When new Oregon women’s basketball head coach Paul Westhead hired his third and final assistant on April 20, the program saw the return of a familiar face. Dan Muscatell was an Oregon assistant under Jody Runge and Bev Smith from 1999 to 2003, serving on the coaching staff for two NCAA tournament teams and the 2002 Women’s National Invitational Tournament champion squad.
Oregon Daily Emerald: How does it feel to be returning to your old job?
Dan Muscatell: Awesome. Everything about it’s been great. The welcome that I’ve had from folks that I’ve worked with have been just wonderful. The kids have been great – really receptive to not just myself, but Coach Westhead and our entire staff. It couldn’t have been a better transition.
ODE: How has the process of getting to know the women on the team been?
DM: It’s been really good. The hope that you would have is that they’d have open arms, and they certainly have received me and everybody else that way, which is awesome.
ODE: The new coaching staff has been put into place very quickly, and one new recruit has already been signed. What accounts for the speed of operations?
DM: Well, there’s experience everybody has, so the ability to hit the ground running really comes together. The credit, in terms of the cohesiveness, goes to Coach Westhead. He put together a group of people that obviously have merged really well. Our players have also jumped on board with that. At this point of time, there’s a transition period where everybody needs to not tip-toe into the water, but jump off the deep end.
ODE: Oregon recently received a national letter of intent from guard Kristi Fallin of Umpqua Community College, less than three weeks after your hiring to complete the staff. How did her commitment come about?
DM: Ironically, Coach (Dave, of Umpqua Community College) Stricklin and I have been friends for 10 years. He called me my first day here and said that Kristi was there and he wanted to see what we thought. She was actually visiting a couple other schools at the time, so I waited until she got back. From there, it was somewhat done on a bit of a whim. I walked into the office on Friday morning and said, “I’d better call Kristi, she’s probably back from her visit.” Apparently, and I didn’t know this at the time, she had just missed the Arkansas State coach to tell him or her that she was coming. That missed phone call, with the timing of my call, allowed us to even get a foot in the door. She at first was kind of set and where she was going, and I could understand that, this late in the process. But we talked her into coming out and spending the day and she did, and from there, as the saying goes, the rest is history.
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