Summit For Hire?

The day after Univ. of Tennessee's Pat Summit eclipsed North Carolina's Dean Smith for most career wins by a Division I Head Basketball Coach some suggested that she would be a good choice to lead the Vols' men's squad. UT has since hired a male coach. Yet we are still left with the question of whether Summit should be considered for, or accept any such job.

The 800-pound gorilla in this argument is whether Summit deserves to lay claim to the title as "all-time winningest Division I basketball coach." In a purely statistical sense, she does. But comparing the women's and men's games is like comparing, well, women and men. They're completely different.

Sadaharu Oh hit more home runs than Hank Aaron, but nobody would say the two men are comparable, since Oh played in Japan, and Aaron played in the U.S. John Gagliardi won more football games than Bobby Bowden. Again, a difference: Gagliardi coached in Division III, while Bowden spent most of his time in the I-A rank. And Summit has more wins than Smith. But we're talking about two different sports. Not better or worse, different. Smith is the men's wins champion, and Summit holds the women's title; two different sports, two different leaders.

The reason Summit shouldn't consider taking the men's job is that she could end up damaging the women's game by doing so. She is a giant in her sport, the most successful coach ever and the builder of the program every other school wants to emulate. If she were to take over the UT men's team and not win big, there would be joy among those who consider women's college basketball inferior.

Summit has never recruited men's players. She would have to build a new network of high school and AAU contacts to help funnel her players. She would have to deal with prep stars who believe their next dribble should be for NBA millions, not collegiate glory. That doesn't

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