Ex-UW coach Daugherty finds new home in Pullman

PULLMAN — June Daugherty bought the house Dick Bennett built. By that we mean the spacious palace on the hill with the high ceilings and a lawn that manicures itself, not the Washington State men's basketball program or the sparkling athletic facility.

Back when Bennett built the house, before he built the weight room and the practice court and eventually the program, turning the Cougars into a national contender seemed improbable. Then it happened. And that's what Daugherty keeps coming back to after taking over the WSU women's basketball program and buying Bennett's house in the past week.

Same town. Same school. Same house, even. So why can't she do the same thing?

"It's funny how life throws you surprises," Daugherty says. "If you were to tell me two months ago, we'd be sitting here, and I'm the Washington State head coach, well ... "

She smiles, orders spaghetti and sits down. This is home now, Main Street, downtown Pullman. She wears a crimson jacket. She sits in a crimson booth. A world turned upside down.

Washington fired Daugherty on March 18 after 11 seasons. Soon after, she found herself delayed overnight in Minnesota with two old friends — then-WSU coach Sherri Murrell and Portland assistant Loree Payne, a former Husky — en route to the Final Four.

During dinner, they consoled Daugherty by talking about the abundance of job openings in women's college basketball this season. Daugherty had already talked to Michigan three times about its opening, and she had an informal interview scheduled with Cincinnati at the Final Four. (Later, she also talked to Penn State.)

"It's ironic now, looking back," Daugherty says. "Like somebody took the deck and shuffled us."

Murrell resigned from her post at WSU on April 5. Payne took an assistant job at Washington with the new regime. And Daugherty ended up at Washington State, wearing crimson, buying Bennett's house.

Funny how life throws you surprises, she says again.

The least surprising part of this whole process was the firing itself. Washington athletic director Todd Turner did not offer Daugherty a renewal after the 2005-06 season.

Daugherty sensed even at the beginning of this season that it would be her last with UW, and she told her team as much, trying to minimize distractions.

The Huskies made the NCAA tournament again this past season, but a career 191-139 record, six NCAA tournament appearances and a recruiting class ranked 12th nationally were not enough, particularly in the buzz department. The headline read: "UW dumps Daugherty."

The easy part was cleaning out the office. Grabbing all the pictures, putting them in boxes, fighting back the tears. There went Megan Franza, the Washington native who turned down Stanford to become Daugherty's first recruit. Then Giuliana Mendiola, the first Pac-10 Player of the Year at UW. Then Kayla Burt and Andrea Lalum, and right on down the line.

The hard part was explaining to her twins, 12-year-olds Doc and Breanne, why kids at school brought the newspaper, laughed and pointed at the headline, why they had to move now.

The kids grew up in the UW gym, through the renovation and the Elite Eight appearance and the decline in attendance in recent years. Doc wanted to burn his UW sweatshirt the other day. Mom reminded him she had moved on. And moved on quickly.

"We have," says Mike Daugherty, June's husband and an assistant on her staff. "The hardest part is we had more talent there now than at any time in our career, and we don't get a chance to capitalize on that."

The week after the firing, Mike and June sat around their living room and talked for hours, soul-searching. Washington had offered June a one-year severance package, so there was no rush to get back into coaching. Mike had been a salesman before.

The more they talked, the more obvious it became. They wanted to coach forever. Then they went to Florida for a vacation and all these jobs opened. Taking one made too much sense.

"Our passion didn't change because the address did," June Daugherty says. "I feel revitalized now, re-energized. This is a huge change. There's no doubt about it. But it forced us to re-evaluate things."

Funny how life throws you surprises. After news spread of her firing, Daugherty received hundreds of flowers, e-mails, text messages and phone calls. The very first came from Marcia Saneholtz, longtime senior associate athletic director at WSU. It read: "Thanks for the class. Thanks for the integrity. Thanks for everything."

The day Murrell resigned, Daugherty happened to call Saneholtz to thank her for the note. That's when Saneholtz informed Daugherty of the opening and asked if she was interested.

"It was surreal," Daugherty says, "and it still, at times, feels that way."

Washington State athletic director Jim Sterk said the athletic department looked at more than 50 coaches. When it became clear that Daugherty would be among the favorites, Sterk called Turner for the "political dynamics. So he wasn't blindsided."

The Cougars held a news conference last Friday to introduce Daugherty as coach. She brought Mike and the twins along. Sterk says the turnout there was among the loudest and largest he'd seen for WSU women's basketball. "A great buzz," he says. Ironic, don't you think?

The morning after the news conference, Daugherty slept in at the family's home in Mukilteo. When she woke up, Mike was carrying several trash bags, and she noticed purple-and-gold clothing protruding from the tops.

Breanne had a soccer jamboree that afternoon, and the family loaded everything Huskies related into an SUV. So much stuff, some brand new, it spilled out when they opened the trunk. Between games, they gave it all away.

"It was cathartic," Mike Daugherty says. "Under the circumstances we left in, I didn't want to see the color purple anymore."

The task ahead is not an easy one. The Cougars have won 10 Pac-10 games this century, and last finished with a winning record in the 1995-96 season. Five years ago, Murrell created similar buzz. Five years later, her plan still hadn't worked.

So why will Daugherty be any different? She helped turn around two other programs, first as an assistant with Stanford before it turned into a juggernaut, later at Boise State. She is familiar with the conference, players, schemes, etc. She has also proven she can win in the Pac-10. And with a seven-year deal, she has time.

What she needs, Sterk says, is the kind of program-building class Bennett brought to his — and now her — house not long ago. The kind of class, Sterk says, that shows basketball games can be won in a place like Pullman.

"June fits," Sterk says. "We're not going to get McDonald's All-Americans. June has had success in identifying talent in other areas. That's exactly the kind of coach we need."

Daugherty stopped by her new house recently. On her way out the door, she went back into the den. She's still not even sure why. Sitting on Bennett's desk was a small trophy for taking Wisconsin to the Final Four. It stopped Daugherty in her tracks. She needed a deep breath.

"I don't know what it means," Daugherty says. "But it's one of those moments where you stop and go, 'OK, it's all meant to be.' I believe that. It's all meant to be."

Funny how life throws you surprises, she says again.

Greg Bishop: 206-464-3191 or gbishop@seattletimes.com