Shea 'hello' to your new coach

It has been seven years since Shea Ralph played a game at UConn.

In that time, there have been Final Fours and National Championship runs, tears of joy and tears of heartbreak.

Ralph has shed her share of tears - she won a national championship as part of the 2000 team, and she ended her career on the ground with a knee injury in the 2001 Big East tournament.

So when Ralph returned to Storrs in July, she brought with her optimism for the season. This time, however, she was an assistant coach, ready to help Geno Auriemma - her former coach - build the pieces for a return to the Final Four.

Maybe, even, the national championship.

Ralph came just days after assistant coach Tonya Cardoza took the women's basketball head coaching position at Temple. So far, the transition has been smooth for the staff, and the players, in particular, Auriemma said.

"Shea commands an awful lot of respect from them," he said. "You know, it's pretty hard when you walk into our offices and you see her picture everywhere to not pay serious attention to what she's talking about."

The dedication to what she believes in is evident in each practice and game.

During practices, Ralph sits intently watching every move. But she is not on the bench. Instead, she is in her UConn blue warm-up suit, squatting while on the tips of her toes.

"She's been through it before," said senior guard Renee Montgomery. "She's played here. She's played under coach so she knows, you know, how it is to get yelled at. She knows how it is when he's happy with you."

Auriemma said that Ralph has a strong desire to get the team back to where it was, what UConn represented when she played alongside the likes of Svetlana Abrosimova. But these players' skills pose different challenges.

Her focus, however, appears not to be on what the Huskies have done in the past, but on what they can do now.

"I don't think the players have had that moment of indecision or doubt of 'What does she mean' or 'It's not like how it was last year,' or 'Tonya said,' you know," Auriemma said. "So there hasn't been any of that. It's been almost a seamless - 'Oh, man another person that won't let us get away with anything. We were hoping it was the substitute teacher that we could, you know, take advantage of for a little while.'"

The coaching staff, too, has benefited since her arrival. Ralph is the first new face on the coaching staff in years, and that requires Auriemma to be on his toes and prepare even more, something the head coach says has been good for him.

She has a different approach to injuries, as well. Instead of hounding Kalana Greene and asking her how her leg is constantly, Ralph said that she goes into the training room to sit with her and discuss how things are going. She presents her with her own experiences and tells stories of her difficulties with injuries. And she gives suggestions.

More importantly, Ralph appears to be someone that the players feel comfortable with going to with problems. She has become more than just a coach; she is a role model. Lorin Dixon even called Ralph her second mother.

"Yeah, like our coaches, they're not just the same old coaches who are just strict and you know, don't have a relationship with them," Greene said. "We have a relationship with them on and off the court and just trusting them off the court makes you trust them on the court even more. She's a really good coach."

And at the end of the day, Ralph is their coach. And from the crowd's ovation when she was announced at the start of the Stonehill exhibition game, fans are excited to have her back.

"It's different. A lot of people don't like change; everybody thinks change is bad but we went from a great coach from another great coach," Greene said. "She knows the program, she knows the coaches. She's very, very, intense.

"She's the same way as a coach as she was as a player - intense, fiery - she loves the game, is serious about it and passionate about it."