Student-athletes suffer most in wake of Patraw firing
Tuesday, Nov. 13, 2007 @ 2:01 am
The Nevada soccer team’s 1-0 loss to Fresno State in the quarterfinals of the Western Athletic Conference Tournament on Thursday was the exclamation to a sad truth.
The true victims of former soccer head coach Terri Patraw’s firing back in August ended up being the players and assistants that had to carry on after.
Patraw was terminated on Aug. 28, just three days before the Wolf Pack’s season opener against Oregon. She filed a lawsuit on Thursday seeking restitution and reinstatement.
Figuring out where responsibility lies in her dismissal – whether she was a loose cannon or fired without true cause – could take years of court proceedings, but the negative impact it had on the soccer team is clear.
This was supposed to be a breakout season for Nevada. Instead, the Wolf Pack struggled to a 6-11-1 record. Picked to win the conference in the preseason polls, the Wolf Pack finished the regular season in fifth place (out of eight) before getting bounced in the first round of the conference tournament.
The players and coaches haven’t said much about how Patraw’s firing has affected them, but this season’s record says enough.
“This was the most talented team we ever had here, player for player,” said Patraw, who has watched most of the Wolf Pack’s home games this season from the stands. “So you can imagine how confusing this has been for them.”
Last season the Wolf Pack went 13-5-4, won the WAC Tournament, and made the program’s first appearance in the NCAA Tournament.
With almost all of the significant talent returning from that squad and a schedule that set up a possible top 25 run, this season was supposed to mean even bigger things.
Instead, the system failed them.
Head coaching changes are always dicey propositions, but the timing of this change couldn’t have been worse.
It’s not like the players had an entire offseason to prepare for the changes. It happened three days before the start of the regular season.
To make matters worse, there was no clear resolution.
If Patraw had committed an irrevocable sin, then logic would suggest that the cause would have surfaced by now. It makes equally little sense that the university would fire her so close to the beginning of the season.
Patraw’s contract was up after this year, so the university simply could have waited out the season and let her walk.
Instead, the players had to endure losing the woman who recruited them, getting used to a (sort of) new coach in former assistant Antoinette Marjanovic, then wondering all year long what had happened.
“I’m really proud of the team and the interim coaches,” Nevada director of athletics Cary Groth said. “They endured some adversity and they handled it very well.”
The team did handle the adversity well. The Wolf Pack was competitive in almost every game despite the distractions.
Still, the end result of the season fell far short of where it could have been.
It’s not because of any deficiency among the players, lack of talent, or plain hard luck.
We may not know who is to blame for the situation, but we certainly know who has suffered most.
It’s not Groth. It’s not the university. It’s not Patraw – even if it does turn out that she was wrongfully fired.
It’s the student-athletes, and that’s the most unfortunate part about this entire mess.
tincil et aciliquip eum il in ea feu feu feumsandit nullandiat ver sequi tem iustisi.
vullaor erilisci erostio nsenibh et
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