Coaches Talk Twitter

WASHINGTON, DC (WUSA) - Jim Larranaga's like many people recovering from hip replacement surgery.

"I have a lot of free times on my hands, I'm housebound!" Larranaga says.

Forced to sit still, Larranaga has picked up a new skill.

"With my laptop in my hand I just started twittering," Larranaga explained.

Twitter, a social messaging forum, was a foreign concept for the coach, until his assistants convinced him otherwise.

"They said, 'Coach you got to do this thing. It's the latest thing and it's different than Facebook and myspace and you can reach a lot of people,'" said Larranaga.

Over In College Park, Brenda Frese understands the impact of twitter, posting updates about her day, giving fans, and especially coveted recruits, a look inside how her Maryland program works.

"It's really changed with technology and you have to be up on it and ahead of it. anyway you can," Frese said. "Especially now that they've taken away text messaging with recruits, and it's just a new medium."

Right now the NCAA Views twitter as an email form of communication. Recruits and coaches can message with each other, but only directly. Nothing can be publicly posted to a page, and those same rules apply for facebook. Coaches are not allowed to write about recruits they're interested in, or even talk about towns where they're visiting recruits.

"Usually the NCAA will come out with legislation like a year later and shut everything down," Frese said.

But for now, fans and players can follow their favorite programs, and coaches can follow their favorite colleagues.

"Gary Williams is one Bruce Pearl, John Calipari," Larranaga lists as those he follows. "When I read their twitter page, I might pick up an idea or two for my own program because they're writing about things that are interest to coaches."