Our anticipation level is reaching its peak with the college basketball season just days away. Several New England women's teams have a legitimate chance at making the NCAA Tournament, including Harvard.
Coach Carrie Moore took over for 40-year coaching legend Kathy Delaney-Smith in 2022. Entering Year 3, Moore has compiled a 36-24 record with the Crimson and taken them to the Ivy League tournament in her first two years, including a near-victory in the 2023 Ivy championship game. With most of last year's squad returning, including star guard Harmoni Turner, the Crimson are in prime position to chase their first March Madness bid since 2007.
Moore, who previously was an assistant on coaching staffs at Princeton, Creighton, North Carolina and Michigan, is one of the most well-respected young coaches and recruiters in the country. She also is Western Michigan's all-time leading scorer and led the nation with 25.4 points per game in 2006-07.
Before Harvard's season opener Nov. 4 against UMass, Moore joined the HoopWise Podcast to discuss a wide range of topics, including her initial arrival in Cambridge, her expectations for the upcoming season and how she's seen recruiting change during her time in basketball.
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Highlights
A lot of people view the upcoming season as a time when your window is very open to make the NCAA Tournament. How do you manage those expectations?
"It's really ironic that we probably have, maybe the deepest team that we've had in my three years here and we do feel really excited about what we are capable of doing this year, and we know that winning a championship is definitely something that we can do and that we want to do. But I think ironically enough, it's probably the least at which we have talked about it. ... I just felt like we talked about it so much and it was just like, championship or bust, and, and then obviously we had a bunch of different factors that that didn't help us to, to make that happen.
"But I think the biggest difference that we talked about as a staff this year was: We need to be more about the process and less about the outcome. And so, yes, I agree. I agree that, we got a lot back upperclassmen-wise, and we've got a lot in our first year group that we hope can really help us, but it is about being 1 percent better every day and just one foot in front of the other."
You've talked about how recruits today have a good gauge on if a coach is being genuine. What else do you notice has changed about this generation of student-athletes?
"I do think that they are quick to pick up on the phoniness, right? So that's why I think you have to be able to just have a conversation, and it does not need to be about basketball. It cannot be about basketball all the time, and I think that's one of the biggest differences. Maybe I would have been OK, 25 years ago in the recruiting process, just talking about basketball, but these guys, especially at this place, they want to talk about more than just that. And you've got to know who they are beyond the game and how they think.
"What's their 'why?' What do they like to do? What fuels them; what drives them? How are they spending their time and with whom outside of practice and and workouts, and who are they closest with in their family (and) in their friendship circles? Do they have partners? These are all things that, I think, from a holistic point of view, I think are really important to make sure that we're asking and we're knowing."
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