After Wednesday’s resignation of Eastern women’s soccer head coach Steve Ballard, the Panthers will have their hands full trying to replace the man who started the women’s soccer program at Eastern.

In Ballard’s 10 years at Eastern, he led the Panther’s to two regular season Ohio Valley Conference championships and five OVC tournament championships.

Riding high off his fourth straight NCAA Women’s Soccer College Cup berth, Ballard’s resignation seemed to come out of nowhere. But with Ballard no longer a part of the program, the Panthers need to look to the future.

And whoever will be the coach of the future for Eastern will have big, Ronald McDonald-sized shoes to fill.

I’m sure Eastern won’t have any trouble finding a coach to take over a team that will return 10 starters, including four All-OVC selections and the OVC freshman of the year, Michelle Steinhaus.

But on the other hand, not every candidate for the job may be ready to walk into such a successful program. While it may seem easy to inherit such a talented team, there are certain expectations that go along with it.

Let’s compare that to Eastern’s last coaching change, women’s basketball head coach Brady Sallee replacing Linda Wunder. Sallee took over a program that went 8-19 the year before under Wunder.

With eight games left, Sallee has already matched last year’s win total and anything beyond that will be a plus when you consider the program he took over.

But whoever takes the helm for the women’s soccer team won’t be allowed any “transition years” for the players to adjust to a new coach, like Sallee has.

Not to mention the fact that the coach preceding them won 124 games in 10 years and was 33-4-4 in nine years in the OVC.

Talk about pressure.

To whoever takes over one of the OVC’s top programs and replaces the founder of Eastern women’s soccer, I’d like to wish you good luck because if you don’t keep winning, you may not be here too long.

Dan Renick is a junior journalism major and can be reached at [email protected]