Miss State's Schaefer Leaves For Texas Longhorns Job

[ConwayGamecock]

    In what is most certainly the biggest sports news to hit women's college basketball since the NCAA pulled the plug on the post-season, Mississippi State head coach Vic Schaefer has decided to leave Starkville after 8 seasons and accept the head coaching post at the University of Texas. Schaefer will replace former Longhorns head coach Karen Aston, who was let go this past week.

It's pretty big news for WCBB in the SEC, as Schaefer was setting up to be the chief rival for South Carolina and Gamecocks' head coach Dawn Staley. Schaefer had brought in some quality talent to the Bulldogs' roster, including top-10 2019 prep prospect F Rickea Jackson and 5* PG Aliyah Matharu who both shined in their debut season in college. South Carolina beat Mississippi State 76-62 in the championship game of the 2020 SEC Tournament in what would be the final game of the season for both teams, due to the COVID-19 Pandemic.

Schaefer, a Texas native, graduated from Texas A&M and spent nine years as associate head coach there under coach Gary Blair. He was a member of the Aggies' staff when they won the national championship in 2011. He took over as head coach of Mississippi State in 2012 and led the Bulldogs to the national championship game in 2017 and 2018 losing both times, once to South Carolina. Schaefer was 221-62 while at Mississippi State, and 89-39 in SEC games.

This is a sizable shake-up in the SEC - Schaefer had built up Mississippi State to become a major conference rival for South Carolina, and the program was poised under Schaefer to continue as such for the foreseeable future. Schaefer however did seem to struggle in overcoming South Carolina's and head coach Dawn Staley's dominance in the conference: the Bulldogs had won only 3 of 15 games against the Gamecocks under Schaefer, including 4 SEC tournament championship games in 5 seasons, in addition to the 2017 national championship game.

Now Schaefer moves on to the Big-12 Conference, where the power of that conference is Texas' bitter rival Baylor and Kim Mulkey. Karen Aston was terminated despite having substantial success as head coach, with strong recruiting and a overall 184-83 record in Austin, TX. What did Aston in however was her 1-18 record versus Baylor, something Schaefer will need to correct quickly if he wants his time at Texas to be fruitful.

https://www.espn.com/womens-college-basketball/story/_/id/28997584/texas-hires-mississippi-state-vic-schaefer-new-head-coach

 

[jrgamecock]

It should remind us of how good Dawn is. In my opinion she is the best of the Gamecock coaches.

 

[AikenGameFan]

It should remind us of how good Dawn is. In my opinion she is the best of the Gamecock coaches.

In my opinion she is one of the best coaches in the country. And according to those that decide, she was the Naismith National Coach of the Year. I sure do hope she gets a great raise this off season.

 

[JDuro]

Lots of speculation that former USC assistant, and current ODU HC Nikki McCray, will be Schaefer’s replacement.  MSU fans noticing McCray started following MSU’s players and AD on Twitter.