Can McCallie Take Duke All the Way?

Back in 1982, Joanne McCallie from Brunswick, Maine, was looking for a place to go to school and to play basketball. She badly wanted to go to Duke. Her mother wanted her to go to Northwestern. Mom won, and she ended up at Northwestern. But Joanne McCallie never got Duke out of her mind.

On Friday, Joanne P. McCallie (called "Coach P" by many for her maiden name Palombo), who led Michigan State to the 2005 NCAA championship game, was greeted warmly at a Cameron Indoor Stadium news conference as she was named Duke's new women's basketball coach, replacing Gail Goestenkors.

I thought the 41-year-old McCallie came across well. She was energetic and enthusiastic and genuinely excited. Those are qualities that do motivate others, and she's been a winner.

"They're getting a passionate person, an extremely hard-working, a very inspired person in terms of the honor to serve as the Duke coach," says McCallie.

McCallie says she was happy at Michigan State, where she was named the 2005 National Coach of the Year. She had just signed a new contract that called for a nice increase in salary (funny thing about coaching contracts, they're signed to be broken) and when Goestenkors left for Texas, she figured, like many, that her friend Joanne Boyle, the California coach and former Duke player and assistant coach, would take the Blue Devil job. When she didn't, McCallie said she had to take a look.

"The reality was this was an opening I never thought would occur. It's taken 15 years for this job to open. It was something I had to seize as somebody with an appreciation and an excitement for Duke University."

And the new coach, who met with men's coach Mike Krzyzewski for about 45 minutes on her interview, said Duke did not have to put on a full-court press. This was her dream.

"Duke did not have to come searching for me and asking too many questions," McCallie says. "I believe I made it very clear that I wanted the job."

For the Duke players who were first devastated by the upset loss to Rutgers in the Sweet 16 and then seeing their coach leave for Texas, they're happy just to move forward. Rising junior Abby Waner made calls during the interim to the Blue Devils top-rated recruiting class to reassure them that all would be OK and that none of the current players would be transferring. Waner, last year's leading scorer, says the team is relieved that a new coach is in place.

"When we found out that she was going to be our coach, it was just the fact that this is now over and we can move forward," Waner says. "But as we got to talk with her and know her and her family, it's not only the fact that we have a coach, but also that it's her."

McCallie did well at Michigan State, compiling a 149-75 record in seven seasons, including taking the Spartans to the 2005 championship game. But at Duke she inherits a program that has won an NCAA-record 30 or more games for seven straight years. The bar has been set high, and the new coach knows that in the ACC the pace is quicker and the players more athletic than the sometimes plodding Big Ten. McCallie says she'll have no trouble adapting to the talent she'll have at Duke.

"We'll work together to build a team. We'll try different things to see what works," McCallie said. "Defensively, I'll probably put more things in, to be clear. We'll start with defense and rebounding and let the offense flow from it."

One thing that happened at Michigan State while McCallie was there was a dramatic increase in game attendance. McCallie stressed at her news conference that she would do all that she could to see that happen at Duke.

Under Gail Goestenkors, Duke did everything except win the national championship. Joanne McCallie knows that's the large step forward that a highly successful Duke program can take. She says that's the program goal, and her goal is to make it fun reaching it.

"You have to enjoy the process," says McCallie, who's overall record at Maine and Michigan State was 316-148. "I really want the team to have fun, recognize that we know what we're pursuing and we're going to pursue every year. The goal is never going to change: Championships every year, no matter if we're picked to or not."