UH to the Big Dance

[Nconroe]

Just wanted to congratulate the 2009-10 Coog players and Coaches on winning conference USA tournament. Some real entertaining games. And Best of luck in the NCAA tournament. Hopefully now some local talent will now consider playing at UH again as used to.

[barrett]

I'm not sure this helps them long term. Before this it was almost a gaurantee that Penders was out and rumor was throwing around Billie Gillespie as a replacement (or anyone else who would recruit locally). Now Penders will stick around.

Either way congrats to the kids and I'll celebrate as an alum.

[HPF Bob]

Penders could always put an entertaining product on the court but he can't coach defense. UT got rid of him in a similar way to Texas Tech getting rid of Mike Leach - they nailed him for something they would have gladly excused if the coach hadn't rubbed some folks the wrong way. It could be he's wearing out his welcome in Houston too.

Anyway, congrats to him and the Cougars. I bet they last longer in the tournament than the Longhorns do.

[Nconroe]

Jim Rome on 610 had a very nice, positive interview of Tom Penders this noon.

Aubrey Coleman, nations leading scorer is from Houston for UH, local talent, who due to illness didn't play in high school.

Team enjoys playing for Penders, he is a players coach with good player feedback.

Penders is one of a small group who has taken four different teams to the NCAA finals, which is pretty good. Rhode Island, George Washington, Univ. of Texas, and now Univ. of Houston.

The Hoffhines gymnasium is very poor shape and players cannot even take a shower in the building anymore, there are some plans to upgrade this, which likely would help recruiting quite a bit.

The team had lots of injuries and illness this year to overcome with players having broken leg bones and mononucleosis amonng others.

The team may do pretty well, 10 deep for good players, peaking at the right time, but going against 4 seed Maryland may be tough.