<p>lol, the corndogs (LSU fans) are gonna really hate us now. But it looks like Murphy re-thought his decision and wants to come back to Tuscaloosa.</p>
<p>"LSU has re-opened its search for a new softball coach after Patrick Murphy reneged on his decision to coach the Tigers, Vice Chancellor and Director of Athletics Joe Alleva announced Sunday.</p>
<p>“I am very disappointed in Patrick’s decision after he had committed to be our head coach,” said Alleva. “I am especially disappointed for the young women on our team to whom he gave every indication he was in this for the long haul. We will use this opportunity to find a coach who will be the right leader for our student-athletes, who will wear the purple and gold with pride and will lead the softball program with integrity.”</p>
<p>Ok it’s official. Pat Murphy is removed from my hate list. This will allow me more time to hate those cow molesters at the former east alabama male college they now call auburn.</p>
<p>TideSports.com has learned that Patrick Murphy will return to the program he led for 13 seasons.</p>
<p>Murphy contacted the University of Alabama on Sunday about the possibility of returning as head softball coach.</p>
<p>Murphy amassed a 712-210 record at Alabama before LSU lured Murphy away from Alabama, making him the game’s highest paid coach at $225,000 a year. Alabama matched that offer before Murphy temporarily decided to take the LSU job.</p>
<p>The Baton Rouge Advocate reported Sunday afternoon that “Murphy reneged on his decision to be the next Tigers softball coach.”</p>
<p>Advocate reporter Scott Rabalais wrote on his Twitter that LSU Athletic Director Joe Alleva released the following:</p>
<p>“I am very disappointed in Patrick’s decision after he had committed to be our head coach. I am especially disappointed for the young women on our team to whom he gave every indication he was in this for the long haul. We will use this opportunity to find a coach who will be the right leader for our student-athletes who will wear the purple and gold with pride and will lead the softball program with integrity.”</p>
<p>That is extremely surprising. Did he forget to ask his wife first? Did he get a better salary offer from UA? Did he decided he doesn’t like crawdads???
Oh to be a fly on that wall…</p>
<p>It caused me to spew water on my keyboard too. But not for the same reason I don’t think. Coach Murphy isn’t married but I won’t say anything further.</p>
<p>Here’s the statement from Pat Murphy:
STATEMENT FROM PATRICK MURPHY</p>
<p>TUSCALOOSA, Ala. – Below is a statement from University of Alabama head softball coach Patrick Murphy:</p>
<p>“First, I want to thank everyone at the University of Alabama – the administration, the players and the support staff – for their support over the last few days. I have tremendous respect for the University of Alabama and for LSU. LSU offered me a great opportunity, but I realized once I got there that I had made a mistake that had nothing to do with LSU. I realized that I belong at Alabama. Alabama is where my heart is and I cannot in good conscience try to do a job in which I am not totally committed beyond any doubt. I can honestly say that the last few days have only made it clear that Alabama is where I want to be – beyond any doubt. It would have been totally unfair to everyone at LSU – especially the players – for me to be conflicted at all about where I was.</p>
<p>“I appreciate everything LSU did. They did everything in a first class manner. This change of heart is not in any way a reflection on anyone at LSU. It is solely something that I am responsible for. I can only convey to everyone my deepest apologies for putting all of those who care about both of these programs through a difficult time. In my heart, I know that this is the right thing for me to do.</p>
<p>“When reconsidering all of the factors involved, this decision comes down to the fact that I love the people at Alabama, the kids that have played for us there and who are on the team right now. Obviously, there are some fences to mend, but I look forward to getting the chance to discuss the situation individually with everyone involved over the days ahead. I am excited about the future of Alabama softball and I look forward to getting back to work.</p>
<p>“In closing, I want to give my thanks to Dr. Witt, Coach Moore, Dave Hart, Finus Gaston, Marie Robbins and all of the people at the University of Alabama who have been so supportive over all these years. I am grateful for the chance to return and I look forward to continuing on the journey we have been on these many years.”</p>
<p>* but I realized **once I got there **that I had made a mistake that had nothing to do with LSU. I realized that I belong at Alabama. Alabama is where my heart is *</p>
<p>Wow…I didn’t realize that he even had time to actually get to LSU.</p>
<p>University of Alabama Director of Athletics Mal Moore announced Sunday afternoon that softball head coach Patrick Murphy has returned to UA as head coach after leaving on Thursday, June 9, to take the head coaching job at LSU.</p>
<p>LOL…left on Thursday for LSU and then changed his mind by Saturday? That seems unbelievably odd…he certainly had been on LSU’s campus many times before. Did Bama offer another raise? </p>
<p>Had he actually physically moved out of his home in Ttown? Or when they say “left for LSU” do they mean “not physically left”, but that he had left Bama employment?</p>
<p>From what I understand he had his feelings hurt over what he perceived as a lack of love and support by the athletic department for the softball program.</p>
<p>LSU swooped in and made him feel loved and offered to make him the highest paid softball coach in the country. Mal Moore said he’d match their offer but Murphy at the time let his pride get in the way of his heart and decided to take the LSU job.</p>
<p>After a couple days of wondering what the hell he just did. He realized he was being stupid and needed to get back to Tuscaloosa where his heart was. </p>
<p>He hadn’t signed the contract with LSU yet so getting out of that was easy. The hard part was calling Mal and telling him he made a huge mistake and wanted to come back. </p>
<p>The other possibility is like azcpamom said, he really was upset over being on my “hate list” :-)</p>
<p>Apparently he went around and raised the funding for that on his own. And to his credit he has pretty much built the softball program from scratch. </p>
<p>But he has to realize it’s softball. It’s a non-revenue producing women’s sport at a FOOTBALL school. IMHO he should be happy with what he has. It’s the baseball team that needs a facilities upgrade but I doubt that will be coming any time soon.</p>
<p>All the more reason to admire him if that’s the case. He didn’t wait for a handout from football profits, he got his facilities through his own sweat. Which is the reason he would be able to pull a stunt like this.</p>
<p>Personally, I think he should enjoy a delicious omelet from all the egg being wiped off the faces of those who were ready to proverbially **** on his grave when he left.</p>
<p>*But he has to realize it’s softball. It’s a non-revenue producing women’s sport at a FOOTBALL school. IMHO he should be happy with what he has. It’s the baseball team that needs a facilities upgrade but I doubt that will be coming any time soon. *</p>
<p>Frankly, virtually all coaches of women’s sports have to realize that their sports are money-losers. They need to be grateful to be at schools where football brings in enough dough to fund their sports as well. Even the top female basketball teams are money losers. If it weren’t for Title IX, these college sports would go by the wayside.</p>
<p>m2ck you are absolutely right! Title IX is what keeps many womens team going right now. My DD is a top nationally ranked keeper and has just made the difficult decision to not play soccer in college. We have seen several programs cut, and available money fade. And while you may get a ‘full ride’ it is only a yearly guarantee, a new coach, a new direction and you could find yourself without a team. At least with Merit money you have some control…meet the minimum gpa or lose the money. Ooops did not mean to go off topic and rant. Thank goodness for Title IX, but these days even that is not enough to offset budget cuts at some other schools.</p>
<p>While Title IX has done wonders for women’s sports it has killed some non-revenue men’s sports. Wrestling is one sport in particular that has felt the effects of Title IX. </p>
<p>If they would simply take football out of the equation it would help a great deal. You have to add an awful lot of women’s sports to account for the 85 scholarships in football. And in the process some non-revenue men’s sports get cut to balance the budget. </p>
<p>I’d personally like to see it amended to where only non-revenue sports are considered in regards to Title IX.</p>
<p>Wow I had no idea that football had that many scholarships! 85? that is tough to balance.</p>
<p>We have a friend of ours who agreed to swim for Arizona a few years ago, then the school decided they had to cut men’s swimming/diving for budget reasons. They actually reinstated it the next year, but the damage was done and our friend never went back to swimming. So sad that it affects so many students regardless of sex. I know that baseball was cut at Iowa State and is still not reinstated. I’m sure that the list goes on and on.</p>
<p>As our son was being “looked at” by several D-1 schools for football there was a lot of talk about scholarships and what that meant. As I understand it each college has so many full ride and partial ride football scholarships available depending upon how many scholarships are already “committed”. We actually met with a gentleman who was from the NCAA to make sure we understood the process and to help us make the best choice for our son (it ended up being irrelevant due to his head injury in the Mo-Kan All Star Game). Are you saying that Alabama has 85 full ride football scholarships or 85 total football scholarships? DD’s best friend is a scholarship athlete playing softball for Mizzou. Even though she was highly sought after but most of the major colleges around , MU, KU, K-State, Iowa, Oklahoma none of them were able to give her a “full ride” so to speak. DD’s other good friend plays volleyball for MU and is a “full ride scholarship” athlete (she just finished her freshman year and is currently playing with Team USA in China) I assume it all has to do with budget and again how they are able to “cut up” the pieces of the pie.</p>
<p>All football scholarships at the D1 level are full rides. Programs are allowed 85 total scholarships but only 25 can be given to new signees in any given year. So if a team has 65 returning players on scholarship they can really only offer 20 scholarships to new recruits for that year. Of course there are ways around this which is what all the over-signing hubbub has been about lately. However regardless of over-signing, a school can still only have 85 on scholarship at any one time.</p>
<p>The only sport I was aware that offered “piece” scholarships was baseball. And that is because baseball only gets 11 “full” scholarships to divvy up amongst the roster. Hence one of my problems with Title IX. Apparently there are some other non-revenue sports that do this as well. </p>
<p>Back in the day, Bear Bryant (and others) used to sign a few football recruits to a wrestling scholarships to get around the limits. The NCAA then changed the rules to where any player that plays football or men’s basketball has to count against that sports scholarship limits effectively eliminating that loophole.</p>