Adia Barnes has one more addition to her staff.
Arizona announced Tuesday morning that Chris Allen is the new assistant coach of performance enhancement.
If the name sounds familiar, it should: Allen was at UA for six-plus yearsΒ β 2012-2018Β β overseeing the entire strength and conditioning operation for 17 Wildcat sports.
Allen returns to Tucson after time at Indiana, Kansas State and West Virginia working with exclusively with the football teams at all three institutions. Most recently, he was the assistant director of strength and conditioning for football and director of speed development at WVU, his alma mater.
While earning his graduate degree in athletic coaching education from WVU, Allen was an assistant with noted strength coach Mike Barwis. After earning his masterβs, Allen started his journey with former UA football coach Rich Rodriguez, working with him at West Virginia, Michigan and Arizona.
Allen's focus for women's basketball will be on speed and conditioning.Β
He already has started putting the Wildcats through their paces. Even Barnes took part in the first training session early Monday morning. She was seen in a video that the program posted on Instagram pulling on one end of a resistance band while West Virginia transfer Isis Beh held the other end.
Brittney Griner, the WNBA player once held in Russia for nearly 10 months on drug-related charges, spoke in Phoenix Thursday where she continues to to map her return to the court with the Phoenix Mercury. Griner was arrested last year at the airport in Moscow on drug-related charges and detained for nearly 10 months, much of that time in prison. Her plight unfolded at the same time Russia invaded Ukraine and further heightened tensions between Russia and the U.S., ending only after she was freed in exchange for the notorious Russian arms dealer Viktor Bout.
