Columnist Dean Juipe: UNLV staff gets younger and younger

Dean Juipe

Friday, July 25, 1997 | 8:24 a.m.

NOW IT'S a pattern.

UNLV has hired so many young and inexperienced coaches in a row that it has to have been done intentionally, with forethought.

Maybe it's good, maybe it's not. Time will be the judge.

But it's curious, if nothing else. And it's easy to be a little skeptical.

She hasn't been formally introduced yet, but Staci Hendershott is the newest UNLV head coach. She'll take over the women's soccer program that begins play next year.

She has no experience as a collegiate head coach.

Fact is, the last truly experienced head coach hired by UNLV was track coach Karen Dennis in 1992. Jim Weaver was the athletic director back then and he was succeeded by Charlie Cavagnaro three years later.

Cavagnaro wasn't here at the time, but back around the turn of the decade UNLV was strong in every sport except football. The school had a nice group of veteran coaches and the athletic department was productive as well as harmonious.

Collectively, the UNLV programs were in the midst of a heyday and were among the best on the West Coast.

The same cannot be said today despite the fact the men's basketball team has a top-20 look to it, the golf team was ranked No. 1 most of the season, the tennis teams provided the NCAA champion in men's singles and doubles and the swimming teams had their usual successes. The other sports are either down or competing in a publicity vacuum.

Since Dennis was hired five years ago, UNLV has hired six head coaches (excluding Ola Malmqvist, who arrived with men's tennis coach Larry Easley in 1991 and has since taken over the women's tennis program). Those six post-Dennis coaches include: Jeff Horton (football), Bill Bayno (men's basketball), Deitre Collins (volleyball), LaDonna McClain (women's basketball), Rod Soesbe (baseball) and Hendershott.

Of the six, Bayno has obviously worked out and is a bright, young talent; Horton was an easy choice, especially because it also enabled UNLV to rob Nevada-Reno of its football coach; Soesbe was a veteran assistant, albeit one without head coaching experience at the major college level; while Collins, McClain and, of course, Hendershott have yet to prove themselves. Truth is, the jury is still out on everyone but Bayno.

The pro-UNLV view is simply this: The school has stockpiled a cache of young coaches who could develop into the type of veteran staff it takes to win at the highest level. This could be a second coming of sorts of the staff that was here and doing so well in the late 1980s.

The negative view is just as easily defined: UNLV wants passive and submissive coaches for its "minor" sports and the school really cares only about fielding winning teams in football and men's basketball. Along these lines, as additional veteran coaches leave the staff through attrition and what have you, UNLV will continue to seek replacements who are less demanding.

But let's stay optimistic. Welcome aboard Ms. Hendershott.

Now show us something.