Women's Gymnastics--Lavallee gone--at start of the season

Jackbacker2

Davis, Calif. - The University of California, Davis has terminated the employment of Head Gymnastics Coach John Lavallee, Director of Athletics Rocko DeLuca announced today. Lavallee was in his 15th season with the Aggies. Tanya Ho will serve as Interim Head Coach throughout the 2022-23 academic year.

"It is time for new leadership atop our gymnastics program," said DeLuca. "Tanya has been an instrumental part of our program for several years and I am grateful that she has agreed to step up. I am confident that our student-athletes will have a transformative experience and compete for championships under her leadership. We will begin a national search for a new head coach in the months ahead and, in the meantime, we will do everything we can to support our student-athletes."

John Lavallee is a great coach. Great success in their MSPF conference, many Hall Of Fame athletes and conference MVPS. He deserved better.

BlueGoldAg

↪Jackbacker2

When the university makes an official statement that starts with, "It is time for new leadership atop our gymnastics program," it makes you wonder if something was amiss...??

69aggie

When it comes to news about woman's gymnastics and coaches, one has to take a deep breath before you read to the next line. It’s never a good read. I just hope it’s not as bad as some of the other big time programs. This is not to say lavalee was in any a bad coach. We will see. . . I hold out good thoughts.

AggieFinn2

↪BlueGoldAg

I wonder if this is related to the student-athlete who made the allegations of racism against the program a few years ago. To my knowledge she would have long since graduated, but like we saw with Matt Vaughn a coach can take the fall for something that happened years before if they knew about it and didn't address it properly, or it was perceived they didn't handle it properly.

AggieFinn2

Here's the Davis Enterprise article I was referencing :

https://www.davisenterprise.com/news/local/decorated-ucd-gymnast-calls-out-racism-in-aggie-program/

Jackbacker2

Here is the College gym web-site:
https://collegegymnews.com/2022/10/18/uc-davis-terminates-head-coach-john-lavallee/

movielover

This statement was telling: "“I was ready to let everything burn to the ground for this cause,” she said."

Why wouldn't she identify which teammates allegedly used racial epithets?

The coach released a statement years ago supporting BLM. Humm.

Jackbacker2

Here is an Aggie Article:
https://theaggie.org/2020/06/29/former-top-ranked-uc-davis-gymnast-alexis-brown-speaks-out-about-racism-on-team/

AggieFinn2

We don't know for sure that this is related to the racism allegations, but it certainly out of the realm of the possible.

It seems like the new AD has spent a lot of time cleaning up messes that Kevin Blue either just flat out dismissed or swept under the rug. Wouldn't surprise me if Blue resigned just so he wouldn't be brought to task, and the pandemic gave the perfect distraction.

The statement about BLM from Lavallee they quoted seems coerced and kind of insincere. And look how long it took him to make it.

I really don't give two sh!ts about gymnastics, but I do care about whether he lost his job for doing something bad, or if he was dismissed for not giving progressive enough a response. Coaches, hired long ago, such as Lavallee and Vaughn, may have different ideas of what their role is with respect to student-athletes, and when they aren't meeting the new expectations.

Women's Gymnastics--Lavallee gone--at start of the season

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