W. Basketball needs Bilsky's help to succeed

But unlike the men's team, coach Julie Soriero's women continue to struggle -- maintaining annually low attendance figures. Over the past five years, women's basketball has failed to meet expectations, both in terms of team record (39-91 over the past five seasons) and ability to maintain recruits. It seems that the more things change with the Penn women's basketball team, the more they stay the same. A new cast of players, but the same approach, doesn't seem to add wins to the Quakers' total. But the Athletic Department continues to ignore the team's silent cry. Even Athletic Director Steve Bilsky rarely attends the games himself; he much less actively gets involved in growth of the program. How can Bilsky understand the Penn women's basketball team's struggles without witnessing them himself? In today's sports environment -- where the ABL sells season tickets and the nationally No. 1-ranked UConn basketball team consistently packs the house -- there have bound to be fans in Penn's community who want a women's basketball team to support. The problem, however, is fans don't like to watch teams that lose. And for the past five seasons, women's hoops has been losers. Each season, Soriero wants to ignore the past and start anew, perennially re-using the same rhetoric about how the incoming freshman will immediately contribute more than the previous class. Without taking active involvement in the team, Bilsky can't address the team's concerns with Soriero. And with each passing year, certain mistakes keep repeating themselves. It's time for everyone incorporated in the program to sit down with Bilsky and develop a recruitment plan for long-term basketball success. This season, the Penn women's basketball lost seven of its 11 eligible returnees, including five of Soriero's past recruits -- 1996-97 Ivy League Rookie of the Year Chelsea Hathaway, sophomore Shelly Fogarty, senior Hope Smith, sophomore Kristin Hetterman and junior Keri Reese. Walk-ons Hadley Perkins and Miranda Berge have each also turned in their uniforms. These players were replaced by 10 freshman, eight of whom were recruited. But with this many new faces arriving in one season, how much room on the roster is there for Quakers recruiting next season? Players dropping off the women's basketball team -- forcing additional recruitment -- is nothing new to Penn basketball. The trend of early departures started back in the 1995-96 season, when point guard Erica McCauley walked away from her starting point guard position in the middle of the season for "personal reasons." But the losses are more profound this season than ever before, based upon the sheer quantity of players who aren't returning. This turnover rate is rare in Penn's athletic program, save perhaps the 1996 Penn softball team (57-128 in the past five seasons) which shares basketball's reputation of perennially finishing near the Ivy basement. There's no doubt that the losing record and a high turnover rate among players have a high correlation. And the two factors combined indubitably depress attendance. To make matters worse, losing games and players is a positive feedback system. When a team perennially loses, the players are more likely to become disinterested and leave. When players of McCauley or Hathaway's caliber quit, it takes time to develop replacements -- as visible by Penn's collapse after McCauley's departure two seasons ago. So breaking the losing cycle isn't as simple as it appears. Bringing in all freshmen won't solve the problem. The newcomers need a system where they can be eased into the lineup, rather than thrown directly into the limelight, as Hathaway and Fogarty were last season, and as Soriero will again be forced to do with this year's recruits. Soriero acknowledges that conflicts with both Hathaway and Smith affected the players' decisions not to return this season. "Addition by subtraction," Soriero said. "The attitude is better, the talent is better." But isn't this just a repeat of what Soriero said when Hathaway and Fogarty entered the program, replacing Natasha Rezek. The only way to improve the program is to develop an environment where winning in the short run doesn't matter, and a long-term plan for a steady basketball program is enacted. Incoming players must know right off the bat that the plan is to rebuild, so they don't become frustrated with the team's initial struggles and abandon ship. To think that at this point in the preseason, when last year's freshmen should have been coming into their own, Hathaway and Fogarty have exited the program. Based upon the recent turn of events, Bilsky and Soriero need to sit down and outline a course of action for the women's basketball program -- one that both the current players and incoming recruits fully understand -- and one that will place emphasis on starting fully from scratch, rebuilding the program from its grass roots. But until the Penn Athletic Department makes a commitment to women's basketball, what would make the fans want to fill the seats?