.
I think the why is obvious. The AD thought the program was underachieving in spite of their success. Not saying that was the case, but the AD clearly thinks so.
"While we have enjoyed a high level of competitive success, I determined after a careful review that a change in leadership was in the best interest of our program. We are fully committed to providing the best experience to our student-athletes on and off the field and that will be our focus as we look to identify the next head women's soccer coach at Johns Hopkins University." Whether the AD intended it or not, I do not know. But this quote implies the success was fine, but the 'experience on and off the field' was not. Just my interpretation of reading the release and this quote.
I believe he is an excellent soccer coach. Kind of on the stricter no nonsense side. Must be more to the story. Weil’s legacy includes the following: 1. 15 consecutive years as Centennial Conference Champions or Finalists 2. 1 NCAA Final Four appearance 3. 6 NCAA Elite Eight appearances The only possible soccer knock is that his teams have not defeated more than 1 USC ranked top ten opponent since 2015. But that’s probably still better than 98% of D3 college coaches out there.
That’s relative. The school’s reputation draws in the talent. You could argue that they underachieved with the talent they have had. They beat the teams they were more talented than and lost when the talent level was even. But reading the quote again, I agree with the previous poster. Must have been some complaints. These days you need to be a junior psychologist in addition to coach.
I disagree. 26-year tenure coaches in D3 do not get fired for "underachieving," which I interpret to mean Win-Loss record and tournament success, or lack thereof. I can believe that the AD believed that Weil was getting "stale" (no longer fresh, slow to change, losing touch with players' needs/state of mind, not being energetic); not that any of those things is true. But firing a long term coach for the past couple of seaons tournament record just does not happen.
PowerSoccer has got it right. Hopkins success in large part can be attributed to the schools academic reputation. The school lives in some rarified air, there are only three D3 schools that consistently make the academic top 10 rankings - Chicago, MIT and Hopkins. Add in Williams who is consistently ranked at the top of small liberal arts institutions and that’s their peer group. These schools draw students in on a wide geographic area based on their academic reputation. And quite a few of those happen to be really good soccer players as well. That’s a massive advantage in filling out your roster. Compare that to the two finalist teams and their rosters - mostly from the surrounding “local” geography in both cases. But in that peer group, Hopkins soccer has underperformed. Just one Final Four appearance is the most telling stat. Soccer is a crazy game and you would never want to attribute one game or even one season as the reason for a dismissal. Weil has plenty of record to look back on and the lack of NCAA titles or final four appearances across his 28 years is what’s noticeable. The AD’s at those schools don’t care about tourney bids and conference titles - those are expected. They want Learfield Cup points, which means deep runs in the tourney and National titles. For contrast, you need only to look at his peers on the Hopkins campus. Those coaches have the same recruiting situation as Weil, and the women’s volleyball coach, the field hockey coach, the swimming coach, and especially the Cross Country coach have all exceeded Weil’s results of late.
I would tend to agree with a lot of what you're saying. I am not sure what metric(s) you are using for the academic top 10 rankings but two more D3 schools that I would argue are in the same peer group as UC, MIT, and Hopkins. Those two are WashU and Carnegie Mellon. Both schools consistently are in the top 10 academically in various areas. WashU has had more success on the soccer field compared to Carnegie Mellon but the Tartans did have a breakout year this year and somewhat unexpectedly made the final 4. Both schools are very similar to the schools that you mentioned in terms of size and academics. When you get into that "rarefied air" that you speak of we are splitting hairs over the various merits of the schools and all have areas of excellence. Every year the rosters of the schools mentioned are littered with kids that are good enough to have played somewhere at the D1 level. There are a lot of ECNL & DA kids and others from top club programs. Many of the kids at these schools could have received significant athletic aid from, at the very least, mid-major programs. Those that were bright enough to be admitted to these schools have realized that there is a lot more to life than soccer and have realized that athletics is only one component of a rich college experience. In this writer's opinion playing at any of the aforementioned schools is a much better overall experience than playing at a mid-major with average academics.
Personally I wonder if women's soccer has become so popular that Type A parents want/demand a soccer program that is also on par with the academic reputation of JHU and similar colleges. There are several colleges I can think of where the newly recruited players are used to being in a top 10 relative rankings in club soccer only to find that college is a drop off from what they are used to experiencing. In club soccer an "underperforming" coach is subject to market forces. Parents can move their players to successful coaches. In contrast, in college soccer once you sign up you are kind of "stuck" if you feel the coach is not up to the standard you are accustomed to. The "switching costs" for a college soccer player are just too high and hence the college coach is insulated from poor coaching decisions. I believe he was an excellent coach. However, I can see how more ambitions parents, players and a new AD might be ready for a new skipper at the helm of their women's soccer program.
@PlaySimple Johns Hopkins was one of the Founding member schools of the UAA which as you know includes WashU, Uof C, Carnegie Mellon etc... Basically top flight academic and large Research Universities...not sure why they eventually withdrew from UAA and joined the Centennial but clearly the UAA has their closest peers as an academic institution...
The “new” Hopkins AD is a Navy graduate (and lax player) and one of the first female combat aviators. Then transitioned to a key position at Under Armor (in Baltimore HQ). She arrived at Hopkins a few years ago where she served as the Asst AD overseeing the women’s soccer program. After being promoted this Fall, it is telling that her first big change is to the team she spent the most time with over the previous years. Weil must not have impressed her during that time.
Here's a release the opposite of JHU. JP is worthy of such high praise and he was quoted. Weil did not get any love at the end so it seems something must have happened. Hopefully not serious. A coach in the quarterfinal and top-25 all the time doesn't just become inadequate. https://www.catholicathletics.com/sports/wsoc/2019-20/releases/20191210hr0vm7
Yeah, the contrast between the two releases is stark. No mention of “retirement” or even “next challenge” And no quote from the coach. It not only points to involuntary termination, but it also points to Weil legally contesting this (or at least the AD’s caution about that). This release was not written same day, they never are. Weil was likely told last week and informed that an announcement would be made Monday. Assuming there isn’t any malfeasance at play by Weil, I’m certain he was given the choice of “retiring” and letting the announcement reflect that. So he must have come back and rejected the retirement angle. Something tells me we haven’t heard the end of this.
Some word out there of Coach Weil being kinda checked on the last few years and others within the program doing most of the work. There are high expectations out there at JHU...Catholic University AD is a first class person so no surprise there at all.
I have to disagree with you concerning William Smith's "local" roster. I assume local to Geneva NY would mean upstate NY. However, only about one third of the roster is from upstate. The non-locals include players from Germany, Spain, Canada, Washington State, Colorado, Iowa, Virginia, Maine, Massachusetts and Vermont. In fact, the roster seems to be becoming less "local". All six seniors are from New York. Only four of the thirteen underclasswomen are.
To some, Coach Weil seems a bit odd , or maybe to others..a jerk... Coaches don't relate to him well, and my opinion, I can't see young women having a good experience playing for him in 2019. Perhaps the new AD felt bad for the women on the team and thought it was enough...or maybe it was just time for a change.
Your disagreement is noted. My statement was not meant as a criticism and, respectfully, you’re missing the larger point. At a quick glance, the three schools I noted (Hopkins, MIT & Chicago) each have AT LEAST 17 different states or countries listed on their rosters. And Williams (the small liberal arts college) has more than William Smith as well. None of those schools are sending coaches to recruit players in Texas, California, Hawaii, Colorado, etc. but they show up to be recruited because of the school’s name/rep beyond soccer.
Three years ago I had dinner with Coach Weil and two other coaches. I sat across the table from Weil. He was kind, nice, unassuming, humble and quiet. The other coaches were more outgoing and funny and he laughed along with their jokes. He worked a soccer clinic for a club and the players genuinely liked and learned from him. In all honesty there was nothing to indicate he was "odd" or a "jerk" to the other coaches or players all weekend. Weil came across as a good man whom I would describe as serious, hard working, quiet and humble.