Army West Point Athletics
Ask The AD Transcript
April 08, 2008 | General
Below is a transcript from Army Athletic Director Kevin Anderson's latest "Ask the AD" segment with Rich DeMarco on March 27, 2008.
Rich DeMarco: Hello again everyone, Rich DeMarco back another edition of “Ask the AD,” your chance to ask questions to Army Director of Intercollegiate Athletics, Kevin Anderson, and have Kevin Anderson answer your questions about the Army Athletic Department. Once again, if you would like to submit a question for the show, you can log onto the official website for Army Athletics, goarmysports.com, and click on the “Ask the AD” button, and you can submit your question there. Kevin, good to be back on “Ask the AD,” as Army Athletics finishes up a successful winter season and I know you’re very proud of the accomplishments of the winter sports here at West Point.
Kevin Anderson: Rich, it’s always good to be with you. Yes, I’m very proud of the progress that we’ve made and the accomplishments across the fall and winter sports. I’m particularly pleased with the progression we continue to see with men’s basketball. They finished better than they did last year. They went to the Patriot League Tournament and they played very well there. The women competed well again, we came up short because we did believe that we could have competed for the conference championship so losing in the first round was somewhat disappointing. But we’re promised with the talent and the team that we have moving forward. We do lose some great seniors from that team. Losing Cara (Enright) is going to be an impact on the program, not only from the talent she had on the court but what she provided in the locker room and as a leader. Look at Rifle. Rifle competed for the national championship and just came up short. But if you look at that team and the young people that we do have competing. We have one young man, a plebe, Steven Scherer, who’s going to compete in the Beijing Olympics in Air Rifle. And we have Chris Abalo, our firstie, who’s had a wonderful career here at West Point, and he could compete in the Smallbore. So, that’s quite an accomplishment for that team and I’m very proud of everything and everything that’s been accomplished and very happy with our cadet-athletes and also our coaching staffs. But... and I almost forgot one of our most key and important teams of the Winter, is hockey. What a season Brian Riley and the cadet-athletes on that hockey team had. Winning our first and only conference championship in hockey, says everything. We fell a little short in the Atlantic Hockey Tournament, however, I’m extremely proud of that team and how they played and what they accomplished and Brian Riley is one of the best collegiate hockey coaches in the country.
RD: And Kevin, the end of the Winter Sports season brings us to the Spring and Spring Football practice getting started on Wednesday, as the Army Football team begins its preparation for 2008 and we’re never far away from football season it seems here at West Point, and the start of Spring practice is just another reason why it’s so close.
KA: Well, Rich, it seems like we just got through playing Army/Navy and now we’re into Spring ball and then we’re going turn around and look at it and we’ll have that first game here at Michie on that Friday night against Temple. I think Stan (Brock) and his staff had a very productive offseason. And they’ve been able to put a lot together both offensively and defensively. I’m looking forward to progression in the program. Again, our goals our and the mission is to at least finish 6-6, win the Commander in Chief’s Trophy and also go and qualify for a bowl game. It’s no different, I believe the schedule dictates that putting all these things together, we can accomplish all three goals. I think that we’re going to have an exciting football team and to do some exciting things this year. And I feel confident that we will be successful.
RD: Kevin, we’ve had a few questions. Including one from Zig Roebuck from Huntsville, Alabama, asking about the decision to close Spring Football practice... with the sessions inside of the Foley Center. Can you talk about the decision to have Spring practice closed as well as the value you feel will come from those sessions private?
KA: Moving into the Foley Center, it limits the access. There’s just not a lot of space in there, particularly to bring people to observe football practice... so there are some safety issues. The other thing is... is that it is confined and there’s not a lot of room there. And we have a short period of time the NCAA allows us this Spring to put everything together. And I want to create an atmosphere for our football players where it’s a learning environment we minimize to negate any distractions. Not having a lot of people wandering the sidelines and in the middle of the field I think will diminish any possibilities of our football team being distracted... it will allow our coaches to teach... and it will allow our players to learn. Because again I’ll just state... the mission is to at least finish 6-6, qualify for a bowl game and to win the Commander in Chief’s Trophy... and I want to create an atmosphere that allows everybody that success.
RD: And Kevin, our next question comes from John from Orlando, Florida. And John wants to know if there is any plan to have Notre Dame on the Army Football schedule coming up in the near future?
KA: We are in the process of negotiating with Notre Dame and it looks like we could have a two-to-four game package with them. It looks now there would be two neutral sites and then two games at Notre Dame. So, it’s very promising. I would say we’re pretty far along in negotiating these games and that I feel pretty confident that they will become a reality.
RD: With Spring Football already here we are in the midst of the Army Spring sports season... and I know you are very optimistic on how our Spring sports teams will fare here at West Point as well as some of the success those squads already have had.
KA: You know I have mixed emotions about track... because I think our track team has been put in a place where they will be very competitive. However, our track coach, Jerry Quiller’s career will come to an end as the Army track coach. Coach Quiller has done a tremendous job with our program, but he’s a tremendous human being and I enjoy being around him every day and hearing some of his jokes. People who know Jerry know he has a very outgoing and very gregarious personality. So I will miss that. So with mixed emotions that I was looking forward to this track season... but then again it will conclude Coach Quiller’s tenure here at Army. I’m very excited about our baseball team. Coach Sottolano had a great recruiting class and we have a lot of plebe’s playing and starting. There’s going to be a lot of high and there might be some lows but they’ll be competitive and it will be fun to see these young guys compete at the college level. Our softball team has again it’s a young team and it’s struggled but I think that once it warms up so will their bats and they’ll find a little bit of pitching and they’ll be right in the hunt for the Patriot League Championship. Golf, again, it seems like we’re on a youth movement and that most of our key golfers will be in the younger classes and so I’m looking forward that they will mature and that we will prepare them for the future so they can be competitive. I can’t say enough for our lacrosse team. They just beat Hofstra the other night, who was ranked 14th or 15th at the time. We’ve come back and we’ve played the top teams in the country and two of them we’ve lost by a total of two points. One each with Syracuse and the other was Cornell. So I’m very pleased with that coaching staff because I believe we have one of the best lacrosse coaching staffs in the country and our young men are competing at the highest level and I think at the end of the day that we’ll be right in the mix with all these other great lacrosse programs in the country. Then, I look at our other Spirng sports and our men’s and women’s tennis team. They do a tremendous job, the coaches do a tremendous job... again we have a combination of younger players and seasoned players and we’ve always competed at the top of the Patriot League and there’s no reason why we won’t this year so I’m very pleased with the progress of Coach Poling’s and Coach Peck’s teams. They do a tremendous job and year in and year out we’re always at the top of the Patriot League in most if not all of these sports. Overall, I’m very pleased with our progress and what we do here and that now the thing is one of the most important sports we have here is football and I believe that we’re now in the process of correcting the areas we need to and to move forward to be successful and to have a successful football program.
RD: Kevin, always good to be with you here on another edition of “Ask the AD.” Just a reminder for our listeners, if you want to submit a question for Army Director of Intercollegiate Athletics, Kevin Anderson, log onto the official website of Army Athletics, that’s goarmysports.com, and click on the “Ask the AD” button. Kevin, always good to be with you and I look forward to catching up with you next month.
KA: Rich, good to be here... and Go Army!
RD: That’s Army Director of Intercollegiate Athletics, Kevin Anderson. For Kevin Anderson, I’m Rich DeMarco... on “Ask the AD”... have a great day everyone!
