By Staff
Coaching Management, 9.3, April 2001, http://www.momentummedia.com/articles/cm/cm0903/qachristopher.htm
Kim Hudson-Christopher could be called a master of turning around losing programs. Since taking over at the University of South Carolina in 1993, she has navigated a program with a 1-13 Southeastern Conference (SEC) record to four NCAA tournament berths and a 12-2 regular-season conference record last year (both losses were at the hands of Florida). Her 1998 squad set a school record for single-match attendance with 1,380 spectators, and members of her program continually pick up conference honors, including academic awards.
Prior to South Carolina, Hudson-Christopher turned a 9-22 Northern Arizona University program into a 26-8 team in just one year. And at Division II West Texas State University, she took the Lady Buffs from a 10-24 season to the 1990 NCAA Division II National Championship in a three-year period.
In the following interview, this 1997 SEC Coach of the Year and 1990 American Volleyball Coaches Association Division II Coach of the Year shares her thoughts on recruiting, South Carolina’s near upset of Nebraska in the NCAAs, and the challenges of working with a young team.
CM: You have shown a great ability to turn around losing programs: first West Texas State, then Northern Arizona, then South Carolina. What’s your strategy?
Hudson-Christopher: I really feel that building a good program is about building relationships—it’s all about connecting with the administration, getting assistants who are willing to work and understand the impact they can make, and connecting with the players. The programs that I’ve been involved with have all had administrators who believed strongly in our sport, and believed that I was a person who would connect with the players and the staff.
When you came to USC, what were your steps to improve the team?
The first step is to get the right coaching staff. If you surround yourself with people who are smarter than you and willing to work hard, good things are going to happen. I think the years our program has flourished have been indicative of the kind of coaches I’ve had on staff.
A second step was to show the athletes that the athletic department was behind them. When I arrived at USC, the number-one problem was the facilities. We needed to send a message to our athletes that they were important, and we used the facilities upgrade as an example of that.
It then became my job to get our athletes to buy into the fact that we were doing this to win rather than just to have a nice court. My job was to show them how these changes reflected how valuable they were to the program.
Is recruiting particularly difficult when trying to revitalize a poor program?
It’s really hard. But recruiting, in general, is hard. The one thing we had in our favor when we first began recruiting is that South Carolina has beautiful weather, and a lot of volleyball players’ parents have vacationed in South Carolina. So the location was our selling point. Then we sold the coaching staff—that we were going to be here, that this was our new home.
We also talked about how we were ranked 193rd among Division I teams and that the staff and existing athletes wanted to see where we could take the program. And most athletes really liked that challenge. “Okay, the program is here. Where is it going to be when I graduate?” We gave them a chance to help make a difference—and do it in warm weather.
But recruiting is still hard. Our challenge is that South Carolina doesn’t have many high school athletes who have played volleyball at the level that we need. So our recruiting base is all over the country and that’s challenging. Plus, I think in volleyball there’s more parity, so you’re fighting against lots of good programs.
The great thing about recruiting in the SEC, though, is that the coaches have a good rapport with each other. There’s no negative recruiting going on.
What recruiting solution has worked best for you?
One thing that has worked well is getting current players to help us recruit. We’ve tried to recruit our players’ former high school and club teammates, and that’s been effective. When you’re recruiting, you don’t ever know exactly what you’re getting, so it helps when a player within your program knows a prospect.
We also ask our current players to be very involved in our recruiting once we have kids come on campus. If a prospect comes in and it’s not a good fit, our athletes have a say—because they are very smart and in-tune young women. This really helps with our team chemistry, which has been great over the past few years.
Many of your best players last season were underclassmen. What challenges did that pose?
A big factor for a young team is dealing with transitions. These girls were adjusting to being away from home, coming into a new setting, joining a program with an unfamiliar system, and learning how important academics and community service are to us. I think just understanding the system and getting acquainted with their teammates was a difficult transition for many of them.
There were some experiences that were so much fun because they were new to the players. And there were some that were not fun at all—like keeping their composure in high-pressure situations. So having a young team does create a challenge for us as coaches, but the team can’t grow or improve without going through some of those situations.
For example, in the SEC postseason tournament, we were upset by Georgia, and that was a pivotal point for our team. Afterwards, we came back to Columbia and really reevaluated things—what we were doing, why we were training, and why we were working so hard if we weren’t able to put it together when we needed to.
One thing this team does well is work really hard. But the problem was, even though they were able to work hard physically, when they had to support each other emotionally and people needed to step up into certain roles, they weren’t capable of taking that strength and transferring it. And I think that’s an indication of a young team.
So we challenged them physically in order to bring about emotional cohesion in tough situations. We created some extremely rigorous physical conditioning work, and by the end of it all, they were so supportive and encouraging each other, and just pushing each other through it. They were exhilarated that they completed the task.
And when they were finished, the coaches said, “Why is it easy to show that support when you’re in the gym, but not on the volleyball court?” And it was like a light bulb went on for them. They finally understood that their physical work and their emotional connection with one another was very important, and they figured out they can transfer that from one arena to another.
It was an important exercise because they needed to understand what they are fully capable of together as a group. This is a sport where players have to be connected and understand their roles in order to be successful. And I think that understanding then came through when we started NCAA tournament play.
You won your first-round match, then nearly upset eventual champion Nebraska in the second round. Was that match viewed by your team as a disappointing loss or a great effort?
It was a good match for us to finish on when you look at how we competed and our attitude towards competing against Nebraska on their home court. There’s always a sense of disappointment in losing, but our team was relaxed, and we enjoyed the atmosphere. We enjoyed competing at that level, and we didn’t allow the pressure to affect how we performed, for the most part.
What was the atmosphere like?
I have to give Nebraska’s administration a great deal of credit for the way they host an event. All the playoffs should have that much excitement around them. Some of the girls on our team went shopping and people in the community knew about our match. The city knew about our sport. It was a big deal. So that really set the tone.
There was a time during the first game when the crowd was so deafening the players couldn’t even hear each other on the court. And when we looked at each other, there were these huge expressions on our faces of just, “This is really what it is about. This is why we train.” So instead of being intimidated by the crowd’s enthusiasm, the girls considered the recognition a huge payoff for their hard work.
I’m very proud of the way the team accepted that. Because in some situations previously, it felt more like pressure rather than something to be appreciated. That’s what made me feel like we had overcome a huge hurdle.
Your system of play has utilized different line-ups, which is unique in this game. Why that approach?
One reason I started doing that was because there was more parity on the team this past season, especially in the middle. Then on the outside, we had a pretty new group of outside hitters. When I looked at our players’ capabilities statistically, they were all comparable, so I used different line-ups according to my players’ strengths and the opponent we had.
This isn’t something I’ve done every year, but it worked with this team because it was so young. The hardest part was getting the team to buy into it. I thought our seniors did a great job because they accepted their roles and understood that if they were taken out, it wasn’t all about them. It does create tension and competitiveness, but this team, I think, was very special, and they were very unselfish and handled it with a lot of class.
As part of a very successful DII program at West Texas State, what prompted your move to DI?
I made the decision to leave because it was the early 1990s, the economy was not very good, and a lot of universities were going through cuts. During our championship year, the President called my staff in and told us there was a chance that would happen to us. So I made the decision to leave largely out of the fear and uncertainty. In retrospect, and with a little more experience, I would have understood to just ride it out.
I never really looked at DI as “the bright lights,” because I was at a good program with great local athletes who wanted to play. We had a good booster club, my parents were involved because my dad had just retired, and that was my home. It wasn’t until I moved away from that security that coaching really became my career. Up until that point it was just a passion I pursued.
Your team has benefited from high attendance at your matches. How do you draw fans?
Well, it’s gotten better, but it has been a challenge. This was our second season having a marketing director for women’s athletics, and that was a commitment by the university administration. They wanted to see if providing marketing to all sports would help foster support, and it has.
What are some tips for working well with administrators?
It’s something you definitely have to work at. In my opinion, keeping my administrators informed is critical for the growth of my program—ensuring that they understand what my goals are for volleyball and how we’re getting there. It is my job to make sure they remember me and my program as they plan budgets, projects, etc.
Laurie Massa is our senior woman administrator and associate athletic director. She was a coach and understands the demands of coaching. So it’s easy for me to keep her informed because she’s somebody I respect.
What are the Gamecocks’ goals for the future?
My number one goal is to have a productive, healthy program. But as far as wins and losses go, we really have the desire and motivation to win an SEC title and be a Sweet 16 team. We want to be a team that is consistently in the Top 25 and feel like we’ve done it the right way—fairly and ethically, and that we have players in our program who are happy.