FORT COLLINS — As she glared out the window of her second-floor office at the McGraw Athletic Center, Kristen Holt searched for an answer that could’ve just as well summed up what her team has faced since late March.
What has been the most challenging thing since she became the women’s basketball coach at Colorado State?
The answers could’ve been numerous, considering the turmoil that has overcome the Rams in recent years.
There’s been the infamous pipe bomb prank in January 2007 that resulted in the suspension of four players. There’s the four wins last year — the last two coming in surprising fashion at the Mountain West Conference Tournament after a 20-game losing streak. There have been no NCAA Tournament appearances since 2001. And there was the firing of her predecessor, Jen Warden.
But it should come as no surprise the 39-year-old former Rams assistant coach answered with a look to the future.
“There’ve been hard decisions to make whether it be personnel or staff. I just know I had to have the right players around me and I have to have the right players playing for me,” Holt said.
It’s a daunting task considering all that has become of Colorado State women’s basketball for the better part of the last decade.
A former interim head coach at Radford and an assistant at Wichita State, Holt joined Colorado State last season. She saw firsthand the 4-28 season that led to Warden’s dismissal. She saw what the Rams had and what they needed. And what they needed was a change in their outlook. But that’s easier said than done.
“A mentality is hard to change. It really is. It’s not just snap your fingers and there’s a new coach, now we have a different mentality,” Holt said. “Like I told my team, I don’t know if we can gauge our success this year on wins and losses, because off the floor, like at practice and in the locker room, we’re going to have a lot of success that none of the fans or no one outside of our team is going to understand or know.”
The Rams didn’t have much success last season. Colorado State didn’t win a single game from Dec. 4 on until two upsets at the MWC Tournament. A lot of that had to do with the team’s mind-set.
Colorado State was going nowhere fast under Warden. But Holt must reprogram a program that hasn’t been to the postseason in four years. It was a challenge she felt worthy of taking on, but she knows it won’t be easy.
“It’s going to be a process,” said Holt, who while at Radford was named the Big South Conference coach of the year in 2002 after leading the Highlanders to a third-place conference finish. “It’s probably the biggest challenge that I face as far as putting this team in the right mental frame of mind. But I think the whole team, after what we went through last year, is ready for a new thing and ready for a change.”
