DWHoops File Photo by Orin Day

Joanne Boyle (pictured here supporting Duke at the 2006 NCAA title game) is the new head coach at the University of Virginia

After a crazy series of events in Charlottesville, former Duke player and coach Joanne Boyle (T'84) has been named the fourth head coach of the University of Virginia. After "resigning" two days after announcing she wasn't going to retire, Debbie Ryan finally has a successor. The coaching search has unfolded with the same sense of aplomb and timing that the resignation possessed, with multiple false leaks about various coaches taking the job. Former Virginia star Dawn Staley was thought to be Ryan's favorite: a member of the Wahoo "family" with extensive playing & coaching experience. That possibility was snuffed out when the Virginia administration balked at the expense of paying for the buyout of the remainder of her Temple contract as well as buying out the more lucrative South Carolina pact.

Former Virginia assistant and coaching rising star Nikki Caldwell was then interviewed. A certain web source tweeted that she would be taking the job. About a day later, Caldwell took the job at LSU, which tripled what she was making at UCLA. The same source then tweeted that Georgetown's Terry Flournoy-Williams was going to be the new coach at Virginia. Precisely what happened there is unknown, but that didn't come to pass either. A few days ago, another source tweeted that Boyle would be taking the job. She released a precisely-worded statement that said "I am not the head coach of Virginia", a maddeningly vague phrase that could be parsed any number of different ways. The evidence started to mount, however, that this was actually going to come to pass.

Timing is everything in the world of coaching. When Gail Goestenkors left after the 2007 season, Boyle was Duke's first choice by acclimation. How serious of an offer was made by Joe Alleva is not clear, but working for the boss who alienated the coach she worked for for eight seasons was not exactly the most savory of situations for Boyle - even at her alma mater. At the same time, she was starting to build something special in Berkeley after just two years and wound up leading a moribund program to the Sweet Sixteen in 2009. She guided Cal to four straight NCAA bids and grabbed a top five recruiting class with the high school class of 2009, pulling in seven players.

As many coaches quickly come to understand, good situations can turn sour with great speed. Those recruits have not panned out as expected for the most part. One of them had to quit basketball due to a medical condition. Others have transferred. After four straight NCAA bids, Cal missed the tourney in 2010, but did bounce back to win the WNIT. That young team was expected to bounce back this season but instead finished 18-16. The team's leading scorer announced that she would be transferring at the end of the season. On top of that, the budget crisis in California is sharply affecting every athletics department in the state. Cal had to cut several varsity sports and depended on private donations to save others. Finding a more stable situation with a school that had a brand-new facility and a willingness to spend money on supporting its teams was frankly a no-brainer for Boyle.

Being able to return to her old stamping grounds in the ACC was a bonus for Joanne. She's well acquainted with the Virginia area after coaching at Richmond for three years. She was a strong recruiter at Duke and will be in a position to reclaim high-profile recruits who were going to Maryland and Duke as well as seek out lower-profile but quality recruits who were turning James Madison into the state's best women's basketball program. Some in Berkeley grumbled that Boyle failed to seize on her own momentum to create a program that could truly challenge Stanford and become a consistent national power. It is certainly true that her 2009 class has not become what was expected, though to be sure they do have two more years to prove themselves. I think there's a sense in which having a class that was highly ranked was a negative for Boyle, in that while the players were highly ranked relative to other players in their class, the reality is that this high school class may not be very good overall. In other words, the hype worked against her.

What is clear is that Boyle rejuvenated both Richmond and Cal. She brought Cal its greatest success, ever. She got highly-rated recruits to come to Richmond. She knows the ACC quite well, though it's changed a bit since she's left. Indeed, since she left in 2002, the league added Miami, Virginia Tech & Boston College, while Maryland, Virginia, Wake Forest, Georgia Tech, NC State, Duke and Clemson went through coaching changes. Only Sue Semrau and Sylvia Hatchell remain from Boyle's days as an assistant, just a decade ago. She will be the fourth ex-ACC player who has returned to coach in the league, joining fellow Blue Devil Katie Meier, former Heel Sylvia Crawley and former Tiger Utoro Umoh-Coleman. Joanne was quite well-liked during her tenure at Duke, and I expect her to have a positive impact for a Virginia program that has always had the potential to be very good.

Editor's Note: Schedule permitting, DWHoops will cover Joanne Boyle's first home game at Virginia.