Houston coaches let go?

Howie Ryan (at UH 26 years) and Mike Takaha (8 years?) had both their contracts terminated on the basis of returning the program to a more sprint-oriented one. Ryan was the Men's Distance/XC coach. Assistant Coach, Theresa Fuqua (the women's coach), will be working with the men this year and the position has been terminated, as to what I've heard. Oh well.

Takaha had more than 8 years at UH, more like 18 or 19

Bad timing to let coaches go this close to the start of school!

coogfan wrote:

Bad timing to let coaches go this close to the start of school!

that is the way it seems to typically go at cougar high, though.

Wow...that is an awfully strong move by Burrell...Didn't Takaha help develop him when he (Burrell) was an undergrad at UH...

That is a shame...Ryan is a good guy...he recruited me when I was in HS.

Story I just heard is that although Takaha is a good coach, he can't recruit worth a darn, which as we all know you need to do both well to build or maintain a program. Burrell was recruiting but the recruits knew Takaha would be coaching them. I quess that's the way it goes. I know nothing about the distance coach.

Heard the same thing. I quess the 80's and 90's glory days were not enough to keep the recruits coming. Dried up.

They needed to do something because with the addition of TCU and ECU to their conference last year, they couldn't get by with mediocre talent in the sprints anymore. They were not only uncompetitive at the national level but also at their conference meets.

I guess you mean the men's teams, since the women's teams won the conference.

Wonder who has been doing the recruiting for the past few years?

Yes, sorry, I meant only the men's side. The women are still pretty stacked.

Do y'all mind if I play the cynic here? Firing a man, and having a woman take on his duties is a very effective way improve Title-9 numbers. I'm sure it crossed the AD's mind, or whoever made the call. Perhaps that was the reason. I know nothing of the UH program, though. It occured to me as soon as I read the thread.

Or it might be that new blood is what the team needs. Sometimes people get too secure in their jobs/roles and a little shake-up is needed. With the re-configurement of their conference dynamic a different perspective could really help.

I'm not sure why Mike Takaha was fired, as he always seemed like a successful coach.

As to Howie Ryan, I cannot understand why this guy was around for so long. He was an awful distance coach. The pitiful performances turned in year in and year out by the mens' cc team show this. Very few runners improved on their high school times. Times and team performances always got worse at the end of the season.

Not to mention he would schedule practice times and locations around his personal activities, including, but not limited too, sleeping in, his daughter's athletic events, and business appointments. This made for plenty of long drives to workouts during the hottest part of the day.

How many 9:20/4:15 guys came to UH from New York only to drop out, transfer, or spend most of their time injured?

Zero coaching, or oversight by the women's coach would be far better to that provided during Howie Ryan's days. Good luck to any distance runners still at UH. You're in much better shape now than you would be with Howie.