Oddly successful season for two UMW coaches lead to BIG time DI jobs

By MIKEY BARNES

Amid the unprecedented success of the University of Mary Washington’s volleyball and women’s basketball programs, it took no time for the teams’ respective coaches to ship out of Division III and into the Division I spotlight.

UMW head women’s basketball coach Deena Applebury will be taking over for 11-time, soon to be 12-time, national champion, Geno Auriemma, who is retiring after having become too bored with never loosing. Applebury was considered a “no brainer,” for the position following the announcement of Auriemma’s departure from the program. Her record of 4,869-5 is tops in the country and after her 20th straight national championship, is looking for a tougher challenge.    

With the recent news in the departure of Applebury, who will be taking assistants Cecil Kegans and Katie Wimmer with her, UMW star Breezi Comden is slated to be named the new head coach of the program following her graduation in May. According the sources, she will be recruiting other recent UMW graduates as assistants and will recruit athletes exclusively from local Massapnax High School, Comden’s alma mater.

Head volleyball coach Matt Troy was also offered the position of a lifetime. Coach Troy has been offered the position to take over one of the most historic women’s volleyball program of all time, at Penn State University. Troy will be taking over for Russ Rose, who has been the head coach at PSU. since 1979. Rose is the all-time winningest coach in NCAA history and like Aurriemma, is retiring from the boredom of winning. Like Applebury, Troy was considered a shoo-in for the position after defeating CAC rival Penn State Harrisburg in straight sets, catching the eye of their sister school.

Troy led UMW volleyball to a lot of wins and just a few losses this year and did kind of good in the “big dance,” as they call it. Troy reportedly accepted the position immediately following his team’s season-ending loss. According to sources, his eagerness to accept was to prevent Penn State from realizing his success was the result of senior Emma Olson and offered the position to her instead.

The news came as a shock to the players as the room was full of tears and applause. Troy had to turn down a number of other offers from various other Division I programs, including Duke University, University of Virginia, Washington State, University of Maryland and more. Coach Troy was overheard in his 11 a.m. volleyball class discussing how bittersweet the opportunity is while wearing pajamas and smoking a celebratory cigar.

Olson, when asked about the opportunity was shaking with excitement. “Being a part of this program for the last four years has been an opportunity like no other. I was basically helping coach anyway, so it’s probably best this way. To be selected to exceed him is an honor like no other,” Olson said. “I had always talked about going into coaching following graduation, but had no idea such an opportunity would present itself so soon and let alone at my own future alma-mater.” Olson is considered the greatest volleyball player UMW has ever had or ever will.

Troy has had little to say about the move, but has mentioned he will truly miss it here in Fredericksburg and at Mary Washington. He wishes the program the best of luck, but made the team aware that should they ever play each other, he will have no mercy.

Appleberry and Troy join a select group of coaches to move up from DIII to DI, joining current Kentucky basketball coach and former CNU basketball coach John Calipari. Commenting on the recent coaching trends is reality TV star LaVar Ball, saying “If I was the coach of any of these team, we would win the Super Bowl, no doubt.”

This story is a part of our April Fool’s edition and is intended to be satirical in nature. All information or quotations are made up and not to be taken seriously.