It has been an all-time year in the Division III women’s basketball coaching carousel. At least as far as the upper tier of the division goes.

2025 WBCA National Coach of the Year finalist Hannah Iverson made a major intra-conference move from UW-Stout to UW-Eau Claire that got the WIAC talking. Scranton’s Ben O’Brien left the Lady Royals for D1 Lafayette on the heels of a historic 32-1 campaign. Springfield’s Naomi Graves and Ithaca’s Dan Raymond retired after long (and successful) runs at their respective institutions. Ithaca and RPI hired top rising young assistants in Erin Hughes and Megan Yawman.

And five days into June, quite possibly the biggest coaching move of the offseason surfaced with news out of Oshkosh, Wisconsin on Friday. Brad Fischer is leaving UW-Oshkosh as he pursues a Division I opportunity.

Yes, the same Brad Fischer that guided the Titans to back-to-back Final Fours in each of the last two years. The same coach who took Oshkosh to the NCAA Tournament 11 times in 14 seasons, winning at least one game in each appearance. The same leader who, in 2012, inherited a program that hadn’t enjoyed a winning record in six years and took them to 13 straight years of 20-plus victories. Few coaches in the last two decades in Division III have rewritten a program’s history like Fischer. It could be easily argued nobody else has done it quite to the level he did it at, considering the longevity of his run at Oshkosh and the tremendous peaks of his tenure. After all, no other basketball coach—men’s or women’s—in the WIAC’s storied history has ever won 20 games in 13 straight seasons. He departs the program standing apart from the rest, a true giant in the Division III women’s hoops history book.

"Brad's accomplishments speak for themselves,” Oshkosh AD Darryl Sims said in a press release. “He transformed our program into one of the premier women's basketball programs in Division III, but what makes Brad truly special is the way he developed young women into leaders, professionals and champions in life.

”While we are certainly saddened to see Brad leave Oshkosh, we are equally excited for this next chapter in his career and wish him nothing but continued success. Opportunities to advance to the Division I level are a testament to the respect Brad has earned throughout collegiate basketball and a reflection of the exceptional work he has done here at UW-Oshkosh."

Fischer will leave big shoes to fill inside the Kolf Sports Center, even for as much high-level interest as the Oshkosh job is sure to garner. He built a program that consistently maintained its place at or near the top of a league known for its inconsistency, widespread parity, and unexpected outcomes. The Titans always seemed to keep the ship steady through the often rough waters of January and February in WIAC play, winning the WIAC regular season title five times since 2019 along with WIAC Tournament titles in 2015, 2016, 2019, and 2020.

"For 14 years, I gave everything I had to this university, this program, and the young women who wore our uniform," Fischer said in the release. "In return, UW-Oshkosh gave me far more than I could ever repay. While I am excited for this next chapter, I leave with a tremendous amount of gratitude. UW-Oshkosh has had a lasting impact on my life, and a piece of my heart will always be here."

Even for all of the accolades and achievements that came Oshkosh’s way in the Fischer era, it is noteworthy that the program never plateaued in its trajectory. History-making moments seem to seldom come to programs already embedded in the highest tier of the national pecking order, but at Oshkosh, those sorts of “firsts” kept coming. En route to a Final Four trip in 2025-26, Paige Seckar was named D3hoops.com Region 9 Rookie of the Year, making her the first player in program history to earn the honor. The year prior, a 60-53 win over Baldwin Wallace sent the Titans to their first national semifinal in 29 years. And one season before that, Oshkosh’s outright regular season WIAC title made Fischer’s team the first in league history to claim 15 regular season conference championships. The bar was never lowered under Fischer’s guidance, and the results were a reflection of that.

“Most importantly and above all, I want to thank our players,” Fischer said in his statement in the Oshkosh release. “Every player who ever said yes to be a Titan and lived that standard. The relationships we've built and the memories we've shared will stay with me forever."

His recruiting prowess fueled Oshkosh’s consistency, from finding top eastern Wisconsin high school talent from Taylor Schmidt (the program’s first WIAC Player of the Year since 1998) to Kayce Vaile (Oshkosh’s No. 3 all-time rebounding leader) to Seckar, who turned down at least one Division I offer out of Oshkosh West High to stay home and play for the Titans.

He also found the right transfers over the years, perhaps none more notable than current rising senior Sammi Beyer, who had a breakout season in 2024-25 after beginning her college career at D1 St. Thomas (MN). Fischer’s incoming recruiting class for 2026-27 also includes a pair of especially high-profile transfers in former Belmont starter Emily La Chappell and Olivia Witkowski, who started 22 games as a freshman at UW-Eau Claire last winter.

Now Fischer will take his exceptional recruiting and schematic talent to the Division I ranks at a program that I’m told will soon announce his hiring publicly. It will be Fischer’s first D1 coaching position in his career, though he has coached at virtually ever other level to this point. His resume includes high school experience (Gale-Ettrick-Trempealeau HS, JUCO experience (Assistant at Western Wisconsin Technical College), D3 experience (Assistant at UW-La Crosse, HC at UW-Oshkosh), and D2 experience (Assistant at UW-Parkside).

Incredibly well-respected around Wisconsin and within the women’s basketball coaching community nationally, Fischer was lauded by many coaches on social media Friday afternoon after Oshkosh announced the news. In particular was Fairfield assistant Blake DuDonis, who was the head coach at UW-River Falls from 2019-22 before joining his wife, Carly Thibault-DuDonis, in building Fairfield into a mid-major powerhouse.

“I’m a better coach having had to compete against @UWOCoachFischer when I was in the WIAC, and grateful that we’ve been able to become friends over the years,” DuDonis wrote. “Excited for him and the program he’s joining; talk about a win-win!”

The next part of the conversation turns to Oshkosh’s future in this news, and who the Titan administration turns to for 2026-27. Coming off its two consecutive Final Four runs with a roster that includes last year’s top two scorers, Oshkosh is set up to be a Final Four contender yet again. That considered, along with the school’s geographic placement in Wisconsin and its facilities, Sims won’t lack a quality candidate pool when it comes time to make a hire. It is a high-profile job and one with enormous expectations for obvious reasons. Expect a number of sitting head coaches to put their names in the mix, though Oshkosh could go in several different directions with this hire. As we’ve seen from other WIAC hires this offseason, there is reason to think the administration can and will move quickly in getting its next head coach in place.

“A national search for the Titans' next head women's basketball coach will begin as soon as possible,” the Oshkosh release noted Friday, adding that day-to-day operations will be handled by Sims and assistant coach Abby Gildernick in the interim.

Oshkosh is the third WIAC head coaching job to open following the 2025-26 season. Additionally, two of the four teams from last season’s Final Four will be led by new coaches next winter, with Scranton having hired Rider assistant Kaitlyn Lewis earlier this week.

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One of the most sought-after jobs in this year’s coaching cycle has been filled by a familiar name.

Three months removed from its first national championship game appearance since 1985, Scranton found its next head coach in a former assistant, appointing Kaitlyn Lewis to the position on Tuesday. Lewis coached with the Lady Royals from 2019 to 2022, and was part of three Landmark Conference title teams in that span.

“Returning home to Scranton and to the University that means so much to me is truly a dream come true," Lewis said in Scranton’s press release. "I'm excited to begin building relationships with our student-athletes and helping provide them with an outstanding experience both on and off the court.”

Lewis heads back to Scranton after three Division I stops in the last four years. She joined the staff at Lehigh in 2022 before moving to her alma mater, American University, as an assistant in 2024-25. Last winter, she coached at Rider alongside former Arcadia head coach Jackie Hartzell.

Her Division I tour concluded by earning her first career head coaching job at Scranton, long known as one of Division III’s women’s basketball powerhouses. In her first stint with the Lady Royals, she proved key on the recruiting trail, helping Scranton secure its rising senior class of Katie Gorski, Meghan Lamanna, Elizabeth Bennett, and Natalie Stoupakis, a group that will serve as the foundation of Lewis’ squad in 2026-27.

"Her ability to build relationships and recruit quality student-athletes makes her the ideal person for this job,” Scranton AD Dave Martin said in the release. “She helped the Lady Royals achieve tremendous success as an assistant coach here, and we are excited to welcome Kaitlyn back to Scranton."

Lewis takes the helm after Ben O’Brien departed for Division I Lafayette in April. In four seasons, O’Brien went 117-7, winning the Landmark Conference regular season title in all four years.

For a number of reasons, this hire appears as a strong one, even with Lewis having not previously been a head coach. A name that has been present in coaching circles for several years, she was a WBCA Thirty Under 30 honoree as an assistant at Scranton and has not only familiarity with the Landmark Conference and the program, but also with a handful of the current players on the roster. That connection has the potential to be vital in Year 1, allowing for more immediate chemistry between Lewis and her players as Scranton aims at a return trip to the Final Four.

Lewis will be the ninth coach in program history, per Scranton’s release.

“I am incredibly grateful to join a program built on years of tradition and success,” Lewis noted in the announcement. “I will do everything in my power to honor those who have come before me and helped shape the program into what it is today."

Additional Coaching News & Notes

• Franciscan made a solid (and unique) hire in Tracy Guerette, announcing the news on Tuesday. Guerette will be a college head coach for the second time in her career with the Barons, having previously spent a stint leading the program at Maine-Presque Isle (UMPI) before joining the staff at Division I Maine as an assistant/DOBO. A former walk-on at Maine, she eventually worked her way up to scholarship status with the Black Bears, and following her basketball career, took up distance running, a pursuit that ultimately landed her a spot in the 2020 US Olympic Marathon Trials. She recently worked in a role with FIERCE Athletics, “helping equip coaches through the teachings of the Catholic Church.” Per Franciscan’s press release, it was through FIERCE that she took a trip to Franciscan last fall, setting the groundwork for her to take over the women’s basketball program. She’ll have her work cut out for her in Steubenville, taking over a program that went 3-22 in 2025-26.

• For the second time this offseason, a sitting head coach has left their current job for another one in the same league, with the most recent occurrence coming in the Pacific Northwest. Late last week, Whitworth hired away Pacific head coach Alecia Parker in a great move that keeps Parker in the Northwest Conference. At Pacific, she went 106-84 in eight seasons, notably taking the Boxers to three consecutive NWC Tournament title games from 2022-2024. She raised the profile of Pacific’s program during her time there, leading the Boxers to the NWC Tournament for the first time since 2009 when they earned the tournament’s No. 2 seed in 2020. The hire also makes sense considering Parker’s last assistant job before taking over at Pacific came at Whitworth, where she was part of two NWC Tournament semifinal appearances for the Pirates. She will aim to get Whitworth back to that tier of the NWC starting in 2026-27, with the Pirates having posted a winning percentage of .360 or below in each of the last three seasons.

• Keeping with the theme of regionally-focused hires, Mount Union didn’t go far to find its next head coach, hiring John Carroll assistant Emily Taylor. The decision is a smart one for the UMU administration, as Taylor played a role in JCU’s tremendous Sweet 16 run this past season and knows the OAC, having played on JCU’s first OAC regular season title-winning team in 2013-14. While JCU is no longer in the OAC, Mount Union still is, and Taylor knows the Ohio recruiting landscape well from her four years on staff with the Blue Streaks. She was with JCU for three years initially before stints at Merrimack and Cleveland State. She then returned to University Heights for the 2025-26 season as the program’s assistant coach.

• Peyton Whitted has been hired at Westminster (MO). Her background is largely as a player, starting with a four-year career at Penn State before playing professionally from 2017-2025, with stints in Greece, Romania, Sweden, Spain, Turkey, Belgium, Italy, Indonesia and the Czech Republic. Her coaching experience has come at the high school level (Georgia’s North Gwinnett High School) and with the ATL Bucks AAU program. Westminster announced the hire on May 29.

• St. Scholastica announced Rob McDonald as head coach on Wednesday afternoon, as the Saints look to build on their first-ever MIAC Tournament appearance this past season. McDonald takes over after a four-year run on the staff at D2 Saginaw Valley State, where he coached as an assistant. The bulk of his coaching experience to this point has come in D2, with previous stops at Saint Leo (FL) and Lincoln (MO). However, he does have personal ties to the MIAC, having played in the league as a dual-sport athlete at St. Olaf (football and basketball).

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Eastern Mennonite made a splash hire on Tuesday, naming Virginia assistant Tori Jankoska as head coach with the Royals looking to up their placement within an increasingly-competitive ODAC conference.

Jankoska’s coaching resume is impressive, highlighted by four years spent in the ACC on staff with the Cavaliers—including an improbable Sweet 16 run in this past season’s NCAA Tournament—and three seasons at top mid-major Missouri State. But perhaps even more notable is her playing career, in which she earned All-America honors as one of the top guards in Michigan State history and was picked No. 9 overall in the 2017 WNBA Draft by the Chicago Sky.

"Throughout the search process, Tori separated herself with the combination of her high-level basketball experience, clear vision for our program, and genuine excitement for the opportunity to lead EMU Women's Basketball," EMU Director of Athletics Carrie S. Bert said in an EMU release. "While this will be her first head coaching opportunity, her playing and coaching resume have prepared her well to lead our Royals.

“She articulated an appreciation for the Division III experience, and it was evident in her interview conversations that she is committed to transformational coaching, recruiting student-athletes for four years, but building relationships and impact that last for 40. Tori's energy, competitiveness, and passion for developing young women make her an outstanding fit for EMU."

Jankoska, Michigan State’s all-time leading scorer, played with Team USA at the 2017 World University Games and later professionally in Poland before shifting into coaching in 2018. Her first job brought her to the bright lights of the Big Ten, handling recruiting and player personnel for Maryland, who won the Big Ten regular season title in Jankoska’s first season with the program.

At Missouri State, the Bears went 74-15 in her time on staff, including a historic season in 2020-21 that featured a No. 5 seed in the NCAA Tournament as part of a 23-3 campaign. That preceded her more recent stint in Charlottesville, which brought her back to the East Coast and the state in which she will now take on her first head coaching job.

“What stood out to me most about EMU was its strong sense of community and the shared vision for the future of the athletic department and women's basketball program,” Jankoska said in EMU’s announcement. “I truly believe in Athletic Director Carrie Bert's leadership and vision, and I'm deeply grateful for her confidence in me to lead this program.”

Jankoska is the fourth new hire in Division III this offseason to come from Division I, joining Zenarae Antoine (Texas State —> UMHB), Audra Clark (NIU —> St. Kate’s), and Izy Todd (North Dakota —> Monmouth).

She takes over a program looking to rekindle its success from a decade ago, as the Royals have finished below .500 overall in each of the last eight years, going back to 2018-19. However, in 2014-15, EMU found itself amongst the top of the ODAC, reaching the 2nd Round of the NCAA Tournament as part of a 23-5 season. The season prior, the Royals went 22-6 and earned an at-large bid to the national tournament as part of a streak of four consecutive 20-win campaigns.

Other recent comings and goings in D3 women’s hoops:

• Last week, Lyon head coach Michael Peckham left his position after just one season to take the associate head coach job at D2 Texas A&M International. In doing so, he reunited with former Lyon head coach Casey Fowler, who went 12-14 in his first season in Laredo this past winter. Peckham led Lyon to a 12-14 mark in Batesville in 2025-26, and for the second-straight offseason, the Scots will be looking for a new head coach.

• After one of its best seasons in recent memory, Bethany will be seeking a new head coach after Mikayla Lopez left for D2 Lake Erie College. Lopez was at Bethany for four years, putting the Bison in the PAC Tournament in all four seasons, including a semifinal appearance in 2024-25. Bethany added to it this past year, upsetting nationally-ranked Randolph-Macon in the regular season as part of a 17-10 overall mark.

• Lynchburg opened with Allison Nichols taking the position of “Director for the Masters of Coaching and Sport Leadership program” at Randolph College. She resigned after five seasons at Lynchburg, where she compiled a 61-68 record, including a 16-win season in 2021-22. Nichols will head back to Randolph, where she was the head coach for six years between 2010-2016.

• This is older news, but Haverford is open, making it the first Centennial job to open this cycle. Grace Elliott leaves the program after four years. Haverford won at least 10 games in three of her four years.

• Rhodes made an interesting hire with alum Andrew Galow. The first job to officially come open this cycle when Judi Thurman was let go in early February, Rhodes took over three months to select Galow, who most recently was the Team Programs Director for M14 Hoops, a basketball training academy in Chicago. Galow was a 1,000-point scorer and All-South Region selection for the Rhodes men from 2009-2013, after which he had a stint on the Rhodes men’s coaching staff.

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IOWA CITY, Iowa — Bria Medina sent the email with no expectation of a response.

She certainly hoped for one. And she believed her film from three years spent as one of Division III’s most prolific scorers at Knox College warranted at least a look.

But the Tucson, Arizona native was also aware that the recipients of her message, the University of Iowa coaching staff, seldom found themselves looking to Division III when it came to offseason transfer portal additions.

Even still, Medina thought to herself, there was no harm in giving it a shot. The worst that could happen? A non-response from Jan Jensen and the Hawkeye coaching staff. The best? By that point, she had already let herself dream, if only for a moment, about what stepping into Carver Arena in an Iowa uniform might feel like.

“It was a shot in the dark,” Medina said recently. “More of a, ‘Let’s see if they respond’ sort of thing.”

There would be no letdown if she never heard back. She loved Knox, a place where she met her fiancé, Josh Stewart of the men’s basketball team, while rewriting the record books as the Prairie Fire’s all-time leading scorer. Coming back to Knox for her senior year was on the table, along with numerous mid-major Division I opportunities that presented unique offerings of their own.

In fact, the primary reason she entered the portal in the first place was a financial one, the costs of three years at a private college without an athletic scholarship having added up. Getting a full year of school paid for by her stellar point guard play had significant appeal from a real-world perspective. And yet even then, with legitimate Division I and Division II offers in hand, her mind wasn’t made up on leaving. She had gotten opportunities to go elsewhere after her junior year too, a season in which she averaged 18.2 points per game, and turned those down to stay in Galesburg.

“I wasn’t eager to leave Knox,” Medina noted. “I was completely fine if I stayed. I love it here. So it wasn’t like, ‘I need to transfer’, but more of, ‘Let’s see what options [are out there].’”

Fairleigh-Dickinson, the program eventually landed 2025-26 NESCAC Rookie of the Year Sofia Tavarez of Connecticut College, was amongst the first wave of interested parties to come calling. Having won the Northeast Conference, FDU was set for a First Round NCAA Tournament game on March 21, and asked Medina to tune in. The Knights’ opponent was, as fate would have it, Iowa. She watched the broadcast as a crowd of over 14,000 filled Carver-Hawkeye arena for what unfolded as a back-and-forth, 58-48 Iowa win.

A few days later, a text message came across her phone. Randi Henderson, an assistant coach at Iowa, was reaching out to introduce herself. And that’s how Medina’s path from the Midwest Conference to the Big Ten began.

“I was shocked and super surprised,” Medina remembers. “It was a ‘pinch me’ moment. I thought, ‘Is this really happening?’”

It was indeed. And Henderson being the first point of contact could not have made it any more perfect considering it was Henderson who two years before, jumped from her head coaching job at D-III WashU to the Iowa staff on the heels of the Hawkeyes’ second-straight Final Four run. Now, a path was being presented for Medina to do the same.

“Obviously, everyone keeps up with Iowa,” Medina added. “If you’re involved with women’s basketball, you know Iowa. And they’re so close [to Knox] so over the years, I would watch their games. But never in a million years did I expect to be potentially playing for them.”

It became more real when she made her official visit to campus last Tuesday. Then it really sank in when she committed a day later, an announcement met with much fanfare in Iowa City. She was not the typical transfer for Iowa, one of women’s college basketball’s most recognizable brands, if only because of the fact that she came from D-III, and a program largely unheard of by the masses outside of the central Midwest. But her credentials said plenty, none more noted by the local beat reporters than her 23.6 points per game last season, the fifth-highest mark in the NCAA, and second-most in D-III. Interviews and feature stories soon followed. Iowa Women’s Basketball’s post on X welcoming Medina to the program eclipsed 1,200 likes with over 44,000 views. Her own social media followings grew rapidly.

“I heard about the fanbase and how supportive and involved they are. But, I definitely wasn’t prepared for this amount of attention. I guess I wasn’t used to it, so I wasn’t expecting it.”

Every spring, a select handful of Division III standouts transfer to Division I programs. Two years ago, D3hoops.com First Team All-American Elyce Knudsen left Millikin to play a grad year at Illinois State, where she started 35 games and put up nine 20-point performances for the Redbirds the following winter. Last summer, NESCAC Rookie of the Year Monet Witherspoon moved from Tufts to Brown, and ASC Rookie of the Year Madison Hurta went from ETBU to Houston Christian.

Before Medina committed to Iowa, moves along those lines had seemingly been the ceiling when it came to Division III players’ opportunities at the scholarship level. Those who enter the portal have tended to move on to low-major and mid-major programs, some with more successful pedigrees than others. But going from Division III to the Big Ten—and not just any Big Ten school, but the same one that drew the second-highest single-game average in all of women’s college basketball last season—reached another stratosphere.

Data on Division III women’s basketball transfers has only recently begun to be tracked and organized. But there is reason to believe Medina is the first Division III player in history to transfer directly to a “Power 4” program—a team in the Big Ten, SEC, ACC, or Big 12. It has happened multiple times in track & field, most recently in the example of Notre Dame’s Lauren Huber, who excelled as an All-American basketball player and multi-event track athlete at Illinois Wesleyan before joining the Fighting Irish last fall. She finished second in the pentathon at the 2026 ACC Indoor Championships and fifth in the heptathlon at ACC Outdoors last weekend.

But that hasn’t been the case in women’s basketball, and especially not when it comes to the country’s premier programs. Medina to Iowa is an anomaly, even in an age where the transfer portal is used by coaching staffs more than ever, and increased access to detailed analytics has opened the door to top coaches being more aware of the talent pool in Division II and Division III. It is, after all, a very difficult jump to make. The size and speed at the highest tier of Division I, where Medina will soon be isn’t found in Division III, and limited roster sizes make taking a chance on a Division III standout more of a risk.

But the Iowa coaching staff, as it became clear to Medina during the recruiting process, was willing to take that on. She fit what they needed as the construction of their 11-player roster for 2026-27—including six newcomers—drew to completion.

“We are so excited to add Bria to our program,” Iowa head coach Jan Jensen said in an Iowa press release. “Her energy and gratitude to be a part of our family is the coolest part about her. She had a great deal of scoring success at Knox College and has an immense amount of appreciation for our sport. Her mindset and work ethic is what set her apart for us as we went through the process.”

What is incredible is that Medina ending up at Knox came somewhat by chance. There is an alternate world where Medina hangs up her basketball shoes after leading Salpointe Catholic to an Arizona high school state championship, and never steps onto the floor at the 1,100-student Division III school in Galesburg, Illinois. It nearly happened that way, if not for some persuasion by her cousins, Mae and Kylee Callahan, to give Knox a shot.

“I had a couple D2 offers out of high school, but I was really super interested,” Medina remembers. “It was more of, ‘Should I play or should I not?’ I went back and forth with that. My cousins are older than me, and they were already established at Knox [on the women’s basketball team].

“I actually committed to Knox, then de-committed and was not going to play basketball. I said that decision was final, and was very stubborn on that. And then I started thinking, ‘What am I doing? I have to at least try it.’”

That thought process, and some urging from her cousins—who she had shared the court with in AAU going back to fourth grade and later, in high school—led her to Knox without knowing exactly what the next year would hold.

“I felt like, ‘OK, if I’m going to go play basketball, I’m going to do it with my cousins,’” Medina said. “I had already played with them in high school, and basically my whole life. We started really young.”

The point guard for a stellar high school team that included future Division I players in Hannah Williams (Northern Arizona) and Taliyah Henderson (North Carolina/Clemson), Medina had a skill set that would surely aid the defending Midwest Conference champions in the backcourt from Day 1. She wasn’t yet a primary scorer, but her assist numbers at Salpointe Catholic, paired with quick feet on the defensive end were the type of traits every coach is constantly seeking.

But there was one problem: although Medina re-committed to Knox, there was really no coach to commit to. Kira Mowen and her staff left for D2 Millersville in early June, and as a result, Medina walked onto the Knox campus with no indication as to who she would actually be playing for as a freshman.

“I recommitted and the coach told me, ‘You can come play, and we’d love to have you, but our whole staff is leaving.’ Then we got Coach Seth [McDowell], and he was my first coach there. But I wasn’t recruited by him. So I came to Knox when there wasn’t a coach. My cousins were like, ‘Yeah, you’re on the team,’ and that was it.

“Coach Seth wasn’t hired until [October]. So I remember trying to do things with the team, and we were trying to put stuff together with no head coach, no assistant coach. As far as preseason, we were like, ‘We aren’t really sure what to do.’”

But eventually, things settled. McDowell, now the head coach at Ozarks, took the helm for the next two years. Medina started the season opener against Dominican, beginning a streak of 78 consecutive starts for the Prairie Fire. She also separated herself as the clear choice for the Midwest Conference’s Newcomer of the Year award, averaging 16.9 PPG, 4.2 RPG, and 3.1 APG for a 19-win team that reached the MWC title game.

Medina says she never had expectations going into her freshman year at Knox, and instead just worked to fill the role she was needed in. She was more of a traditional pass-first point guard in high school, but emerged as a dynamic scorer almost immediately with the Prairie Fire, scoring 20-plus points six times as a freshman. That is the way she plans on approaching this next chapter too, stepping into a new locker room in a new city at a new school, well aware that she won’t be the go-to scorer in the way she was at Knox, which presents an opportunity to hone other aspects of her game.

“We have so many talented people [at Iowa],” Medina said recently. “Chit-Chat [Wright] is a great point guard and she just dominates. So I’m excited to learn from her, learn from everyone, learn from the coaches. And as far as my role goes, I think being able to look more for my teammates and getting them open is something I’m excited about.”

She might be leaving Division III behind in the season ahead, and along with it, three years of record-setting performances at Knox. But it will remain a central part of her basketball journey. At Iowa, she’ll represent some of the best of what Division III has to offer, giving a hint of added recognition to the division that has shaped her since her arrival in the Midwest.

“I was skeptical [of coming to Knox] at first, because I wasn’t sure if moving across the country was something I wanted to do, or if I wanted to play at all,” Medina said. “But I’m so glad I did. Knox has been an absolute dream. I met so many amazing people here, and had so many great experiences. It’s a small community, and I love the people, love my friends. I met my fiancé here, which was really special. That’s what I’m going to take away from all these years.

“I think it helped me being at Division III and not really having any expectations, knowing that maybe I could play at a higher level, but not necessarily wanting to because I love it here so much. Giving my all to Knox, really enjoying where I’m at, and being present has really helped. I can get emotional about leaving Knox…because I have loved every single part of it.”

Medina’s transfer to Iowa isn’t the only piece of offseason transfer portal news this spring in D3. Here are a handful of other notable transfers coming in and leaving D3 programs:

Transferring out of D3

• Sofia Tavarez: Connecticut College —> Fairleigh Dickinson (D1)

• Carmen Cruz: Puget Sound —> Menlo (D2)

• Olivia Vick: Trinity (CT) —> Merrimack (D1)

• Pryelle Kesse-Beda: Thomas —> SIUE (D1)

Transferring into D3

• Emily La Chapell: Belmont (D1) —> UW-Oshkosh

• Elyse Wendler: UW-Parkside (D2) —> UW-Platteville

• Olivia Corson: McKendree (D2) —> Illinois Wesleyan

• Sophia Moore: Point Park (D2) —> Chatham

For more updates and a complete listing of the known transfers within D3 WBB this offseason, check out thed3statlab.com.

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In a major piece of coaching news announced this afternoon, Tufts head coach Meredith Mesaris is leaving the program after one season, and will “pursue new opportunities”, per a news release from Tufts. The Jumbos went 13-12 this past season, with a 4-6 record in NESCAC play and an upset of then-No. 4 Smith in non-conference action.

"I'm proud of what we accomplished together and excited for what comes next as I pursue new opportunities outside of college coaching,” Mesaris said in the announcement.

"We appreciate all the hard work Meredith put into our women's basketball program this year," Tufts Director of Athletics Ryan Pisarri said, per the release. "We wish her nothing but the best going forward."

Mesaris came to Tufts after going 46-10 over two seasons at Vassar. She won 20-plus games in back-to-back seasons at Vassar, winning consecutive Liberty League Tournament titles.

Expect this to be a job that gets a ton of interest, just as it did when it opened last offseason. With the pedigree of the program and tradition in women’s basketball, Tufts will certainly be sought-after job.

Note: Prior to that breaking news at Tufts, which came out just as we were set to publish this newsletter, we were set to lead off with this in-depth look on the hires made earlier this week by RPI and Ithaca. So consider this the “second intro” to today’s newsletter.

Over the course of an offseason, the coaching carousel tends to bring about hires from a variety of paths and backgrounds. One school may give a Division I assistant their first head coaching job while another may select a longtime high school head coach for the same role at the college level. In every case, an AD has to determine what their program needs and who fits those necessary traits to lead the team into the future.

It goes without saying that Division III has some intricacies that make it unique when compared with other divisions of college basketball, particularly on the recruiting front, but also in the regular season calendar and the pace of the season. And when you consider that, I truly believe some of the best hires made in D-III are programs that go out and hire coaches who know what it takes to win at a high level in this division and truly have a passion for D-III basketball itself.

RPI and Ithaca did exactly that on Monday.

In two of the more high-profile northeastern jobs this cycle—both out of the Liberty League—RPI and Ithaca made two of the smartest hires we’ve seen this spring, with RPI hiring Carnegie Mellon assistant Megan Yawman and Ithaca selecting Trinity (CT) assistant Erin Hughes.

I say “smart” because I love the approach by both to go out and bring in an accomplished, nationally-recognized assistant who has experienced what it takes to recruit to a high-academic D-III and build a winning program within this highly-competitive division. Hughes was a 2024 WBCA Thirty Under 30 honoree, and Yawman received the same honor as part of the WBCA’s 2026 Thirty under 30 list, which says plenty about the caliber of these two head coaches coming into the Liberty League for the 2026-27 season.

The combination of programs Hughes and Yawman have been part of speaks volumes as well. Because in my opinion, it’s not just “being in D-III” that matters, but where you’ve been in D-III. And the resumes for both feature some really impressive programs.

Hughes played at Washington & Lee in the ODAC, a program that more recently rose to national prominence with record-setting forward Mary Schleusner leading the way. She was a WBCA All-American as a senior in Lexington, and became the first ODAC Defensive Player of the Year in program history in 2019, helping the Generals to a 19-win season and a trip to the ODAC championship game that same season. She graduated in 2021 as the single-season steals leader while also ranking as one of the program’s top career free throw and 3-point shooters.

She wasted no time applying that knowledge to the future of W&L women’s hoops, earning a spot on the coaching staff immediately after wrapping up her playing career. Year 1 saw W&L win the ODAC Tournament and face NYU in the opening round of the NCAA Tournament. Year 2 brought Schleusner to campus as W&L continued its rise into the Top 25 conversation, and by Year 3—Hughes’ final season with the program—the Generals went 29-3 with an incredible run to the Elite Eight. She then headed north, joining the staff at Trinity (CT) where she gained valuable experience coaching in the NESCAC for two seasons with head coach Maria Williamson.

Taking into account Trinity’s second round NCAA Tournament appearance in her first year in Hartford, Hughes has now been part of a team in the national tournament in four of the five years in which she has been a college coach. What a stat that is. She’ll look to continue that trend at Ithaca, a program that enjoyed quite a run of national success for several years under Dan Raymond, who retired after this past season.

Yawman has a similar story, including close connections to the Liberty League and interestingly enough, to Ithaca itself. She played four years for the Bombers, contributing to three Liberty League title teams, and as a sophomore, was part of Ithaca’s 2018-19 Elite Eight team. Yawman appeared in 30 games that season, and a year later, started all 29 games for a second round NCAA Tournament team. In fact, in all four years of her Ithaca career in which a season was played (she was with the program through the canceled 2020-21 season), the Bombers made the NCAA Tournament, winning at least one game in each appearance.

She took the assistant coaching job at Carnegie Mellon after a season at the high school level, coaching in a stacked UAA during NYU’s historic win streak, while WashU, Emory, Chicago, and Brandeis each had noteworthy moments of their own. Over the last three years, one could argue that the UAA was a Top 2 conference in the nation, and Yawman played a role in elevating the CMU program to a point where the Tartans challenged and kept pace with the league’s best, which in turn, were some of the best in the country. Kathy McConnell-Miller took over in Year 2 of Yawman’s time in Pittsburgh, and the Tartans then produced one of the best one-year turnarounds we’ve seen over the last decade, considering the strength of schedule and competitiveness of the league. CMU went 21-6 and made a second round tournament appearance, tying the program record for single-season wins. They nearly made it back to the NCAA Tournament again this past winter, putting together a strong second half run and finishing just outside the at-large bid picture with a 15-10 mark.

In summary: between the two of them, Hughes and Yawman have experience (whether playing or coaching) in the ODAC, NESCAC, UAA, and Liberty League. Yawman has been part of five NCAA Tournament teams in her time in D-III. Hughes has been part of four. That is impressive, and again, just speaks to the type of high-achievers Ithaca and RPI have hired. I felt pretty certain both would be in the conversation for head coaching jobs in this cycle, and I look forward to seeing the way both lead their new programs.

There is absolutely nothing wrong when a program hires a coach from outside the division, but a big part of me really appreciates when a search committee pursues candidates who are accomplished within D-III and know this level deeply. I think it has the potential to lead to more immediate success in a lot of cases, as well. A+ hires by both programs.

Elsewhere, we’ve had a handful of hires and departures over the last week or so. Perhaps the biggest news on the “comings and goings” front came yesterday, when Stevens head coach Megan Haughey announced her decision to accept the Athletic Director position Rutgers-Newark, an NJAC institution in D-III. It is a big move, considering Stevens is one of only three programs in this cycle so far that won 20 games in 2025-26 and will now have a new head coach next season (the others being Southern Virginia and Scranton). While the Ducks missed the NCAAs this winter, they went 20-7 and reached the MACF title game in yet another solid season under Haughey, who spent 14 seasons at the helm. She leaves Stevens as the winningest coach in program history with a 232-122 record, and took the program to five NCAA Tournaments, including two in the last four years.

Other notable departures as of late:

• Southern Virginia head coach Lynette Schroeder is heading back to Utah as the head coach at D2 Westminster. She previously served as an assistant there before getting the SVU job, where she went 123-52 in 7 seasons with the Knights.

• Rose-Hulman head coach Devrinn Paul departs after 3 seasons, as he accepted a D1 assistant position at Bellarmine. He posted a 33-45 record as a D-III head coach.

• Anderson head coach Jon Gin is leaving to accept a D1 assistant position, though his new landing spot has not yet been announced. Gin was 70-62 at Anderson, highlighted by a 17-win season in 2025-26.

We also had a new hire announced late yesterday, as St. Catherine tabbed Audra Clark, an alum, as its next head coach. Clark has a mix of D-III and D-I coaching experience, having begun her career at Oswego State before moving to Cortland as an assistant with Jacey Brooks. In two years with the Red Dragons, Clark was part of NCAA Tournament teams in both years as Cortland went 45-11 in that span. She moved to Bowling Green when Brooks joined the Buffalo staff, but the two reunited at Northern Illinois this past year, where Brooks was named head coach.

In seven years as a college coach, Clark has spent time at two D3s and two D1s, building a solid resume that she’ll now carry back to her alma mater. As a player, she started for four years with the Wildcats, earning All-MIAC honors in each season. With St. Kate’s looking to further establish itself in the MIAC pecking order, it seems advantageous to bring in someone who knows the institution so well and who experienced being a student-athlete in the same program she is now leading. Very good hire here from St. Kate’s, who is absolutely capable of being more involved in the MIAC title conversation from year to year.

That’s all I have for today. As usual, the coaching carousel is still spinning quite a bit in May, with several jobs still open, including Springfield. I’ll continue to track that, and I should also mention, this is the time of year when recruiting really picks up, especially with the transfer portal. Scott Peterson is tracking transfers over on thed3statlab.com, so be sure to check that out periodically. Outstanding resource.

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Yesterday evening, news broke that Scranton head coach Ben O’Brien had accepted the same position at Division I Lafayette, a major announcement that quickly caused a buzz around Division III.

Scranton, of course, is coming off a national title game appearance and a 32-1 season, one of the reasons it will likely be the most sough-after D3 job in this year’s offseason cycle. The program just wins. The last three head coaches (Trevor Woodruff, Nick DePillo, Ben O’Brien) were a combined 288-35 at the school in Northeast Pennsylvania, and each of those head coaches only left Scranton to make a direct jump to a Division I head coaching position. I look forward to seeing how that search unfolds.

But the carousel keeps on spinning, and this morning brought news of another Division III head coach departing for Division I, as St. Scholastica’s Jason Schmitz resigned after five seasons leading the Saints. Per the news release from CSS, Schmitz will be joining a D1 staff as an assistant. He orchestrated a turnaround for the program after it found limited success prior to his arrival, leading CSS to its first postseason appearance since 2018 when the Saints earned a MIAC Playoff bid this past winter. CSS went 16-10 in 2025-26, a 15-win jump for the program over just four seasons, and its highest single-season win total since 2013-14.

"The last five seasons at St. Scholastica have been incredibly rewarding," said Schmitz. "Taking over a program transitioning into the MIAC was a daunting task and I'm incredibly grateful for both the investment of the institution in our program but more importantly each player and family that believed in us. Thank you to every single person that helped us move the program forward, I will miss this place and my players dearly but cannot wait to be a fan of the Saints going forward!"

— Jason Schmitz in St. Scholastica’s press release on Thursday

Moving further east, Moravian tabbed Denison assistant Olivia Woolam to lead the program in an announcement yesterday, infusing the program with another highly-successful leader to follow the late Mary Beth Spirk, who held the position for 38 years. Woolam coached on Denison’s staff for three years and was a key contributor to the Big Red’s historic 2026 national championship run that culminated with a 55-41 win over Scranton in the title game. Denison went 65-20 in Woolam’s three years on staff, including a 30-2 mark in 2025-26.

"I am thrilled to be joining the Moravian women's basketball program," Woolam said in the Moravian press release. "I would like to thank Athletic Director Rebecca May and President Dr. Bryon Grigsby for their faith in my ability to lead the Greyhounds into the next great iteration of their history. Coach Spirk's legacy of developing competitive athletes and engaged community members aligned with my values, and I am honored to carry on the tradition."

Part of that “tradition” includes Moravian’s exceptional efforts in raising money for cancer research, something Woolam said will continue in her time at the helm. Under Spirk, Moravian led all of D-III in fundraising for the Kay Yow Cancer Fund for 18 straight seasons, donating $281,592 to the cause in that span and hosting an annual Play4Kay game.

"Moravian women's basketball has established themselves as one of the premier programs nationally in the realm of community service," said Woolam. "I expect to continue that culture of giving back through participation in events like the Kay Yow Cancer Fund's Play4Kay game. Additionally, Moravian is well-positioned to compete at a high level within the competitive Landmark conference and on the national stage."

Woolam is a Division III alum herself, having played four seasons at Grinnell College from 2017 to 2021. Before Denison, she served as a graduate assistant at TCNJ, with the Lions going 31-23 in that stretch.

The last hire to note came earlier this week at Hilbert, where the administration stayed within Division III and hired Keystone head coach Ben Arsenault. He spent only one year at Keystone, his alma mater, but it marked his third head coaching stop in the last six years within D-III. Arsenault led VTSU-Lyndon for four years, positing double-digit wins in all three seasons (2020-21 was canceled due to Covid). He then moved to Spalding, where he reached the 10-win mark in back-to-back years. Hilbert brings him to the AMCC, the fourth conference he has coached in since 2019. The Hawks had success prior to the Covid pandemic, winning 20 games three straight times, but have gotten about the 10-win threshold just once in the five seasons since.

"I am incredibly grateful to Tim Seil, the interview committee, and the administration at Hilbert College for this opportunity," Arsenault said in Hilbert’s news release. "It is an honor to lead this program. Our commitment to the holistic development of our student-athletes and our 'Think 40, not just 4 years' philosophy will prepare them for success both now and in the future. I'm excited to begin building something meaningful with our student-athletes and the greater Hilbert campus community.”

That’s all the coaching news I have for the time being. But expect more to be coming soon, perhaps even today and tomorrow. There’s some really good jobs out there that have been open for a few weeks now (Springfield, Ithaca, to name two) and obviously a handful of others that have recently opened. Right now, my tracker has 33 D-III HC changes in this offseason, with 10 hires having been made.

In case you missed it, I put out a Q&A with new LeTourneau HC Morgan Garrett yesterday afternoon (link to read it is here). I’ll have more of those coming over the course of the summer.

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On the heels of a historic four-year run as the head coach at Scranton, 2026 D3hoops.com Coach of the Year Ben O’Brien is heading to the Division I ranks, set to lead the program at Lafayette, per an announcement Wednesday afternoon.

He notably led Scranton to the 2026 Division III national title game and a No. 2 ranking in the D3hoops.com Top 25, with the Lady Royals putting together a 32-1 campaign this past winter. That included snapping NYU’s historic 91-game win streak—the second-longest in college basketball history—in the national semifinals and earning Scranton’s first national championship game appearance since 1985.

O’Brien, who went 117-7 in his tenure at Scranton, reached the career 100-win mark faster than any other college coach in the history of the sport.

"I would like to thank Ben O'Brien for his outstanding leadership of the Lady Royals basketball program over these last four years,” Scranton Executive Director of Athletics Dave Martin said in a release. “Coach O'Brien built on the history and tradition of our women's basketball program and provided us with many exciting moments that captivated the Scranton community. Under Ben's direction, our team reached new competitive heights while representing Scranton in a manner that made Royals everywhere proud.

“While we are disappointed by his departure, we wish Ben, Mandy, and the entire O'Brien family well in their new endeavor. We will begin a national search immediately for the next head coach of the Lady Royals.”

O’Brien will look to provide a turnaround for the program at Lafayette, carrying over his track record of enormous success at both the high school and college levels. The Leopards have struggled in recent years, last recording a winning season in 2019-20, and posted an 11-19 mark in 2025-26. O’Brien is the eighth coach in the program’s 54-year history.

"I am incredibly honored and excited to be named the head women's basketball coach at Lafayette College," O'Brien said in a release from Lafayette. "I want to thank President Hurd, Director of Athletics Sherryta Freeman, and the entire search committee for this opportunity. My vision is to build a program that consistently competes for Patriot League championships while providing a transformational experience for our student-athletes — on and off the court. I can't wait to get started."

In his four seasons at Scranton, O’Brien led the Lady Royals to four consecutive Landmark Conference titles, while also reaching the Elite Eight in each of the last three seasons. That came after an incredible run at Dunmore High School, where he spent 14 seasons, going 347-43 with 13 league titles and a pair of state championship game appearances.

"We are thrilled to be welcoming Ben O'Brien to the Lafayette community," Sherryta Freeman, Lafayette’s Athletic Director, said in the release. "Ben is a proven winner who has demonstrated an unparalleled ability to build championship programs and mentor elite student-athletes. His historic success and commitment to recruiting and developing student-athletes make him the ideal leader to elevate our women's basketball program within the Patriot League. We are excited for the future of Lafayette women's basketball."

O’Brien’s move to Lafayette is notable for a number of reasons within this year’s D3 coaching carousel. Scranton is the first program from 2026 NCAA Tournament field that will be led by a new head coach in 2026-27, and O’Brien becomes the fifth D3 head coach in the last five years to depart for a Division I head coaching job. Two of those five did so after Final Four runs, with the other being Juli Fulks (Transylvania), who went 28-9 at Marshall this past winter. (See the full list of D3 to D1 WBB coaching moves on D3hoops.com).

Per the Lafayette release, O'Brien “will be introduced to the Lafayette campus community at a press conference at noon on Monday in Pfenning Alumni Center.”

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One of the first hires of this year’s coaching cycle came in Longview, Texas, as LeTourneau University stayed local, bringing on Morgan Garrett as the eighth head coach in program history. An East Texas Baptist University alum, Garrett spent the last two seasons on staff at her alma mater after a solid run as a high school head coach in Louisiana, and now gets an opportunity to lead a program once again, this time at the college level.

She takes over an LETU program heading into its second year in the SCAC, aiming to elevate the Yellowjackets’ on-court success while building a strong culture in Longview, just over 20 miles from where she played her college basketball. A guard for the Tigers from 2012 to 2016, Garrett played in 101 games at ETBU, establishing herself as a go-to 3-point shooter in the backcourt.

Garrett’s coaching career began immediately after wrapping up her time on the court at ETBU, taking the helm at Louisiana’s Riverdale Academy—her high school alma mater–-in 2016. She led the program to a 2018 state championship and another state title game appearance in 2020, before moving up to the college level in a one-year stint at ETBU. She returned to the high school ranks following that 2021-22 campaign, which saw ETBU advance to the second round of the NCAA Tournament, and rebuilt the program at Providence Classical Academy. In her two years in Bossier City, Louisiana, she took Providence to its first-ever state tournament and won 41 games, before returning to the ETBU staff in 2024.

I recently had the chance to talk with Garrett about her experiences in coaching to this point, how previously being a head coach sets her up well to take the helm at LETU, and what she wants her team’s style to look like as the Yellowjackets look to become SCAC title contenders.

Let’s start with getting this job at LeTourneau, your first college head coaching job. It’s a short distance from ETBU, where you were an assistant the last two years. What made this the right opportunity for you?

“The most foundational answer I can give to that is just the Lord’s calling on my life. Obviously, there was a lot of logistics that went into it. I was pretty content with where I was in my career, being an assistant at my alma mater and in a great program and atmosphere. So I wasn’t really looking to make a move.

“But from the beginning, it was pretty clear that I felt like the Lord was calling me here, giving me an opportunity to be a head coach at the collegiate level, which is something that I hadn’t experienced yet in my career. So just taking that leap of faith to follow and live out that calling, I believe that He’s equipped me to handle the day-to-day things that come into being a college head coach, but I also know that it’s a great opportunity to learn.

“It’s a good environment, and I feel like I’m going to be well-supported by the administration here. It’s a great opportunity for a first-year college head coach to step in and try to take over something that in the past has struggled to be successful in the win-loss column. Obviously that’s going to be a challenge, and something that I’m aware of coming into this. But I do feel like I’ll be supported as we try to turn this thing around.”

You’ve been at ETBU, and then you’ve been a high school coach as well, right in that same region of the country. How much value do you think that experience has for you heading into this next chapter, being so familiar with the landscape of Division III in Texas, and knowing the area recruiting-wise?

“You really hit the nail on the head. To be honest, geographically it’s a really good fit for me. I’m still within driving distance of my family, and that has a lot of value to me at this point in my life. Professionally, I’ve had the opportunity to recruit in this region to a Division III school for three years. Obviously with Division III recruiting, it’s a lot different than even D2 and especially D1. You see a lot of D1 coaches moving across the country, and so much of D1 recruiting is just way different. But with Division III recruiting, a lot of that is based on relationships. I still have a lot to learn, but knowing this area is giving me a solid starting point coming into this new job and first year as a head coach. I feel comfortable and confident to recruit this area to another Division III school, just because I know the challenges and nuances that come with recruiting in Division III in Texas.”

When it comes to your time at ETBU, what were your takeaways from that, being part of quite a bit of success there in your time over the different stints you had. Watching the video from LeTourneau when you were talking about your vision for your new program, there seemed to be some parallels to the ETBU program.

“I think the biggest takeaway is how to have a successful faith-inspired Division III women’s basketball program. I say ‘successful’ in a sense of, obviously we were making runs nationally in and out of [Top 25] polls and competing at the highest level in the ASC, winning the championship last season. And doing all of that with young ladies and athletes who prioritize their faith and really work hard and trust their coaches. I think engaging with that type of student-athlete inside of a faith-filled program has really helped me learn as a college coach while being an assistant.

“My faith is the foundation of my existence and so basketball coaching is my passion and calling. To be able to integrate that into a new program and at a university that is going to support that here at LeTourneau is pretty cool. I think at ETBU, being able to be a part of success—even if it’s just the smallest things, like doing scouting reports—helped set me up to be prepared for this job.

“I think the main takeaway is just the type of student-athletes that I was blessed to have been able to coach at ETBU, and the community and the culture that they set. Coaches get a lot of credit, but it’s really the athletes that make up who you are as a program. You have to recruit the right kids. I’m thankful for my opportunities to work with Coach [Blake Arbogast] and helping instill some of that into my alma mater, because the program is in a lot better place than when I played. As an alumni, it’s really encouraging to have been a part of that.”

I was going to ask about that 2024-25 season, winning the ASC, hosting in the NCAA Tournament, and reaching the No. 19 ranking in the Top 25 Poll. Obviously, ETBU had some really solid seasons in prior years, but that particular year was really special. How much did it mean to you to be part of it as an ETBU alum?

“As coaches, we just kept our head down and did what we thought was the right thing to do every single day. That team was built for success. We kind of fell short of where we thought we could have been—maybe Sweet 16, if not further. So it was disappointing in the ending, but that team was special. We had all the pieces we needed to have the type of season that we had. It was a joy. It was just another day doing what we love.I think staying focused on where our feet were was important. I don’t think we ever got consumed in the rankings or ratings. I’m sure there was a lot of attention with social media, but for the most part, our athletes stayed focused and kept their head down and stayed in our little bubble in East Texas.

“That was probably a blessing in disguise in regards to not letting it get to our heads or anything. But yeah, it was super special being able to coach in the national tournament again, which I had done in my previous stint. That first time we were on the road, so being able to host [in 2024] that was a really, really cool experience. When you’re in the moment, you’re just trying to win the game, but looking back on that, I’m really appreciative to have had that experience.”

When did coaching enter the picture for you? Was it during your college career at ETBU? Or did it come before that?

“It’s such a funny testimony. I look back and it brings a smile to my face, just because going back to my earliest memories as a kid, sports had always been huge growing up in a very small, rural community. I grew up on a cattle farm; just really small, humble beginnings. I just remember playing basketball barefoot in my backyard, and I always thought, ‘I’m gonna be in the WNBA’, right? That’s every little girl’s dream. I came to realize that that wasn’t in the cards for me, probably not too long after that.

“But once I got to the point of high school and trying to decide what I wanted to do, all I knew I wanted to do was play basketball. I didn’t know professionally what I was going to study. I had a lot of coaches in my life and people in my family and support group telling me, ‘Hey, consider being a lawyer, consider being a doctor’. My oldest brother was six years older than me and he had gone through medical school around the time of me really thinking about my career. I realized with what he was going through, that wasn’t for me.

“So I narrowed down what I didn’t want to do. I went into college my freshman year undecided on my major. That summer, I was actually working at CentriKid Camps, which is like a church camp, and I just felt a calling on my heart from God. It was pretty clear. Everyone had always told me, ‘Don’t be a coach. Go do other things.’ But it was just clear, ‘This is what I’m supposed to do. I’m supposed to use my passions for sports, basketball specifically, to minister to young people.’

“I declared my major to my advisor that summer and never looked back. There’s obviously been hard days—coaching is a very difficult profession—but at the end of every day, I’m very secure in that God has called me to this. Otherwise, I wouldn’t be doing it. It’s such a joy to get to be able to coach. I really feel humbled that this is the life that I get to live.”

In addition to your time at ETBU, you’ve had two stints as a high school head coach. What did you learn during that time in your career that helped shape your coaching style?

“I love talking about this because when I knew I wanted to be a coach, I thought, ‘I’m not going to coach college’, just because of some experiences that I had previously had. So I put a wall up to that, but obviously God has a sense of humor, because here I am 10 years later, coaching college.

“I knew when I was getting my degree that I wanted to coach high school, so being able to go back to my high school alma mater, win a state championship there with some girls that were in grade school when I was playing there was a really neat experience. I coached those girls hard because I’d already had a relationship with them, so I was super blessed in that regard. But when I took a high school job, I remember a lot of coaches saying, ‘If college is where you want to be, it’s hard to take the step from high school to college. It’s a lot easier to take the step from college to high school.’

“Well, in my mind at that time, it was okay because I had no aspiration to coach college. But looking back on that advice, I’ve since had conversations with young coaches of like, ‘That’s not necessarily the case.’ I think there’s a lot of value in that, being a head coach and having done that at two different high schools, one program where I had to rebuild in my second experience at Providence. That gives me a similar experience to look back on in taking this program [at LETU] over, in a sense of trying to flip the script and rebuild, while also being mindful and respectful of the past.

“I think there’s a ton of value to being a high school head coach. And I think when it’s what you’re supposed to do, it’s going to work out. I would encourage coaches trying to navigate the coaching industry to just be present and keep your head down and be who you’re called to be. Those right doors and right opportunities are going to present themselves at the right time.”

Because of that high school coaching experience, you’ve been in the head coaching role before. Is there maybe some added benefit to that, to where now when you walk on the floor for your first practice at LETU, you’ve led a practice before, you’ve addressed a team from the perspective of a head coach?

“Yeah, that’s a great point. Honestly, I haven’t really thought about it just because I’ve already experienced that. I can’t wait to be coaching games. I can’t wait to be leading practices. All of that is almost second nature to me now. But it’s second nature because I’ve had those experiences before. I can’t imagine being in the shoes I’m in now, and taking over a program as a college head coach without having some head coaching experience.

“I definitely think about leading practices, even just the layout of your practice plan and how you need your team to progress from early season to mid-season to the heart of the season to post-season and how peaking at the right time is so important. Navigating your team through that and the X’s and O’s of daily practices, I think there’s a major benefit of having been in those shoes before. As a coach, the pregame jitters are one of the cool things, and something that you can’t really replicate in any other area of your life. Having dealt with that and been able to use that as fuel as a head coach in two other experiences, it is a big blessing to have that coming into this.

“I think some of that is just how God wired me. But I also think that is credit to my five years of experience as a head coach. Standing there coaching a game, you’re coaching five players on the floor and any players on the bench. The arena and the atmosphere is obviously impactful, but for a coach, the way I’m wired is very hyper-focused. I imagine it’ll be very similar to my previous experiences. Obviously, it’s different in a lot of ways, but as far as feeling prepared, feeling comfortable in those aspects, the high school experience has given me that advantage.”

When you think about a Morgan Garrett-coached team, what do you want it to look like from a style-of-play standpoint? I know some of this will be dependent on your personnel and who you’re able to bring in, but do you have any early thoughts on what you want LeTourneau to look like style-wise heading into Year 1?

“I want to be known for getting the most out of my athletes. I just want that these girls, when they step on the floor, they’re at their max, they’re reaching their max potential every day and every year. So two, three, four years later, if the Lord allows me to coach them to that point, I want them to max out their potential.

“That’s going to look like diving on the floor for loose balls. Communication is going to be huge. Playing team basketball both defensively and offensively. Work ethic and passion are going to be important. And just the consistency in the little things. Being disciplined in our structure and in the way we go about things. Being selfless, being servant-hearted even as we’re playing. Putting our teammates before ourselves and being the hardest-working team on the floor day-in and day-out.

“Obviously, I hope that that results in wins. But also at the end of the day, if we’re doing things the right way, success can be measured in a lot of ways. So I think high-energy, flying around, offense to defense, pushing the tempo, and just working hard and being known for bringing energy regardless of whether we’re up 10 or down 10. Whatever the case may be, I want us to be consistent and play with a ton of passion.”

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But it’s too soon for that yearly prediction article. Instead, let’s take a look on which programs saw the most significant increases in their winning percentage between 2024-25 and 2025-26. It’s quite an interesting list! Data generated by cbbanalytics.com.

William Peace — +43.3% (16.0% —> 59.3%)

Annalee Bollinger took over the program in the spring of 2024 with quite a rebuild on her hands. The Pacers went 8-17 the year prior, and that was coming off a season in which they only played 14 games, forced to cancel their final 10 games due to low roster numbers. It had been a downhill ride since the Covid pandemic after going 23-5 in 2019-20. But Bollinger now has William Peace trending back up. After laying the foundation in a tough 4-21 season in 2024-25, the Pacers went 16-11 this past year, including a 12-6 mark in the USA South Conference. They then added a postseason win over Pfeiffer in the league tournament quarterfinals, coming back from a 16-point deficit to win, 63-62. To have a 12-win swing in a 12-month span is exceptional, and it’s a trend that appears poised to continue moving into 2026-27; thed3statlab.com has William Peace returning 100.0% of its production from this past year’s squad.

Denison — +36.1% (57.7% —> 93.8%)

It’s pretty rare to find the national champion on this list, especially as high as No. 2. For years, the national champ has been a team that won at least 20 games the year before, and in the case of the previous three title winners—Hope, Transylvania, and NYU (the first one in 2025)—their championship run came after reaching Elite Eight of the previous year’s NCAA Tournament. Denison broke that mold, going 30-2 this past season after a 15-11 mark in 2024-25. Losing Ada Taute in the 2024-25 opener perhaps had a role to play in that, but even considering that, the 15-win improvement (and five-win improvement in an even tougher NCAC) was incredibly impressive from a relatively young team. Not a single senior started for Denison in its path to cutting down the nets in Salem, and the Big Red won the NCAC regular season title out of a league that sent four teams to the national tournament. Notably, the Big Red is the lone team on this list that posted a record above .500 in 2024-25, and their 93.8% win percentage ranks far and away as the best amongst this group of five. It was also the fourth-highest winning percentage in D-III this past winter. To be honest, it may be a very long time, if ever, before we see a program replicate this sort of jump in a two-year stretch.

Muskingum — +36.0% (16.0% —> 52.0%)

The first of two programs led by first-year head coaches on this list, Muskingum hired alum Ryan McClain at the end of a June, a fairly late move for a program coming off a 4-21 season. That meant McClain went into 2025-26 with a fairly similar roster, as his starting five was composed of players who had all started at least 11 games the season before. As it turned out, that experience proved valuable for the Muskies, who came back this past season and put together Muskingum’s first winning season since 2008-09. The 13-12 record represented a sizable improvement from the 2024-25 campaign, and was made possible by a strong closing stretch from the Muskies, who won three of their last four. The trio of Tori Jones, McKinzi Linscott, and Claudia Harrington led the way, as each averaged in double figures in scoring, but the Muskies also got consistent production from sophomores Julia Jaenke and McKenna Baney in the frontcourt, as their balance throughout the rotation was a considerable strength in OAC play.

Howard Payne — +35.2% (14.8% —> 50.0%)

Howard Payne was also under the direction of a first-year coach in 2025-26, and similarly turned things around in notable fashion. Rodney Gee came to Brownwood following a stellar run at Lorena High School, and got the Yellow Jackets back to the American Southwest Conference title game for the first time since 2011 as part of a 14-14 season (13-14 vs D-III). It didn’t initially appear the season would bring that amount of success on the heels of a 4-22 season in 2024-25, as HPU got off to a 2-6 start that included a four-game losing skid. But they turned things around in December, winning four in a row including a noteworthy home win over NWC contender George Fox. HPU’s success inside Brownwood Coliseum proved to be a storyline for January and February as well, with the Yellow Jackets going 3-0 against their ASC foes at home, highlighted by last-second upsets of Mary Hardin-Baylor and Hardin-Simmons (with the latter going on to win the ASC and reach the Sweet 16). Having watched HPU a few times in-person this past season, the most impressive thing was the toughness they played with despite not having much of a bench to lean on. Madison Clay, an All-ASC honoree in 2025, was out for all but four games of this past season, meaning HPU played with a rotation of seven for the better part of the winter. And even still, despite the lack of depth and size, HPU finished No. 2 in the ASC regular season standings and turned some heads across Region 10 in the process.

UW-Platteville — +34.7% (32.0% —> 66.7%)

It turned out to be a historic year for Kelly McNiff and her UW-Platteville squad, who became the first team in Platteville women’s basketball history to earn a bid to the NCAA Tournament. The Pioneers increased their win total by 10 in 2025-26 after an 8-17 mark in 2024-25, making the most of a season in which three of their five starters were seniors. From the beginning, it was evident Platteville was a different team than the season prior, starting 13-1 with wins over Whitman, Wisconsin Lutheran, and Trine, with all three coming away from home. They rose as high as No. 17 in the D3hoops.com Top 25 after stunning previously-undefeated UW-Oshkosh on the road in a 47-43 win on Feb. 4, and posted an 8-6 record in WIAC play this winter, a significant improvement from their 2-12 league record in 2024-25. A defensive-minded squad with plenty of grit and maturity, Platteville finished No. 19 in NPI while winning the most games in program history since 1988-89 (18).

Let’s shift gears and get to a quick “Coaching News” update

• Whitworth will have a new head coach in 2024-25, as Kenny Love stepped down after four years leading the program last week. The Pirates, a member of the Northwest Conference in Spokane, Washington, are coming off a 5-20 season. The job has been posted here.

• Westminster (MO) also opened last week. I’ve heard this search process will move fairly quick. Talisha Washington spent the last seven years at the helm of the SLIAC program, who went 108-67 in that span.

• Monmouth tabbed an alum for its head coaching position, hiring Izy Todd, who most recently served as the Director of Basketball Operations at North Dakota. Todd played in 83 games and made 28 starts in her four-year career at Monmouth. In addition to her time at North Dakota, Todd has coached at Southeastern Community College (Iowa) and Lake Superior State.

• Lake Forest made a great hire in bringing in John McGinty, most recently the head coach at NAIA St. Francis (IL). McGinty was 110-45 at St. Francis, leading the program to three NAIA national tournaments in a five-year span, including two trips to the second round of the tournament. Lake Forest will be his first time coaching in D-III, but his experience is wide-ranging, having also spent time as an assistant at D2 Lewis, D1 Northern Illinois, and D1 Loyola-Chicago, and NAIA Northwestern (OH).

On the recruiting front: UW-Oshkosh is set to reload coming off a second-straight Final Four

Emily La Chapell announced her decision to transfer to UW-Oshkosh in one of the most significant transfer commitments in D-III women’s basketball in recent memory. La Chapell, an Appleton, Wisconsin native, will play her final year of college basketball in the WIAC after four seasons spent in Division I.

The 5’11 guard opened her career at Marquette, where she was twice named BIG EAST Freshman of the Week, before playing three years at Belmont, appearing in 70 games with the Bruins. She started all 39 games in 2024-25, helping lead Belmont to a WBIT championship game appearance, and averaged 8.5 PPG and 2.5 APG in that 26-win campaign. La Chapell saw action in just seven games last season due to injury, though it included a 6-rebound, 5-assist performance at Oklahoma (who reached the Sweet 16), and a 14-point showing against Lipscomb.

For a team that graduated a handful of impactful seniors after this past year’s 28-4 season, La Chapell should immediately add valuable experience to an already very talented Oshkosh squad heading into 2026-27. I have to think Oshkosh will be the frontrunner in the WIAC once again, with La Chapell sharing the court with 2025 All-American Sammi Beyer and 2026 WIAC Player of the Year Paige Seckar.

Q&A with new LeTourneau head coach Morgan Garrett will be coming your way tomorrow! Have a great start to the week!

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So today, I’m taking a look at the five players in Division III who had the largest increases in their points per game average between 2024-25 and 2025-26. As you’ll see, these five came from programs in different regions and various situations record-wise. Yet each had a major role to play in their team’s successes this past year, while having “breakout” seasons of their own.

Note: The data used in this story is from CBB Analytics (cbbanalytics.com), which has been a valuable resource and tool in my coverage of D3 WBB all season long. Whether you’re a coach, student-athlete, or fan, I’d highly recommend checking out their comprehensive website. For full disclosure, I have no connection or partnership with CBB Analytics, but as someone who searched for quite a while for informative, detailed Division III stat tools, I’ve really appreciated being able to reference back to CBB Analytics to evaluate everything from trends in a team’s second-half free throw shooting to lineup combos and shot charts!

Addisyn Banks — Shenandoah

A versatile guard/forward for the Hornets, the junior was on the court for a total of 383 minutes in 2024-25 (14.1 MPG) but had a minimal scoring impact for Shenandoah’s offense, averaging 4.7 PPG. But Banks came back for her third year and went on a tear, stepping into a leading role for Shenandoah at 33.3 MPG and a scoring average of 18.1 PPG. An ODAC First Team honoree, Banks was the key catalyst in Shenandoah’s push for an NCAA Tournament bid, including a 21-point effort in the big win over Gettysburg early on and 32 in a late-season win over Roanoke. She was definitely one of the nation’s breakout players this past season, and it paid dividends with plenty of team-wide success for the Hornets. Banks was also selected as a WBCA All-American Honorable Mention, becoming just the third player in Shenandoah history to receive such an honor, and earned a spot on the D3hoops.com Region 6 First Team. PPG increase —> +13.4.

Helana Chadwick — McMurry

In the season after the historic Sweet 16 run and the graduations of star scorers Emily Holland and Kylie Flippin, Chadwick truly picked up the torch for the Warhawks in 2025-26. Despite losing so much production and bringing in a new head coach in Laura Lange, McMurry found its way to an 18-7 mark that included non-conference wins over Trinity (TX) and St. Norbert. Chadwick and her 22.2 PPG was a primary piece of the puzzle for the Warhawks, as the senior point guard ranked fifth in the country in scoring. The absence of Holland and Flippin naturally created that scoring role for Chadwick, but she took advantage of it in a way that was especially impressive after averaging 9.0 PPG in 2024-25. Notably, her total minutes only increased by 102 between her junior and senior seasons, meaning she saw an uptick of 13.2 PPG with only a slightly higher minutes/game average. PPG increase —> +13.2.

Evie Schmitz — St. Scholastica

Schmitz may have had the most dramatic scoring increase between two seasons out of anyone on this list. While Banks and Chadwick had huge jumps, they were still contributors in 2024-25. That wasn’t the case for Schmitz, who actually began her career at St. Benedict before transferring within the MIAC to St. Scholastica ahead of this past season. She averaged just 0.3 PPG in 48 minutes at CSB as a freshman, but at CSS, Schmitz was immediately a focal point in the offense. In a season that saw the Saints reach their conference tournament for the first time since 2018, she averaged 13.5 PPG, the second-most on the team, including 21 points against Gustavus Adolphus and 20 against Bethel in MIAC play. Her minutes/game increase was pretty noteworthy as well, going from 48 to 745 in her first two college seasons. PPG increase —> +13.2

Ella Peters — Gustavus Adolphus

Much like Chadwick at McMurry, Peters found herself on a roster in reloading mode heading into 2025-26 after graduating a substantial amount of its offensive production the season before. That created an opportunity for Peters, a junior from River Falls, Wisconsin. After averaging 1.8 PPG in 182 minutes on a team that reached the 2025 Elite Eight, she played 868 minutes and started all 27 games this past season. The only player on the roster to average double figures in scoring, she led the Gusties with 15.0 PPG (nobody else averaged more than 7.9) and proved to be a reliable threat from nearly everywhere on the floor, shooting 32.3% from 3, 42.7% from the field, and 77.3% at the foul line. Perhaps Peters’ best performance of her junior campaign came in mid-January, as she put up 33 points and 11 rebounds in 35 minutes against St. Scholastica, who was ahead of GAC in the MIAC standings entering the contest. PPG increase —> +13.2

Emerson Gray — Ohio Northern

ONU struggled early in its 2025-26 campaign—starting 0-7— but the Polar Bears turned it around for the second half, going 10-10 the rest of the way before wrapping up the year in the OAC Tournament semifinals. Gray played a key role in that turnaround, as the sophomore scored in double figures in 11 of ONU’s final 15 games and was consistently the Polar Bears’ top offensive weapon. An OAC First-Teamer, Gray averaged 14.9 PPG—the second-most in the conference—after being limited to just 2.1 in 135 total minutes as a freshman. She also led the OAC in field goal percentage (44.7%) and ranked third in free throw percentage (77.6%), which are both impressive numbers considering she still has two years left in her college career. PPG increase —> +12.8

Scheduling news, anyone?

It might still be April, but we already have two schedules out for the 2026-27 season, courtesy of Alma and Washington & Jefferson! A few notes:

• W&J has two solid non-conference matchups on opening weekend at its Hampton Inn by Hilton Tip-off Tournament. The Presidents face reigning HCAC champ Transylvania on Nov. 6, then get Case Western Reserve on Nov. 7.

• W&J’s third opponent? The defending national champs, Denison. What a start to non-conference play for the 2025-26 PAC Tournament champion! That non-conference tilt against the Big Red will be played on W&J’s home court in Washington, PA. It will be the first matchup between the two since the 2023-24 season.

• Another marquee matchup for W&J comes on Dec. 30, when the Presidents face Carnegie Mellon on the road. CMU nearly got into the NCAA Tournament this past year and will return quite a bit of its production heading into 2026-27.

• Alma starts its season with a similar gauntlet, facing Otterbein and DePauw in a three-day span, with both matchups on the road. Both Otterbein and DePauw were NCAA Tournament teams (and conference tournament champions) this past season.

• Alma will play at both the Wooster and Wittenberg tournaments, though the opponents have not yet been announced.

• Alma’s MIAA opener will come a bit later this year. After starting league play on Nov. 18 this past season, Alma doesn’t play its first conference game until Dec. 5, facing Adrian on the road. They’ll also host Hope on Dec. 12.

I’ll be back tomorrow with more. We’ll potentially have some coaching news in the coming days, so stay tuned on that. I also have a handful of year-to-year comparison pieces in the works (similar to what I wrote about today with PPG increasers) that should be released over the coming days. As always, I appreciate your thoughts, insight, and feedback. Feel free to reach out using the button below, DM me on X (@ZayasRiley), or send an email at rileyzayas@gmail.com.

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Less than two weeks after the announcement of Hannah Iverson’s move from UW-Stout to rival UW-Eau Claire, Stout has its next leader in place. In a major hire in Menomonie, former Michigan Tech head coach Sam Clayton is returning to her home state, set to lead the Blue Devils after eight seasons and 138 wins in Division II.

Stout made the hire official on Wednesday morning.

"I'm incredibly grateful for the opportunity to join the women's basketball program at UW-Stout and become part of such a strong community," Clayton said in a release. "This position means a great deal to me—not only because of the tradition and potential of the team, but also because it brings me closer to home and the people who have supported my journey."

A native of Durand, Wisconsin, Clayton will be coaching just 20 miles north of her hometown at Stout, as she aims to carry over her success from Michigan Tech to a program that went to the D-III Final Four just two seasons ago.

A Michigan Tech alum, Clayton went 138-88 overall with the Huskies. That includes a 99-54 mark in the GLIAC, a league that produced the 2025 and 2026 D-II national champion, Grand Valley State, along with Ferris State, who reached the D-II national semifinals in 2024. Clayton guided Michigan Tech to a pair of NCAA Tournaments in her time at the helm, including a Midwest Regional semifinal trip in 2021, the same year she won GLIAC Coach of the Year.

In addition to her eight years leading Michigan Tech, Clayton made assistant coaching stops at D-I Youngstown State, D-II Northwood, and D-II Sioux Falls earlier in her career. A standout player at Michigan Tech, the Huskies went 103-22 during her time in the program, as she scored 1,424 points and shot 84.8% at the free throw line, the latter mark ranking No. 2 in Michigan Tech history.

"We are extremely excited to add Sam Clayton to our Blue Devil family," UW-Stout Director of Athletics and Recreation Erin Sullivan said in the release. "In Sam, we have found a leader whose vision, grit, and integrity align directly with UW-Stout Athletics and our women's basketball program. Her commitment to building relationships, developing student-athletes, and leading with purpose will have a meaningful impact on our program."

The hire stands out as a strong one for Stout, who moved especially quickly in its search process after Iverson departed for UWEC. The Blue Devils are poised to return 84.56% of its production from this past season in 2026-27, per thed3statlab.com, which sets Clayton up to hit the ground running in Year 1.

"I'm excited to get to work with our student-athletes, build meaningful relationships, and compete at a high level," Clayton said in the release from Stout. "We're going to focus on developing a culture of accountability, toughness, and respect, both on and off the court. I can't wait to get started and represent this program."

» Link to UW-Stout’s full press release

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We’re now fully into the offseason now across all three divisions of women’s college basketball with UCLA taking the Division I title Sunday afternoon in a dominant performance. And with that, the coaching carousel is only going to spin faster. It was a fairly busy late February and March on the D3 front, with a total of 25 jobs opening, including Hannah Iverson’s major move from UW-Stout to UW-Eau Claire and notable retirements from Springfield’s Naomi Graves and Ithaca’s Dan Raymond. But as is typically the case, the carousel doesn’t really get going until April, particularly with the top programs in D3.

While some very good jobs opened in the immediate aftermath of the 2025-26 season, none of the 25 openings were at programs that reached the NCAA Tournament. We’ve had at least four of those such moves in the last two years, so there’s no reason to expect it will be any different this spring. As we all know, once the dominos start to fall, there’s no telling what might happen.

This is one area of the sport that I only really started to dive into the last couple years, and it’s quickly become one of my favorite aspects of my coverage, aside from writing about the actual games, student-athletes, and storylines of the season itself. There are just so many factors to consider when it comes to these hires, and especially in D3, every search process tends to look a little different based on the school itself, administration, region, conference, and other components along those lines.

All that being said, I’m looking forward to what these next couple months will bring. Unlike D1, where the opening date of the portal means the majority of hires tend to be already made by this point, we’ll often see coaching moves happen as late as May or June. This typically isn’t a short stretch.

So, as we continue the week, here’s a few thoughts from my notebook on the coaching carousel front…

UW-Stout is now on the clock: Who do the Blue Devils turn to?

When Hannah Iverson was announced as UW-Eau Claire’s head coach, I mentioned that it might be one of the more interesting searches of this offseason, considering the increased pedigree of the program coming off the 2025 Final Four run, and the fact that the roster was very young this past year (and still went 13-12 overall). I heard from a few people who asked, ‘Why can’t they just promote from within?’ That was a fair question, considering associate head coach Kyleigh Fanning had been on staff with the Blue Devils for 10 seasons and was an accomplished player at Stout herself.

But Fanning was going to Eau Claire with Iverson as the Blugolds’ associate head coach, news that was made official last Thursday. That seems to take the option of hiring from within off the table for the Stout administration, though it should be noted that assistant coach Brooke Olson remains listed on the staff directory, having recently wrapped up Year 3 of her coaching career, and her second at Stout.

All that said, it leads back to the question I posed on the day Iverson’s hire at Eau Claire was announced: where does Stout go from here? Ideally, they’ll be able to keep this roster together and move forwards into 2026-27, bringing back the most returning production of anyone in the WIAC. But anytime there’s a coaching change, that piece of the puzzle becomes more of a question mark, especially when you’re talking about a team that leaned heavily on freshmen and sophomores this past season. Stout can only move so fast with the way the state hiring protocol is set up, though I would imagine time will be a factor as it pertains to the retention of the roster.

So, who might be quality candidates as Stout looks for its next head coach? To be clear, these are purely my own musings when looking at the job from an outsider’s perspective, not a “candidate list” or names based on any “inside information”. That is important to note!

Let’s start with a name from the Wisconsin high school ranks. Scranton and others in D3 have had success hiring accomplished high school coaches, and there’s no reason Stout couldn’t do the same. How about Darla Olson, head coach at Rice Lake HS? Rice Lake is only about an hour north of Menomonie, and it’s there that Olson’s program has achieved remarkable heights, making back-to-back WIAA State Semifinal appearances the last 2 seasons. A respected coach within the state who has sent multiple players to the college level—including her two daughters and Wisconsin commit Adaline Sheplee—Olson received a Wisconsin Basketball Coaches Association Coaching Achievement Award in 2022. The other connection here is that Olson’s daughter, Brooke, is still on Stout’s staff, giving her a direct link to the program and potentially an increased sense of familiarity with the administration.

I also wrote down a few current assistants, starting with Alexis Foley, who is currently at Saint Mary’s (MN). She just wrapped up her first year at SMU, helping the program to an NCAA Tournament performance and a historic 20-win season. But the connection to Stout is her six years spent on Iverson’s staff from 2018-2024, playing a role in recruiting the team that ultimately took Stout to the Final Four two years ago. She helped recruit a few of the players that are still on the roster, so there’s a strong connection to the current team and administration that could prove to be beneficial.

Nate Oakland is another that might be worth keeping an eye on. He was a finalist for the job when Iverson was hired in 2018, and has since spent time as head coach at D2 Upper Iowa and before joining the staff at Northern Iowa. Perhaps there is still mutual interest between Oakland and Stout.

I also think Marissa Delsman deserves some mention here. If we’re talking about experienced WIAC assistants, she’s at the top of the list. She spent time at UW-Whitewater in 2019-20, 2 seasons on staff at UW-Stevens Point, and has been UW-Platteville’s top assistant the last 2 years, helping the Pioneers to their first-ever NCAA Tournament appearance this season. While experience in the league isn’t a requirement for a job like this, it certainly goes a long way considering the WIAC’s competitiveness and the uniqueness of being a state-school league in a division largely composed of private schools.

Along those lines, I’d also add Eveline Parsons, head coach at UW-Superior. I understand she’s been there less than a year and the 12-16 record in 2025-26 doesn’t jump off the page. But Superior is not an easy place to win at, and she had the Yellowjackets in the NCAA Tournament again this season in Year 1 as a head coach, in addition to winning the UMAC Tournament. Stout would be another step up for the former UW-Stevens Point assistant, who is one of the top rising head coaches in the Midwest (in my opinion) and also has valuable experience in the WIAC.

Finally, what about the alum route? There’s something to be said for hiring someone with personal ties to the program. An outside-the-box name that comes to mind is Kelsey (Duoss) Steinhagen, a two-time WIAC Player of the Year and All-American during her playing career for the Blue Devils. One of the most accomplished players in Stout history—her No. 40 jersey is retired by the program—she’s been away from coaching for a year and spent the four years prior to that with Minnesota men’s basketball. But her resume also includes assistant stops at Concordia (TX), Dubuque, and Menlo on the women’s side. Could Steinhagen be a candidate to return to her alma mater and become a head coach for the first time in her career? Another name I thought about is Liz Oswald, who is a more recent alum (2021) and was part of the WBCA’s “So You Want to be a Coach” program. She has made stops at Eastern Illinois, UW-Green Bay, and Dubuque in the five years since playing at Stout, and while the job appears to be in a much better place compared to when Iverson got it in 2018, Iverson’s resume looked very similar to Oswald’s when she took over as head coach. She had one additional year of experience, but was not an alum and had never coached in D3, two things Oswald has on her resume.

All in all, it’s pretty easy to see that Stout should have ample options and directions to go when it comes to its next hire. I had the chance to visit Stout twice while researching my book on D3 basketball, and both times, I was blown away by the support for the program from the community and students. The NCAA Tournament regional they hosted in 2025 was an incredible atmosphere. I suppose that’s why I’m very interested in this one; it’s definitely a place where there is buy-in for women’s hoops and as a result, one that should attract a lot of strong interest from coaching candidates.

Mount Union opens with Venet moving into administrative role

In what was a big piece of news last week, longtime Mount Union coach Suzy Venet is retiring from coaching to pursue athletic administration on a full-time basis. She led the Purple Raiders for 21 seasons, accumulating 300+ wins and a pair of Sweet 16 appearances during her tenure. The three-time OAC Coach of the Year will become a full-time Associate AD at Mount Union, continuing at her alma mater, where she was an All-American as a player and part of three NCAA Tournament teams.

“It’s hard to think I’m retiring from coaching, but I’m very excited about the next chapter in my life. I want to thank Coach Larry Kehres and President Giese for hiring me back to Mount Union to lead the women’s basketball program. It was a joy and honor to be the head coach of this program that I love for 21 years. I’m so grateful to all my assistant coaches, players, and alums who dedicated their time and effort to help ensure our success on and off the court.”

-Suzy Venet, per Mount Union’s press release

Mount Union was 18-9 this past season in a significant step for the program, after failing to get above .500 in the previous four years. The Purple Raiders started 7-1 and played OAC regular season champ Baldwin Wallace within single digits on two occasions, before being upended by eventual OAC Tournament champ Otterbein in the league tournament semifinals.

The job has been posted here.

Pitt Greensburg is open

There has been a change in leadership at Pitt Greensburg, a program in the Allegheny Mountain Collegiate Conference (AMCC). Julie Bolden spent the last two seasons there as head coach, going 5-45. As of now, I have not yet seen the job posted.

A quick rundown on the jobs that have been filled so far:

• LeTourneau — ETBU top assistant Morgan Garrett was hired on March 24 as the YellowJackets’ next head coach. Garrett played at ETBU, and was part of ETBU’s staff on two separate occasions between stints as a high school head coach in Louisiana.

• Hiram — Former Nebraska Wesleyan head coach Jim Wiedie takes the helm for his 22nd year as a head coach, per a release on April 3. He was formerly the head coach at Indiana State and Findlay, in addition to NWU.

• Rockford — The Regents tabbed UW-Stevens Point assistant Bruce Williams as head coach back on March 18. Williams has prior experience as a high school head coach in addition to his time on Matt Hockett’s staff at UWSP.

• Muhlenberg — Assistant Sadie Nelson was promoted to head coach upon Ron Rohn’s retirement at the conclusion of this past season. The UNE alum has been with the program since 2023.

• UW-Eau Claire — The Blugolds hired Eau Claire native and UW-Stout head coach Hannah Iverson.

As I mentioned above, I’d anticipate this list will increase in length pretty soon as many of these searches begin to wind down. I know of several that are in the second round of interviews and close to settling on finalists, so there should be more news to report on that front in the coming days and weeks. I plan to make these coaching carousel updates more frequent as well, so stay tuned.

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It was another season to remember in Division III women’s basketball, and it’s always an equally enjoyable and difficult task to assemble my final Top 25 ballot following the NCAA Tournament. The Top 5 spots were pretty simple this year, but everything after that proved to be quite a challenge. The parity throughout the division only continues to get better. I know it’s been a few weeks, but I wanted to bring you one final ballot breakdown before we move further into the offseason. To see this season’s final D3hoops.com Top 25 Poll, click here.

As always, I rely on the eye test a fairly good amount, but also utilize data from thed3statlab.com, D3Datacast.com, Massey Ratings, and CBB Analytics.

So, here’s how I voted in the last D3hoops.com Top 25 ballot of the 2025-26 season…

1. Denison — It goes without saying, but Denison’s tournament run will be remembered for a long, long time. The path to the title was just so difficult. Everyone knows what they say about how hard it is to beat a good team three times in a season, and yet the Big Red did exactly that against John Carroll in the Sweet 16. In the Elite Eight, they won in perhaps the toughest atmosphere for a road team that I saw in this tournament, knocking out No. 3 overall seed Washington & Lee. Then came an incredible offensive start in the dominant win over No. 2 seed UW-Oshkosh. And of course, we had the stunner in the final, as Denison won it all and ruined Scranton’s quest for a perfect season, just two days after Scranton snapped NYU’s 91-game win streak. Denison had all the pieces, from the interior presence with Anelly Mad-toingué to a steady point guard in Abby Cooch to a do-it-all scorer in Ada Taute, and they put it together at the right time. As I’ve already noted, this is a rare case where a national champ could return all five starters the next season. I don’t anticipate this being the last time I have Denison at No. 1.

2. Scranton — Even with the national title game loss, the Lady Royals were perhaps the most complete team in the country this season. By March, they were No. 1 in virtually every efficiency metric, including both offensive and defensive adjusted efficiency. And that carried right over into the tournament, as they came out with strong starts through their first four tournament games and nearly led wire-to-wire in the 60-52 win over NYU. It marked Scranton’s first trip to the title game since 1985, and in finishing with a 32-1 record, the Lady Royals set a new program single-season record for wins. And I should add, Kaeli Romanowski and Kaci Kranson were such special players within Scranton’s success and the story of this entire season across D3. Romanowski was the best point guard I saw in the division, and Kranson was such a foundational piece to Ben O’Brien’s first four years leading the Lady Royals. That duo will be difficult to replace, but I have no doubt we’ll see Scranton back in another Final Four very soon.

3. NYU — The Violets’ historic win streak, which garnered widespread publicity, came to an end in Salem. But to me, that wasn’t the story of this season for NYU. Instead, it was the fact that the streak even got to 91 to begin with. That NYU got back to the Final Four for the third year in a row. That this program went undefeated in the UAA for a third consecutive season. Graduating the fifth-year seniors they did, turning the point guard position over to two true freshmen, and being put under the pressure of each win increasing the spotlight, there were reasons for the streak to end well before the final weekend of the 2025-26 season. Yet it didn’t. This was an NYU team that had a different starting lineup compared to years past, and a younger rotation at that, but went 25-0 in the regular season once again and maintained its No. 1 ranking the entire way leading up to the Final Four. Denison and Scranton deserve the No. 1 and No. 2 spots for what they put together this season and in the tournament, but make no mistake about it, NYU was a close No. 3 for me. And here’s something to ponder heading into the offseason": NYU is set to return 85.7% of its production heading into 2026-27. That’s really saying something for a team that went 29-1 this season.

4. UW-Oshkosh — The final game didn’t go at all the way Oshkosh planned for it to. But the tournament run as a whole? Really impressive. To get to Salem for a second-straight year, the Titans had to get past Webster, Wisconsin Lutheran, WashU, and Chicago, with three of those four being pretty defensive-minded units. And in each, Oshkosh found a way to get the win, and did so convincingly in both its Sweet 16 and Elite Eight victories. Oshkosh finished the season with the most Massey Top 50 wins of any team in the country (20) and played arguably the toughest schedule amongst teams in my final Top 25, from facing Carroll and Chicago in November to Whitewater and La Crosse in February. And as I’ve said many times before, I love the fact that Oshkosh takes so much pride in not turning it over. It’s no coincidence that the Titans have had so much postseason success with that approach. They finished the year with just 13.5% of their possessions ending in turnovers, the fourth-best mark in the country.

5. Washington & Lee — W&L was a clear No. 5 for me. The General put together an undefeated regular season, blazed through the ODAC Tournament, and put together a stellar stretch in March, knocking off solid teams in Christopher Newport and Bethel along the way. Denison proved to be too much in the sectional final, but W&L kept it fairly tight most of the way. And of course, we’ve already established that Denison turned out to be really, really good in this tournament. Mary Schleusner’s career came to a close in this tournament, and it’s noteworthy to think of what she did for that program over her four years. With her record-breaking performances, she brought increased attention to W&L that hadn’t been there before, and I have to think she had quite the role to play in Holekamp Gym being packed on back-to-back nights in the second weekend. There’s a strong case that she is the best player D3 WBB has ever seen, from her scoring to her rebounding and unique skill set that allowed her to play all five positions at any given time for the Generals. Schleusner and this entire squad from W&L raised the bar for the program yet again this season, and I expect that to continue moving forwards. This year’s squad will go down as the first 30-win team in W&L program history.

6. Chicago — I debated for quite a while on who to put here, but ultimately settled on Chicago. The Maroons path to an Elite Eight felt very difficult, starting with a red-hot Gustavus Adolphus team in the opening round. In fact, I even went as far as to say GAC could pull off the upset in that opener; that’s how much I saw it being a 50/50 sort of game. Instead, Chicago clamped down on the Gusties in a 60-44 win. The next night, they won again, taking out the hosts, UW-Whitewater, by the same margin, 62-46. Then came a narrow 55-52 win over Hope, a team I’ve had fairly high in my ballot all year. To see Chicago win those three said a lot about the Maroons’ form in the tournament, and while they had a challenging stretch to close UAA play, I thought they finished the season as one of the best defensive teams in the 64-team field. Even in the loss to UW-Oshkosh, who finished the year with the 14th-highest offensive rating in the nation, I thought Chicago had some really solid defensive possessions. Metrics-wise, the Maroons weren’t quite as high as some of the others on my ballot, but on the eye test, the they really stood out.

7. UW-La Crosse — The Eagles finished narrowly behind Chicago for me. We saw UWL go through some highs and lows over the course of the season, but they certainly finished on a high note, reaching the Elite Eight after winning the WIAC Tournament. Even in early February, UWL wasn’t high in my Top 25, in large part because this was a 13-8 team in the middle of the pack in the WIAC. But they closed with an 8-2 mark, including wins over Whitewater, Oshkosh, Carroll, and Southern Maine. Few teams finished with the sort of momentum that the Eagles did, and they just proved to be a really difficult matchup in the tournament. They outscored one of the best offensive teams in the country in my mind (Carroll), out-dueled one of the more disciplined defensive teams (Oshkosh), and did it with such balanced contributions on both ends of the floor.

8. Concordia-Moorhead — One of the biggest upsets in the first two weekends of the tournament came from Concordia, who knocked off highly-ranked Johns Hopkins, the No. 5 overall seed in the tournament, in the Sweet 16. Maya Metcalf was probably the most impactful transfer in D-III this season when you consider her skill set in the post, which was a major need for the Cobbers after graduating Makayla Anderson. Metcalf filled that void exceptionally well and earned D3hoops.com All-America honors as a result, providing an imposing presence in the frontcourt while Concordia’s senior guards held down the backcourt. I mentioned this heading into the Sweet 16, but the Cobbers ranked amongst the best in the nation in assist rate for much of the year and always seemed to have such great cohesion on the offensive end, paired with a solid defensive identity. We saw those two things combined in their tournament run, knocking off UW-Superior, Ripon, and JHU before falling to Scranton. This was a historic year for the program, who reached the Elite Eight for the first time since 1993. When you have an All-American post and a top-tier point guard, it’s usually a pretty solid recipe for success. Concordia proved that in its postseason run.

9. Hope — The Flying Dutch saw their season end in heartbreaking fashion in the Sweet 16, but really were step-for-step with Chicago for most of that game. It’s the primary reason why there’s only three spots of difference between Chicago and Hope in my ballot. I saw Hope face several top teams this year, from La Crosse to Illinois Wesleyan (twice) to Ohio Wesleyan to Hardin-Simmons, and in every instance, this was a team that met the challenge. While they didn’t win all of them, not one of their four losses was decided by more than six points, and against that sort of schedule, that’s a real trend worth noting. Hope played and beat a number of NCAA Tournament teams from November to March, and that level of consistency deserves to be rewarded. At 26-4, this was a squad that used its length exceptionally well on the defensive end, was almost always a threat from beyond the arc, and played off each other fairly well. Also, the overtime win over Illinois Wesleyan has to rank in the Top 3 of game quality in this year’s tournament…the intensity, the drama, and the execution down the stretch made that one so fun to watch.

10. Johns Hopkins — I had JHU as high as No. 3 at one point, and I don’t think the gap between No. 3 and No. 10 in this final ballot is all that large. The Blue Jays went 27-2, posted a 14-0 mark in a two-bid Centennial Conference, and by and large, were amongst the best second-half teams in the country. That said, the Blue Jays did struggle a bit down the stretch, starting with the narrow OT win over McDaniel at home in the Centennial semifinals followed by the loss to Gettysburg in the title game. Of course, the loss to Concordia is something I had to consider in this ballot, and I didn’t think there was enough of a case to keep JHU ahead, especially given Concordia’s seven regular season Top 50 wins. While JHU only lost that one by 5, there were inconsistencies throughout that game that gave me pause when considering JHU in a spot higher than No. 10. But again, there’s no doubt this was a Top 10 team this season, especially considering JHU finished No. 3 in efficiency margin, No. 3 in defensive efficiency, and No. 17 in offensive efficiency. Those are impressive numbers.

11. Bethel — In this ballot, I tend to think there’s sometimes more of an emphasis on recency compared to the ballots done in the middle portion of the season. And few teams closed the way Bethel did, going 8-1 over its final 9, including wins over Gustavus Adolphus, Concordia (MN), and Coe. The Royals also led W&L by 8 at the half in a game being played at W&L in the Sweet 16. Their level of play over those last three weeks was pretty exceptional, and it felt like everything came together at the right moment. Colette Duininck dished out 14 assists over a three-game span in the NCAA Tournament, Emily Erickson was consistent as a scorer, and Elly Schmitz played through injury to carry Bethel to the second weekend. Bethel definitely impressed me over the final few weeks.

12. John Carroll — The Blue Streaks put together a nice run down the stretch, reaching the NCAC title game with a win over Ohio Wesleyan, before knocking off TCNJ and SUNY New Paltz by 20-point margins in the first two rounds of the tournament. While Denison got the best of JCU for the third time this season in the Sweet 16, I thought the Blue Streaks did a solid job of keeping pace through the first two quarters before the margin really widened in the third. This was a team in the preseason that had all the pieces to be incredibly successful and looked good on paper, and while that doesn’t always translate to on-court success, it did for JCU. The Blue Streaks reached their first Sweet 16 in program history and went 11-3 in one of the toughest leagues in the country, as the senior-heavy starting rotation carried them all year. 5 of the 7 in the primary rotation were seniors, which certainly seemed to contribute to the 26-5 campaign.

13. Illinois Wesleyan — In the preseason, IWU was somewhat of a question mark for me, considering the production the Titans lost from the 2024-25 squad. It seemed nearly impossible to replace what they lost in Lauren Huber, Kate Palmer, and the rest of that group of fifth-year seniors. But Ava Bardic and Sawyer White provided a steady presence as returning starters, and freshmen Asia Kobylarczyk and Caitlin Leyden proved to be welcome surprises as immediate-impact starters. Adding D2 transfer Leah Palmer at midseason helped with the depth aspect, and by the end, IWU closed its regular season on a seven-game win streak, beat Carroll for the CCIW title, and took down a very well-coached W&J team in the first round of the NCAA Tournament. They nearly punched a ticket to the Sweet 16, pushing Hope into overtime inside DeVos, but came up just short. From what I saw over that last month of the season, IWU was clearly playing at a Top 15 level. The run & jump style of play had finally clicked, the defense looked sharp, and they had multiple offensive weapons around Bardic to keep opponents on their toes. Even with the second-round exit, I feel very good keeping IWU right in the middle of my ballot.

14. Carroll — Like IWU, this is one that is very much up for debate, because Carroll was eliminated in the second round. But the loss came to a strong La Crosse team that won the WIAC and went all the way to the Elite Eight, which is important context to consider. While I know the Pioneers didn’t have the sort of NCAA Tournament run I thought they might be capable of, this was one of the most consistent, dynamic offensive units I watched over the course of this season. From Emilie Wizner to Julia Lokker to Natalie Gricius, it just seemed like at their ceiling, Carroll was capable of hanging with almost anyone from an offensive standpoint. They were one of those teams that could score in so many different ways and use a number of different contributors to do it. That said, I had to drop Carroll back a bit from where I had them in my last ballot before the NCAA Tournament because of the second-round exit. But the DePauw win was an impressive one in the first round, considering how hot DePauw was entering the tournament, and looking big-picture, Carroll beat three Top 25 NPI teams during the regular season as well.

15. Bates — Bates really impressed me with its tournament run. Playing at home helps, but Smith might be amongst the five toughest teams to beat in March, and Bates did it after trailing 39-23 at halftime. The second-half comeback was impressive to watch, and to me, we saw Bates at peak form for that 25-minute stretch (including OT). While I dropped Bates down quite a bit after the loss to Connecticut College at the end of the regular season, the Bobcats’ run through the NESCAC Tournament—featuring a win at Bowdoin in the title game—and the subsequent wins over USMMA and Smith in the NCAAs pushed them right back into my Top 15. Sophie Spolter was terrific, with back-to-back 20-point performances in the first two rounds, and 16 more against Scranton in the Sweet 16. Finishing at 26-4 with wins over two of the northeast’s best in a one-week span (Bowdoin and Smith) warranted a significant jump in my ballot for Allison Montgomery’s team.

16. Smith — The Bears have historically been so good in March, and I thought that was true again this year, even with Smith’s streak of three-straight Final Fours getting snapped. They simply ran into a tough Bates team that was unwilling to go down without a fight on its home floor, and while the second round exit caused me to fade Smith slightly in my ballot, I still thought the game itself (along with the Union win in the first round) gave us a good indicator of Smith’s overall strength this season. It took Hannah Martin some time to find her rhythm, but she was really solid the second half of the year. Virginia Johnson was also exceptional all season long, and played all 45 minutes in the second round vs. Bates, grabbing 13 rebounds. All in all, Smith went 28-2 with another incredibly successful season and just an earlier ending than we’ve become accustomed to. The one thing that made Smith a difficult team to rank throughout this year (including in this final ballot) was the lack of quality wins on the resume. The NEWMAC was a one-bid league yet again, and the non-conference slate didn’t turn out to be all that strong, which played into Smith being outside the Top 16 and being sent to Bates, despite going 27-1 through the NEWMAC Tournament. No. 16 feels low given the win-loss record, but Smith’s resume lacked the quantity of marquee results that the teams ahead of them had, paired with being eliminated in the second round.

17. Bowdoin — Bowdoin was hard to figure out at times this season, mainly because the NESCAC wasn’t quite where I anticipated it might be, given some of the high preseason expectations. Bowdoin and Bates were great, and both were pushed in a handful of league games, but there was a distinct Top 2 in a conference that ended up only being a two-bid league after getting 5 bids in 2025. Bowdoin swept through NESCAC play at 10-0, and there were multiple times where I thought the Polar Bears were playing at a Top 15 level. Grace Kinum and Abbie Quinn led the charge this season, and were key catalysts in Bowdoin’s 22-1 regular season. That said, they dropped the NESCAC final to Bates, and also didn’t make it out of the first weekend of the tournament with the upset loss to Southern Maine. That pushed Bowdoin a bit lower in this final ballot, though I didn’t consider moving the Polar Bears much lower.

18. WashU — The Bears made a run to the Sweet 16, getting past SUNY Geneseo and Ohio Wesleyan in the first two rounds, before falling to UW-Oshkosh in a sectional semifinal in Wisconsin. Notably, it marked the first trip to the second weekend for the program under Lisa Stone and the first since 2019, as WashU put together a fairly strong campaign en route to its 21-7 record. From about 13 to 19, my group of teams all felt very similar in terms of where I would rank them if this ballot was done in tiers. Ultimately, WashU ends up just narrowly behind Bowdoin and Smith in this final ballot, as I felt like we got my consistency from those two in the northeast when looking at the season in its entirety. For as strong as the UAA was, WashU had a few different points in February where they seemed to struggle, and others (like the Chicago win) where they looked like a second-weekend NCAA Tournament team. Consistency is a difficult element to judge, but I just felt a little more confident in Bowdoin and Smith’s overall late-season form and those two also had slightly higher year-end efficiency margins, which again, is one of the few analytical tools I utilize when comparing a group of teams with varying strengths of schedule.

19. Ohio Wesleyan — Similar story with the Battling Bishops. Due to teams like Concordia (MN), Bates, and Bethel moving up, OWU dropped a bit further than would’ve been ideal. I’d have 4-5 teams at No. 15 if I could, and OWU would’ve been one of them. The Battling Bishops were given a tough draw in the tournament, hosting the only pod featuring two Top 16 overall seeds (with WashU being the other Top 16). WashU edged OWU, 73-68, in the second round, but in a lot of ways, this was such a remarkable year for the Battling Bishops, who graduated three starters and had a new head coach in Cody Hartzler, yet found a way to be right in the NCAC title mix and Top 25 conversation all year once again. Macy Miller was terrific and battled through an injury to come back for the homestretch of the season, while Alyssa Griner and Maddie Ebbert stepped into bigger roles and were primary contributors in the 21-6 mark.

20. Ripon — The Red Hawks represented the MWC incredibly well, knocking off UW-River Falls in a first round OT thriller to give the conference its first NCAA Tournament win since 2013. That also marked Ripon’s 21st consecutive win, and they nearly stretched the streak to 22, falling just short in a true road game at Concordia (MN) in the second round. Seeing what Concordia went on to do in the tournament adds weight to that 78-75 loss, which elevated Ripon ahead of Southern Maine, who also had a memorable tournament run. While the Red Hawks did not reach the second weekend, the overall body of work this season (including wins over 4 WIAC programs along with a dominant run in MWC play) really stands out. The physicality and toughness of this group made them so fun to watch, and that showed up most in their offensive rebound rate of 46.1%, which ranked No. 2 in the nation. I had some tough decisions to make at the bottom of my ballot, but Ripon was right around No. 20 all season, and the tournament performance only reaffirmed their place in the national pecking order.

21. Southern Maine — As I alluded to, USM put together quite a run, highlighted by ending Bowdoin’s season early with a second round upset in Brunswick. USM opened the tournament by holding JWU’s Grace Jaffray, one of the nation’s most dynamic scoreless, to an 0-for-7 shooting night in a 62-46 win over the CNE champs. They followed that one day later with the 67-59 win over Bowdoin, reaching the second weekend of the tournament for the first time since 2007. What David Chadbourne has done there in just three years is one of the more impressive coaching jobs anywhere in D-III right now, as he’s completely changed the trajectory of what was once a national powerhouse. As was the case for most of this season, the low SOS and lack of Top 50 wins (they finished with 1) made it difficult for me to elevate the Huskies all that high in my ballot, and that remains true in this final ranking, even with the Bowdoin win. Their Sweet 16 game with UW-La Crosse wasn’t particularly close, so while I didn’t consider USM any lower than No. 21, I also felt like Ripon’s stronger non-conference results and tighter game with an eventual Elite Eight team on the road (compared to USM vs UWL on a neutral court) broke the tie between the two.

22. Hardin-Simmons — HSU is a unique case within the tournament, and one reason why I often note that it’s difficult in D-III to grade a team’s postseason performance based purely on how far they went in the bracket. The Cowgirls reached the Sweet 16, but did so against Whitman and Claremont-Mudd-Scripps in the Region 10 pod, which was objectively a slightly weaker pod than many of the others around the country due to the geography component in the bracket. That being said, HSU looked terrific in those two wins and carried over its relentless defensive intensity from the ASC Tournament, which is a big reason why HSU went from unranked in my Week 13 ballot to No. 22 in this one. Ultimately, I really liked the fact that HSU played both Hope and Concordia (MN) so tight in the regular season and went 12-3 on the road, good indicators of this team’s ceiling. To add a Sweet 16 appearance to that elevates the resume more, especially considering this was a much younger group than the HSU team that went to the Sweet 16 in 2024. I still came away feeling like Ripon and USM had slightly higher ceilings and the efficiency metrics favored Ripon and USM as well, but HSU is right there with those two in terms of this section of my ballot.

23. Trine — You can always count on Andy Rang’s teams finding a way. Trine has now made the NCAA Tournament in nine straight seasons, a streak that is made even more impressive when you consider that the Thunder has never lost a first round tournament game in that stretch. They kept it alive by knocking off Shenandoah this season before bowing out against Denison in a game the Big Red controlled from wire-to-wire. But by and large, Trine put together a pretty notable campaign, especially with missing Erin Sherwood for a good portion of the season. 23-6 with their only loss in MIAA play coming to Hope, Trine was yet again part of the national conversation, and while I felt they were a tier below the Ohio Wesleyan/Ripon group, this was a very complete basketball team. In the metrics, Trine also found itself highly-rated, finishing No. 16 in efficiency margin and in the Top 20 nationally in both offensive and defensive adjusted efficiency.

24. DePauw — These final spots were difficult. But here’s the bottom line with DePauw: this is a team that went into the home gym of the eventual national champion in a conference tournament semifinal and won convincingly. That data point alone speaks volumes, especially because the Tigers followed that by knocking off John Carroll (who reached the Sweet 16) in the NCAC final. While I know they didn’t quite get it done against Carroll in the first round of the tournament, you can see how much I think of Carroll with where the Pioneers are ranked in this ballot. Had DePauw won that game, they might be in my Top 20. But regardless, the final weeks of the season really spoke volumes about DePauw, who played the NCAC’s best very close, and just took a few too many losses to get into the Top 25 mix during the regular season. Yet, when I look at the number of top-tier opponents on DePauw’s schedule, the five Massey Top 50 wins on their resume, and the key win over Denison in late February, it’s hard to see a reason to keep the Tigers outside of the Top 25.

25. Baldwin Wallace — Much like what I said in regards to Trine, Baldwin Wallace is just so consistent, even in a year like this one where the Yellow Jackets put a newer group out on the floor. Though the growing pains were visible at times early, by late February, this team was right there amongst the 25 best teams in the country, without question. Their tournament run was only further proof of that, overwhelming William Paterson in the opening round, 75-51, before leading at halftime against JHU and really giving the Blue Jays a run on their home floor. I felt like DePauw and Trine had stronger overall results when looking at the season in its entirety, but it was clear how well-coached and disciplined BW was en route to its 25-4 mark. They deserved to be in my final ballot with the way they handled their OAC schedule and took those key strides forwards in January and February.

For those interested, my next 5 were (in order)…

• Christopher Newport — Beat Centennial Tournament champ Gettysburg in the first round by 12, held Mary Schleusner to 7 points in the second round (her lowest scoring total of the season), and finished 24-5 as C2C champs.

• Otterbein — Took down Baldwin Wallace to win the OAC Tournament and beat ODAC runner-up Randolph-Macon in the opening round. Went 23-6 with regular season wins over W&J, Carnegie Mellon, and a tight loss to eventual national champ Denison.

• UW-Whitewater — The Warhawks beat Transylvania to advance to the second round, but I just didn’t feel like they were the same team down the stretch that they were in December and January. Losing Caden Krohn had something to do with that, I think. UWW went 2-4 over its final six games.

• Coe — Caydee Kirkham & Co. took down UW-Platteville in a huge first round win at the Bethel Regional, and really impressed me by beating Wartburg in the A-R-C Tournament final as well.

• SUNY New Paltz — Brianna Fitzgerald’s fifth year with the Hawks saw New Paltz reach the second round of the tournament for the second time in three seasons. This was a connected (and young) group that beat Cortland twice and really continued to get better as the season went along.

More “Season in Review” content will be coming soon, including some analytical breakdowns and reflections on 2025-26 before turning the page for 2026-27. I will say, I’ll have a way-too-early Top 25 out before the end of April, so be on the lookout for that as well!

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In quite possibly the biggest move of this entire coaching cycle, Hannah Iverson is heading to UW-Eau Claire.

After a tremendous eight-year run at UW-Stout, where she lifted the program to historic heights and a 2025 Final Four appearance, Iverson was announced as the Blugolds’ next head coach on Friday morning. She went 125-74 in Menomonie, turning the program around entirely as Stout entered the national spotlight, highlighted by back-to-back 23-win seasons in 2023-24 and 2024-25.

“Hannah is a proven winner who reflects the competitive standards we expect at UW–Eau Claire,” said UWEC Director of Athletics Jason Verdugo in a news release. “She builds strong, authentic relationships with her players, develops student-athletes at a high level, and creates a team culture that competes relentlessly. Her track record in the WIAC shows she knows how to win, and we believe her leadership positions our program to be successful moving forward.”

The move is significant on a national scale, especially as it is an intra-conference hire within one of the strongest leagues in the country and in recent years, Iverson has separated herself amongst the top rising head coaches in Division III. She was a first-time head coach when she took the job at Stout in 2018, and immediately made a name for herself as a top-notch program-builder, winning big on the recruiting trail in addition to the on-court success.

Stout went 18-9 in Year 1, and posted winning seasons in seven of her eight years at the helm. Around 2020, Iverson assembled the group that would lead Stout to national prominence, including All-American Raegan Sorensen, All-Region honoree Anna Mutch, and All-WIAC guard Sam Schaeffer.

The Blue Devils won their first WIAC regular season title since 2007 during the 2022-23 campaign, and followed that by winning the WIAC Tournament in 2024, carrying that success over to an NCAA Tournament run that featured wins over WashU and Puget Sound. Stout came back in 2024-25 and surpassed that level of success, going all the way to Salem and the Final Four, with their Cinderella postseason run including an upset of powerhouse Scranton on the Lady Royals’ home floor in the Elite Eight.

"Hannah's connection to Eau Claire and her vision for this program made this a really special hire," said Kyle Seyer, UWEC Assistant Athletic Director and chair of the search committee, in the release. "She grew up around this program and now has the opportunity to lead it. That full-circle journey, combined with her success as a coach and ability to build relationships, makes her a natural fit to take this program to new heights."

The fact that Iverson grew up in Eau Claire and became one of the city’s most decorated high school players in history made this a logical hire from the beginning. Paired with her proven WIAC success just 28 miles down the road in Menomonie, it seems there wasn’t a better fit for this job than Iverson. A two-time All-State point guard at Eau Claire North High School, she went on to play her college ball in-state at UW-Green Bay, helping the Phoenix to four NCAA Tournaments.

“I am incredibly honored to be named the head women's basketball coach at the University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire," Iverson said in the release. "I want to thank Jason, Chancellor Carney and the rest of the search committee for the trust and belief they've placed in me to lead this program. UW-Eau Claire is a special place with a strong tradition of academic and athletic excellence. I proudly stand with all of the coaches and players who have left their mark on this program and look forward to creating a culture rooted in accountability, toughness, trust and togetherness. My family and I are thrilled to join the Blugold family and we can't wait to get started."

The timing of this hire, as I noted earlier on X, is very ideal for UWEC. Tonja Englund announced her retirement on March 11, and just 16 days later, the Blugolds already have their next head coach in place. The speed of the search process should give Iverson more time to pull together a strong recruiting class for the 2026-27 season as she looks to elevate UWEC back to being a consistent WIAC title contender. Scott Peterson’s 2026-27 Preseason Rankings have UWEC slotted to return 66.1% of its production, though that could obviously change with Englund retiring and Iverson taking over the program.

The other big question becomes where Stout goes from this point. Iverson really transformed the program into one that proved it can win on a big stage and showed it to be a place that strongly supports its women’s basketball program. There is no doubt there will be an abundance of quality candidates aiming at this one, similar to how the UWEC job was viewed when it came open a couple weeks ago. The proximity to Minnesota allows Stout to recruit the Twin Cities in a way few other WIACs can (River Falls and Eau Claire being the others), and again, the recent success makes this an incredibly appealing job. It’s very possible that Stout ends up being a Top 3 job in this cycle, though this offseason has the potential to be one of the biggest in terms of high-tier openings, a list that also includes Springfield and Ithaca.

More to come on the coaching news front, including a more in-depth coaching carousel update sometime over the weekend. I also have my final Top 25 ballot breakdown in the works. Stay tuned!

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SPRINGFIELD, Mass. — For the second time this offseason, a longtime figure in the Division III coaching world has announced her retirement.

On Monday afternoon, Springfield College’s Naomi Graves announced that the 2025-26 season was her last as head coach of the Pride, a program she has led for the last 35 years. Graves won 616 games over 41 seasons as a Division III coach, starting at WPI before taking over at Springfield in the fall of 1992. At the conclusion of this past season, she ranked No. 12 amongst active D-III coaches in career wins.

"It has been an honor and a privilege to be the Head Women's Basketball Coach at Springfield College," said Graves in Monday’s press release. "It was a dream of mine to be a teacher/coach at this institution and I am so grateful to have worked with so many student-athletes, staff and coaches. I leave the Springfield College Community with such gratitude."

Graves recorded her first 20-win season at the NEWMAC program in 1998-99 then went on to lead the Pride to five 20-win campaigns in six years between 2000-2006. The first of that run, in 2000-01, also saw Springfield reach the NCAA Tournament for the first time in program history as Graves’ squad defeat Southern Maine in the opening round. Four years later, Springfield made more history in a run to the Elite Eight, taking down Stockton, Mount St. Mary, and Wesleyan with an average margin of victory of just 5.3 points. More recently, Springfield put together a Sweet 16 run in 2022 as part of a stellar 24-5 season.

"For 35 years, Coach Graves excelled at her craft on Alden Street. The imprint she leaves behind on women's basketball at Springfield College will be everlasting," Springfield Executive Director of Athletics Dr. Craig Poisson said in the release. "Beyond her national accolades and her postseason successes, Naomi also made her mark in the classroom as a consummate teacher-coach, impacting the lives of hundreds of students in addition to our student-athletes on the hardwood. I am grateful for Coach Graves' longevity on the coaching staff and I wish her the best in retirement."

That impact on her players was recognized by the WBCA with the organization’s Carole Eckman Integrity in Coaching Award in 2017, making her only the third D-III coach in the award’s 40-year history to earn the honor. The award “is given annually to a coach that exemplifies spirit, integrity and character through sportsmanship, commitment to the student-athlete, honesty, ethical behavior, courage and dedication to purpose.”

Graves joins UW-Eau Claire’s Tonja Englund as the second coach with over 400 career wins to retire this offseason. She will officially retire from her role as Head Women’s Basketball Coach and Associate Professor of Physical Education at the conclusion of the current academic year.

Monmouth (IL) opens

Per a job posting on the Monmouth College website, the MWC program will have a new head coach for the 2026-27 season. Monmouth went 8-17 this past season under Michelle DeCoud, who was in her third year at the helm.

The Scots increased their MWC win total from 0 to 4 over DeCoud’s three seasons, but haven’t recorded a winning record in league play since 2021-22, in Megan Jones’ second-to-last season leading the program.

Bard College looking for its next head coach

After two seasons, Alaina Walker is no longer the head coach at Bard, a Liberty League program in Dutchess County, New York. The job has been publicly posted.

Bard went 3-22 this past season, and has historically been a difficult place to win at. However, the men’s program turned the corner recently, with back-to-back seasons above .500 in 2023-24 and 2024-25, and there’s reason to think the women’s program could do the same under the right leadership.

RPI parts ways with longtime head coach John Greene

Speaking of the Liberty League, a release from RPI last Friday brought the news that the school is moving on from John Greene, who led the program for the last 25 years. Greene, in his third stop as a head coach after previous stints at Western New England and Bridgeport, leaves RPI with a 322-295 record. The Engineers went 17-9 this past winter, their highest win total since going 18-11 in 2019-20.

“Coach Greene has been an important part of our program for the past 25 years, and we are deeply appreciative of the impact he has made on countless student-athletes and our campus community. After careful consideration, we have decided to move in a new direction with our program. We thank Coach Greene for his long-standing commitment and wish him nothing but success in the future,” said RPI Director of Athletics Dr. Kristie Bowers in the school’s press release.

Greene led RPI to the Liberty League title and an NCAA Tournament appearance in 2009-10. He also recruited four Liberty League Players of the Year, three Liberty League Rookies of the Year, and two NCAA Woman of the Year finalists.

The job has not yet been posted as of Tuesday morning.

I will continue to stay on top of the latest coaching news throughout the division. You can expect more frequent coaching carousel updates as we move further into the offseason, and I also post notes on coaching moves on X (@ZayasRiley) as information comes available.

More to come tomorrow, including a Top 25 ballot breakdown of my final ranking of the 2025-26 season!

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SALEM, Virginia — It was a season when the very top of the division seemed stronger than ever.

Three teams entered the NCAA Tournament undefeated. One carried a win streak longer than all but one team in college basketball history. Another had the National Player of the Year leading the way. And yet another was solidly No. 1 in nearly every positive efficiency metric one could think of.

But it wasn’t one of those three who hoisted the national championship trophy inside Salem, Virginia’s Cregger Center on Saturday afternoon.

In a display of heart and toughness, of physicality and clutch shot-making, of all the things that make this tournament in March so great, it was Denison who cut down the nets in celebration of its first-ever national title after beating Scranton, 55-41.

It will undoubtedly go down as the best story of the 2025-26 season.

This was a team that did not receive a single Top 25 vote in the preseason, was picked second in its own league’s preseason poll, and all along, stayed steady in knowing what it had, even if those on the outside did not. They exceeded the expectations every step of the way; from an undefeated non-conference campaign to emerging as the regular season champ out of a league that sent four teams to the NCAA Tournament to powering through arguably the toughest path to Salem of the four teams that got there.

Reaching the Final Four required beating the No. 3-ranked squad in the country on its home floor. Winning a national semifinal required a near-unstoppable offensive effort against the nation’s No. 4-ranked team. As for winning it all? No. 2 Scranton came into Saturday on a major high as the first team in three years to beat two-time defending national champion NYU. The general consensus, even for as well as eighth-ranked Denison played in Thursday’s win over UW-Oshkosh, had Scranton as the favorite.

It didn’t seem to matter to Denison. The Big Red was the underdog in each of its last three games of the tournament, and instead won all three by double-digits. They had a tenacity about them that seemed to weather every big run by the opponent, and then respond with one of their own. In head coach Maureen Hirt’s words postgame, these magical three weeks in March proved the Big Red “is the real deal.”

“There’s so many emotions right now,” Hirt said on the ESPN+ broadcast postgame. “I think the biggest one I feel is gratitude. Gratitude for this team, this university, my staff. I think a lot of people thought this year was a fluke. We just proved it’s not a fluke, and that Denison Women’s Basketball is the real deal.”

The Big Red met the moment every single time, none on a bigger stage than in Saturday’s fourth quarter. Trailing Scranton, 39-36, with 8:20 left, the ball found its way to Abby Cooch on the left wing. The junior point guard stared down Scranton’s Kaeli Romanowski—one of the Lady Royals’ top on-ball defenders—and lofted a 3-point shot above her outstretched right arm. Swish. And with it, a tied game.

There was no stopping Denison from there. The Big Red closed on a 19-2 run, a closing stretch reminiscent of their game-winning spurt seven days earlier in a sectional final just 53 miles away at Washington & Lee. Scranton fell back into the bitterly-cold offensive lull that plagued the Lady Royals in their one-point second quarter, with Denison’s defensive intensity playing no small role in holding D3’s last remaining undefeated team to a 1-of-12 mark in the final minutes. The other end saw Denison hit eight of its next 13 shots, steadily widening the gap until it was no longer even a three-possession game. With 1:06 left and a nine-point Denison lead, the Big Red delivered the double-dagger. Coming out of a timeout, they ran the shot clock down to two—taking a precious 18 seconds off the game clock—before Cooch drilled a 3 that caused the section of Denison faithful in the stands to erupt in a loud roar. Any sliver of hope for a Scranton comeback was erased right then and there. There was no coming back from a 12-point deficit in just over 60 seconds.

Cooch scored 15 of her team-leading 18 points in the second half, including three fourth-quarter 3s, putting an exclamation point on a tremendous weekend that garnered the Clifton, Virginia native the tournament’s Most Outstanding Player award. But in true Denison fashion, it wasn’t so much the storyline of one player taking over the game as a full unit seizing the moment together. For as stellar as Cooch was, the Big Red’s strength was found in its collective whole, from 6-foot-3 center Anelly Mad-toingué deterring dribble-drives and swatting away shots, to Ada Taute’s go-ahead 3 with 7:20 left, to Morgan Kress’ seven rebounds and three blocks in just nine minutes of action. Four players grabbed at least seven rebounds, three scored eight or more points, and in each of the Big Red’s best stretches, the defense was a unit of five individuals working as a singular unit, frustrating the nation’s No. 1-ranked team in offensive efficiency on possession after possession.

“We do not win playing solo basketball,” Mad-toingué, who had 16 rebounds and was amongst Denison’s most valuables contributors defensively, said afterwards. “We win with all five of us on the court. As Coach Hirt says, ‘We win with all 18 of us, and we need to stay composed throughout the rest of the game.’”

She said that in talking about Denison’s fourth-quarter response after Scranton enjoyed its best offensive run in the 10 minutes coming out of halftime. The Big Red led 19-11 through a surprisingly low-scoring first half that saw Scranton shoot just 4-of-37 from the field, missing all 17 second-quarter field goal attempts. Denison wasn’t much better, at 8-of-38. But Scranton’s halftime adjustments made all the difference in the third, as the Lady Royals came alive in a 12-0 run that had the Big Red very much on its heels.

A fairly strong second-half team all season, Scranton had the deficit to one in just three minutes, and took a 25-23 lead with 3:13 left in the quarter. But as the fourth quarter revealed, Denison never panicked in the face of the Lady Royals’ surge. Playing team basketball, two of the Big Red’s next three made shots were assisted, keeping Denison right in the middle of the back-and-forth pattern late in the third. A dramatic finish to the quarter saw Taute complete a three-point play at the foul line before Meghan Lamanna drained a buzzer-beating 3 for a Scranton lead heading into the fourth. That only seemed to make the Denison storyline better, because even though the Big Red led for just over 30 minutes of game time, they had to face adversity at some point—as all championship teams do—and rise above it. The fourth quarter proved memorable in that respect.

As I watched Denison dribble out the clock on Saturday, it struck me just how unprecedented a season like this was. For the first time since 2008-09, a team unranked in the preseason won it all. And even that George Fox team was 25-5 the previous year. Denison was 15-11 a season ago. I bring that up only to illustrate two points: 1) you just never know who will emerge in a given season, and 2) this sort of title run is incredibly rare. Even if you throw out the preseason ranking aspect, Denison was not in the Final Four conversation in October and November as national champions typically have been, from NYU to Transylvania to Hope.

Even with the strong start and incredible run through the NCAC, Denison had an imposing path to a championship game appearance, facing longtime Midwest power Trine in the second round, a conference opponent in John Carroll in the Sweet 16, an absolute bedlam environment at W&L in the Elite Eight, and the first team in 40-plus years to win three straight WIAC regular season titles in UW-Oshkosh in the Final Four. There was no doubt that Denison faced an uphill battle in this tournament. They weren’t necessarily expected to get to Salem, much less win it all. But the belief and cohesion built had Denison ready. No moment ever seemed too big this March for the Big Red, even with constant reminders in each round of it being the furthest the program had ever gotten in the NCAA Tournament. They just kept showing up, and answering the call, whether it meant coming up with a timely defensive stop or hitting a 3 to seal the national championship. The belief never wavered, and it showed up under the bright lights on Saturday afternoon.

It was a storybook finish to a season that rewrote the program record books. And for much of this Denison roster, it is a story that has not yet reached its final chapter. With a starting lineup of three juniors, a sophomore, and a first-year, Denison made this run with a young group that played with remarkable poise. Brooke Toigo, the lone senior in the rotation, will certainly be missed, but it’s hard not to think about what this team could have in store a year from now, with this entire starting five a year older and now having national championship experience under their belt. There will be a time for that in the weeks and months to follow, to begin prognosticating what the 2026-27 season could look like with Denison as a likely frontrunner.

But for now, the Big Red will celebrate. They made history with Saturday’s win, a stunner in Salem that will be talked about for quite some time on the campus in Granville, Ohio. As it should be.

“I think it is the players you build it with,” said Hirt after the celebration on the court. “It started out as a vision and we have the right people on the boat. They have invested so much into the relationships with each other and with their coaches and our athletic administration.”

>> For a full game story from Saturday’s national title game, check out Gordon Mann’s reporting from Salem on D3hoops.com.

>> Denison Postgame Recap (link)

>> Final Box Score (link)

Thank you to everyone who followed along with my coverage of this season’s NCAA Tournament. What a ride it was! Congratulations to Denison on a tremendous title victory and credit to Scranton for the run they had in this season as well. I’ll get to work on offseason coverage soon (plus one final ballot breakdown), and continue to bring you comprehensive coverage of Division III women’s basketball through the summer and fall. And for those wondering, we’re 229 days away from the start of the 2026-27 season. Start marking your calendars!

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No. 2 Scranton (32-0) vs. No. 8 Denison (29-2)

Place: Cregger Center (Salem, Virginia)

Time: 4 p.m. ET

TV: ESPN+ (subscription required)

Radio: WUSR-Scranton (link)

Last meeting: This is the first time these two programs have matched up. Separated by roughly seven hours, Scranton comes out of the Landmark Conference while Denison plays in the North Coast Athletic Conference.

Historical Significance: Denison is playing in its first national title game in program history. The Big Red have also set a new single-season program record with 29 wins, and coming into this season, had never advanced past the Round of 32 in the NCAA Tournament. Scranton is playing for a national championship for the first time since 1985, when the Lady Royals won it all, though this is their 10th Final Four appearance in program history.

Leading Scorers: Scranton — SR G Kaci Kranson (17.9 PPG), Denison — JR G Ada Taute (13.9 PPG)

Leading Rebounders: Scranton — SR G Kaeli Romanowski (6.0 RPG), Denison — SO P Anelly Mad-toingué (10.1 RPG)

Notable tournament stats: Denison has 42 blocks in this NCAA Tournament, 17 more than anyone else. 16.3% of opposing teams’ 2-point field goal attempts against Denison are blocked. The Big Red also has an effective field goal percentage of 49.7% in its five NCAAT games. Scranton has been stellar on the boards in this tournament, with offensive rebounds on 39.4% of its missed shots. The Lady Royals also have posted a defensive rating of 73.9 in the tournament, and 19.1% of opposing teams’ possessions have ended in steals.

When Scranton is on offense - 3 things I’m watching

How much does Denison look to isolate Kaci Kranson? — NYU did a good job of limiting Kaci Kranson’s touches and forcing her into some tough shots, which limited Scranton’s leading scorer to just five points. But as Ben O’Brien said postgame, that opened up shots for other players, and Kranson is experienced enough to recognize when the defense is pulling too much attention to one player and make the right pass to give Scranton’s offense the edge. How Denison opts to guard her is going to be key. If you try to go one-on-one, there is a variety of ways she can beat you and you risk giving up 25 or 30 points to a First Team All-American. But then again, focus too much on Kranson, and the other four Lady Royals are going to have a numbers advantage. This offense ranks amongst the nation’s best for a reason: it’s not one-dimensional.

Bennett and Talutto’s impact off the bench — Scranton tends to use a pretty limited rotation of seven or eight, and Elizabeth Bennett and Sophia Talutto are always the first two (and sometimes the only two) to come off the bench. Both are incredibly impactful for this offense in different ways. Bennett, as we saw in the first quarter against NYU, posts up and scores well inside while possessing the range to also shoot from the perimeter. Talutto, a freshman, has scored 14+ points twice in this tournament, and is 6-of-12 from 3-point range over Scranton’s last five games. In a game like this, sometimes it’s the bench that proves to be the difference-maker. That could certainly be the case for Scranton on the offensive end today.

The Lady Royals’ assist rate — This is an offense that leads the nation in assist/turnover ratio (2.0) and averages 19.7 assists per game. When the ball is moving at a crisp and disciplined pace, Scranton is near-unstoppable on the offensive end with multiple scorers on the floor at all times. Of course, they had just eight assists against 20 turnovers on Thursday, and Denison’s style of play isn’t all the different from NYU’s in terms of wanting to be up-tempo on defense, apply full-court pressure, and force turnovers in the backcourt. That will be something to keep an eye on in this matchup in particular. How does Scranton handle Denison’s pressure, and can the Lady Royals reach that double-digit assist mark? Those factors will no doubt play a role in the outcome.

When Denison is on offense - 3 things I’m watching

Utilizing the scoring depth — Something Maureen Hirt and Ada Taute both talked about in Denison’s postgame press conference after the Oshkosh win was the dynamic of the offense being able to fill up the stat sheet, even when one or two contributing scorers are being taken away. Denison did that at a high level against Oshkosh—one of the best defensive teams in the country—but Scranton has been head and shoulders above everyone in D3 this season when it comes to defensive efficiency. So the question for Denison will be how much the Big Red can keep things balanced early and actually utilize that offensive depth. Ada Taute can certainly score 20+ on any given night, but the strength of this team through its tournament run has been having four or five each scoring 8-10 points. It certainly seems that the winning formula against Scranton’s imposing defense will come in keeping the Lady Royals somewhat off-balance and spread out, something Denison is very capable of doing with its complimentary perimeter and interior presences between its guards and Anelly Mad-toingué and Morgan Kress in the post.

Getting to the free throw line — Denison has been very good at the line in this tournament, shooting 76.8% as a team from the charity stripe. But more than that, the Big Red has gotten to the line more than anyone else of the four teams that made it Salem, averaging 19.4 free throws per game in NCAAT play. They were 13-of-21 against Oshkosh, a number they’ll certainly want to elevate this afternoon, but it remains a notable trait, as scoring consistently with the clock stopped can pay dividends in a game like this. The other side of this, though? Scranton has been amongst the best in this tournament in fewest defensive fouls committed, averaging only 12.0 per game. The discipline of the Lady Royals’ defense will likely impact the frequency of Denison’s trips to the foul line.

How effective can Denison be in pushing the pace? — This might be the biggest, and most important, question for Denison from an offensive standpoint. The Big Red has been so good in staying controlled while remaining aggressive when they sense an opportunity to get up the court quickly. The pace has worked in their favor multiple times in high-stakes matchups going all the way back to NCAC play, but Scranton handled NYU’s pace well on Thursday, and poses a threat to Denison’s efficiency in transition as well. If the Big Red can get out and run, it will put them in a good spot, whether that leads directly to fast-break points or just wears Scranton down. It’s also the style they’re most comfortable playing. But they’ll need to be careful to not go too fast and end up with a multitude of turnovers as a result. Scranton is a smart defensive team with great anticipation on passes, which is something Denison will need to be mindful of in trying to get its transition offense going.

Enjoy today’s national title game! It’s going to be a good one! To read more on this one, check out my preview for D3hoops.com. Of course, I’ll have plenty of coverage on this game in tomorrow morning’s newsletter, so stay tuned. It is hard to believe we have just one game left in what has been a remarkable 2025-26 season. Just over thre hours until tip-off in Salem!

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Historic. That’s the best way to describe what unfolded in Salem, Virginia last night in the national semifinals of the NCAA Tournament. In the opening game, Denison rode a blistering hot start to an 82-61 win over UW-Oshkosh, sending the Big Red to its first national title game in program history. What a way to set a new program record for wins in a single season!

Then came the much-anticipated showdown between the nation’s No. 1 and No. 2-ranked squads — NYU and Scranton. NYU, of course, carried the second-longest win streak in college hoops history at 91 consecutive victories, and had blazed through its first four tournament games with relative ease. But it was the same story for Scranton, and the Lady Royals showed up in Salem with something to prove. Scranton took its first lead at the 5:34 mark of the first quarter and never trailed again, knocking off the reigning national champion and snapping the streak in a 60-52 victory that sent the Lady Royals to their first championship game since 1985.

Yeah, I’d say it was a pretty historic semifinal night in Salem.

We’re now set for a title game on Saturday between Denison and Scranton, the latter now holding the third-longest active win streak in NCAA women’s college basketball. After back-to-back years of NYU/Smith in the final game of the tournament, we’ve now got a team that hasn’t been here since 1985 and another that’s never been here at all. What a game it’s going to be, from the rebounding prowess of both squads to Denison’s up-tempo style and Scranton’s unforgiving defense. I could go on, but I’ll save that for a preview tomorrow.

In the aftermath of both semifinals, I put together a number of thoughts and takeaways from what we saw inside the Cregger Center on Thursday evening. I’ve pulled out three from each game to dive into here, and as always, for more coverage, be sure to visit D3hoops.com, who has on-the-ground coverage in Salem.

Denison, 82, UW-Oshkosh, 61

Denison was the aggressor early

For a team playing in its first national semifinal in program history, Denison’s opening five minutes gave zero indication that the Big Red was on a new stage. Then again, they looked fairly unfazed playing in a very hostile road environment at Washington & Lee last Saturday, so I’m not I should’ve expected anything different. Well-prepared, committed to their quick pace, and incredibly confident, those first five minutes seemingly won the game for Denison.

I can count on one hand the number of times I’ve seen a 20-2 game-opening run (or something similar) and none of those have come in a national semifinal. Oshkosh was definitely out of rhythm, but it wasn’t the sort of run where miscues just handed an 18-point lead to Denison. The Titans turned it over a few times early, but that was directly a result of Denison’s pressure defense. And on the offensive end, Denison knew the shots it wanted to take, and found those within the flow of the offense. They were intentional in going at the basket, driving downhill, and getting up the floor quickly, but the control they display at the same time really made it all click. No shot was forced, and yet Denison found open shot after open shot right out of the gate, burying Oshkosh in a hole before the Titans really had a chance to get their feet underneath them. The pace paired with exceptional shot-making proved to be a winning combination for the Big Red throughout the entire game, but especially in the first quarter.

Denison’s consistent shot-making kept Oshkosh playing from a sizable deficit all night

Denison led 42-19 at the half, an imposing lead for a national semifinal that would be difficult for any team to overcome. But if there was any chance of Oshkosh rallying in the second half, the Big Red put those comeback hopes to rest fairly quickly. Denison struggled in its first few possessions of the third quarter, but settled in soon after, shooting 51.8% in the second half. There were a few points when it seemed Oshkosh had pulled some momentum to its side on a stop-and-score, but like clockwork, Denison would be right there to answer it on the other end.

Early in the fourth, Bridget Froehlke knocked down a much-needed 3 for the Titans, pulling Oshkosh within 17. But no more than 10 seconds later, Denison’s Abby Cooch pushed the ball upcourt and dished a pass to Molly Dorighi, who then scored through contact for an emphatic “and one” layup that brought the Denison bench to its feet. Oshkosh couldn’t do much to hold Denison’s momentum back in those moments. Later in the fourth, it seemed Oshkosh was close to forcing a shot-clock violation, something the Titan defense has been known to do with its hard-nosed effort and positioning in the half-court. With no other option, Cooch lofted up a 3-point attempt from about 30 feet away…and banked it in. It summarized the day for Denison: the Big Red hit so many timely shots to maintain their sizable lead, and Oshkosh simply couldn’t score enough—and find enough repeated stops—to truly close the gap.

Anelly Mad-toingué is one of the more underrated posts in the country

I could write about Ada Taute’s 10-point first quarter (15 minutes in, she had outscored Oshkosh’s entire team) or Abby Cooch’s steady play at point guard or Brooke Toigo’s 3-point shooting. Each had a significant role in Denison’s statement win. But in the up-tempo, push-the-pace style that Denison wants to play, the skill set of the player at “5” (the center) becomes key. You need a post player who can rim run and go up and down quickly, while also providing a rebounding presence to give the guards running in transition clean outlet passes and chances to get out in front of the defense. And that’s exactly what Mad-toingué brings to this Denison team.

Only a sophomore, the native of Wellesley, Massachusetts had 10 points, 8 rebounds, and 2 blocks on Thursday night in a solid stat line. But it’s what the numbers don’t necessarily show that I think captures her value for the Big Red. She stands at 6’3 but it’s the way she uses her length that makes her such a tough matchup for opponents. Early on, Oshkosh was looking for shots at the rim, but got very few good looks because Mad-toingué outstretched arms were there every time, ready to swat away a shot or at the very least contest it. For an Oshkosh team that came in taking 24.8% of its field-goal attempts in the paint, the Titans had a hard time getting around Denison’s stellar post in a first half that really set the tone.

Then you consider what she can do offensively. With 2:02 left in the third quarter and Denison’s lead at 20, she helped force a missed jumper from Oshkosh then raced down the floor in a textbook rim run, receiving a pass from Cooch in perfect stride for a wide-open layup. As color commentator Monika Moore noted on the ESPN+ broadcast, Denison HC Maureen Hirt said that Mad-toingué can beat several of the team’s guards up the floor, and plays like that are evidence of it. To have a true post player who can score on fast-breaks like that, control the glass, and contest countless shots against quick, agile guards is an invaluable piece of the puzzle for the Big Red. I don’t think we’ve talked enough about Mad-toingué from a national perspective, but we might as well start. She’s going to be key again on Saturday if Denison is to keep pace with Scranton.

Scranton, 60, NYU, 52

The Lady Royals’ strength on the glass was the first step towards the win

With roughly a minute to go in a fast-paced first quarter, Scranton led 14-5, having countered Caroline Peper’s game-opening 3 off the tip by scoring 14 of the game’s next 16 points. NYU was on its toes, needing a quick stop, defensive rebound, and a score on the other end to prevent Scranton’s momentum from snowballing. But when Scranton’s Sophia Talutto missed a jumper off the rim, her teammate Elizabeth Bennett got to the rebound first, keeping possession with the Lady Royals. When Bennett’s ensuing shot didn’t fall, Scranton point guard Kaeli Romanowski rushed in and grabbed it before NYU’s rebounders could get there. And the Lady Royals capitalized on their third chance of the possession, as Meghan Lamanna sank a 3 in perfect rhythm, pushing the lead to double-digits for the first time.

In a game where speed and athleticism were strong traits possessed by both squads, Scranton had the advantage early when it came to using that on the glass. The Lady Royals had 6 offensive boards to NYU’s zero in the first quarter, scoring roughly half (47.1%) of their 17 points off an offensive rebound. It was a 9-2 offensive rebounding advantage by halftime. And that is telling for the rebounding on the other end of the floor too. Because while Scranton was extending their own possessions, the Lady Royals generally held NYU to repeated “one-and-done” trips to the offensive end, in which the Violets got one shot, but nothing more.

With the intensity Scranton’s defense opened with, it was a bad combination for NYU, who scored just one second-chance point through the first three quarters. Scranton led the overall battle on the boards by a dominant +13 margin (29-13) at the half, a big reason for the 30-18 lead through two quarters. The important context here is how good NYU was on the boards through its first 29 games, leading the UAA in offensive rebounding with an average of 17.2 per game along with ranking No. 1 in the league in total rebounding. It spoke volumes to Scranton’s aggressiveness, and no doubt set the tone early in the Lady Royals’ favor.

Elizabeth Bennett gave Scranton a tremendous spark off the bench

Elizabeth Bennett played like an All-American last night. No question about it. Lamanna was incredibly key, playing all 40 minutes and hitting a team-high three 3s along with four assists. Romanowski, too, played huge minutes and pulled down 16 rebounds; not a regular occurrence for a point guard who came in averaging a little more than 5.0 boards per game. But you cannot overlook Bennett’s spark in the first half when laying out the story of this game. The 5’11 forward checked in for the first time at the 6:12 mark of the first quarter, the first off the bench in Scranton’s seven-player rotation. And wow, did she make those next six minutes count.

Bennett was as impactful as anyone in giving Scranton its early 17-5 lead, scoring six points, pulling down six rebounds, and shooting 3-of-4 from the field in that span. Midway through the second quarter, she stepped up again, hitting a 3 on one end to put Scranton back up 11 before getting back down the floor and blocking a layup from NYU’s Eden Williamson, her 36th block of the year. Those key plays gave Scranton the early momentum it needed to continue pushing and to have a player like that off the bench is such a big part of the winning formula. Sophia Talutto, Scranton’s only other contributor off the bench, seemingly picked up where Bennett left off in the second half, coming up with four steals on her own in the final 5:22 along with scoring all eight of her points in the final two quarters.

On the other side, NYU had a similar storyline going with Olivia Lagao, a freshman guard who took charge in the second half when the Violets really needed some positive momentum. She had 14 of NYU’s 19 bench points, all of which came over the last 20 minutes, as the Manhattan Beach, California native helped spur a fourth-quarter rally. She accounted for four of the Violets’ 10 3s in the ballgame along with three steals. Honestly, Lagao was a big reason NYU even got back into it…

Scranton sustained NYU’s big second-half run

…And yes, the Violets did get back into it. Every coach seems to talk about knowing the opponent—especially a two-time defending national champ—is going to make a run at some point, regardless of how insurmountable the deficit may appear to be. It’s in those moments that the identity of the team leading, almost as much as the team trailing, is revealed. NYU certainly made two pushes in the second half, clearly digging deep and looking to overcome the shooting woes that seemed to plague the Violets for much of the night. The first (and biggest) charge at Scranton’s lead came out of the halftime locker room, where NYU opened on a 15-2 run sparked by early scores from Yasmene Clark and Caroline Peper. By the time Lagao sank her first 3 of the contest, NYU was within one possession, 31-28, and the momentum was building for the Violets. But Meghan Lamanna immediately countered with a 3 of her own, slamming the door on NYU’s run as she sparked an 11-4 spurt for Scranton, capped by her driving floater that widened the gap back to 10.

That was the closest NYU got, though the Violets made one final push in the closing three minutes as their streak and national title hopes came under intense pressure. Peper, a senior, hit a huge 3 off Caitlin Kenney’s steal and assist, getting the deficit down to 7. Then on a perfectly-executed sideline inbounds play, Lagao’s fourth 3 fell through, making it a two-possession game. NYU had chances in the final minute to edge closer, but as was the case for much of the contest, they couldn’t get the shots to fall when they needed them to.

That aside, I thought Scranton’s response to the big third-quarter run was telling, as the Lady Royals sustained the run and went right back to work offensively, extending their advantage again. While Scranton had a few unforced turnovers in the final minutes, this was largely a team that stayed very poised despite holding the lead for much of it. And that’s a hard position to be in, considering the quality of opponent and playing on a neutral court. But Scranton handled that pressure really well, made its free throws late, and did a good job of speeding NYU up late to prevent the Violets from getting into much of a rhythm. A+ performance from Scranton on a night then the Lady Royals needed to be near-perfect against a team of NYU’s caliber.

I’ll have more tomorrow on the national title game matchup. Until then, thanks for reading, and enjoy the Division I men’s and women’s tournaments today! And be sure to subscribe to The Scoop on D3 Women’s Hoops if you haven’t already!

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SALEM, Virginia — In Brad Fischer’s 14 seasons at UW-Oshkosh, he has been responsible for the recruitment of three of the program’s five WIAC Players of the Year, three of the four D3hoops.com All-Americans in program history, and all three of Oshkosh’s multi-time WBCA All-Americans.

And yet, it seems likely that the biggest addition in the nearly one-and-a-half decades under Fischer is the 6-foot-0 sophomore forward in the starting lineup right now, the homegrown Fox Valley star who had to travel less than two miles from her high school gym at Oshkosh West to her new home floor at UW-Oshkosh when she debuted on the roster in the fall of 2024.

Without question, Paige Seckar is fast becoming the name to know for a program reaching unprecedented heights, and one that will make its second-straight Final Four appearance on Thursday evening at 5 p.m. ET against Denison.

“I feel like I kind of had a head start with being from Oshkosh, and getting to know the girls and the program early on,” Seckar, the 2026 D3hoops.com Region 9 Player of the Year, said earlier this week.

That familiarity has put her on the fast track to immense success in a short span for the Titans, a two-year sample size that no doubt has the rest of the WIAC—and the rest of Region 9—on alert. At this rate, she will be one of, if not the, most decorated player to ever don the UW-Oshkosh uniform in the coming years, which is saying a lot in an accomplished program that has won 20-plus games in each of the last 13 full seasons.

Her freshman year brought the titles of WIAC Newcomer of the Year and D3hoops.com Region 9 Co-Rookie of the Year, making her the first player in program history to garner the latter honor. They were well-deserved too, as Seckar came off the bench in all 32 games, giving the Titans consistent minutes while putting together breakout performances against NCAA Tournament teams in UW-La Crosse (19 points, 11 rebounds) and UW-Stevens Point (11 points, 10 rebounds).

Her sophomore season? It’s been on even another level. Garnering the WIAC Player of the Year award made her the first Oshkosh player to receive the league’s highest individual honor since Leah Porath in 2021, and she also became one of the youngest players in WIAC history to win it.

Then on Monday of this week, less than 48 hours after Seckar’s 15-point, 11-rebound double-double helped send Oshkosh to the national semifinals, she was given the highest honor in arguably the strongest region in the country, selected as D3hoops.com’s Region 9 Player of the Year.

To put into context how unprecedented it really is, no other player in Oshkosh’s winning history has ever earned such an award. And Seckar did it as a sophomore. All-American honors are presumably the next to come for the Oshkosh native.

“It definitely feels super good to have those individual awards, but it’s not something I could do without my teammates,” Seckar said humbly Tuesday. “Our guards have stepped up countless times this year, and so have other post players. Everyone on this team gives their most day-in and day-out, making sure that we’re getting better each day in practice. Even when things aren’t going great—we’ve had a couple of losses—we show up for each other. It’s been super rewarding. That’s a big part of those awards; being able to lean on my teammates and them expressing my abilities the best they can.”

With both Seckar’s phenomenal freshman campaign and the graduation of All-American forward Kayce Vaile, there was little doubt her minutes would see a sizable increase heading into 2025-26. Exactly how much became evident on the Titans’ opening weekend, in a pair of marquee duels at St. Norbert’s Tournament. In a season-opening, 62-59 defeat of eventual CCIW runner-up Carroll, Seckar was on the floor for 33 minutes, a career-high. 24 hours later, she set another career-best for minutes played, lighting up the scoreboard for 21 points in 37 minutes of an overtime win over UChicago. Despite still being a sophomore, she heads to Salem as one of only two players averaging more 30 minutes per game for a Final Four team.

“Building that trust early in my freshman year was something that I feel like not a lot of people get to do,” Seckar said when asked about the value of playing big minutes as a freshman. “That’s what has helped me this year. We already had the trust piece built and it was just about getting better, improving each day and having that constant flow of communication of what the team needs from me and what I need from them.”

With Vaile’s graduation, Oshkosh’s biggest void was perhaps in the rebounding department, where Vaile had grabbed 8.5 boards per game. Seckar helped keep that production on the glass steady from the get-go, with 12 rebounds in the opener against Carroll and a team-leading average of 7.2 entering Thursday’s national semifinal.

More than anything, it has been Seckar’s versatility that stands out most, from her ability to knock down corner 3s, score in the paint, block shots, and have a nose for the ball when a rebound comes down. There is no easy solution to stopping a player with that sort of all-around skill set, as countless WIAC opponents learned throughout January and February. Along with her team-high rebounding, Seckar leads the entire WIAC in blocks with 42, averages a team-best 13.4 points per game, has the team lead in steals (51), and has dished out 68 assists, which is the second-most on the Oshkosh roster.

“I want what’s best for the team, whether that means I’m taking the shot at the end of the shot clock or I’m doing something where I can get somebody open and get them their shot,” Seckar noted of playing within Oshkosh’s highly efficient offense. “I think that’s really what elevates our offense. We maximize each other’s strengths. Whether that means somebody else is shooting or I’m shooting, it doesn’t really matter as long as it’s a good shot for the person who’s taking it.”

Through her freshman year, Seckar primarily saw action as a “perimeter 4” for the Titans, playing a power forward-type role with Vaile holding things down in the post. But that has changed a bit in the current season, with Seckar’s rapid development and versatility allowing Fischer to utilize her in different ways within the offense, including around the rim, even while she remains a threat from the perimeter. Fellow forward Sarah Hardwick has been stellar in the post as well, giving the Titans no shortage of options when it comes to getting production out of the frontcourt.

“I still feel like I’m a little new to the post,” said Seckar, who has shot 37.5% on 32 3-point attempts while also shooting 45.0% in the paint. “It wasn’t ever something I had to do much of last year. And in high school I wasn’t much of a player who sat down in the post. But I’ve been able to grow with the help of my teammates and coaches, and that’s what has helped me elevate my game this year.”

Coming out of Oshkosh West High School, it was evident Seckar had a skill set that would translate to the college level. An All-State honorable mention as a senior, she caught the attention of multiple Division I and Division II programs, receiving several offers to leave home and play elsewhere. But Oshkosh was special, the place where she could make deep postseason runs with the Titans and do so with her family and friends in the stands; a true “win-win”. In two years, that has proven to be the case, with Oshkosh capturing its second and third WIAC regular season titles along with the historic back-to-back trips to the Final Four.

“The biggest thing for me was just having my family and friends be able to come to each game. The support from the community, even when I was in high school, was great. Now at the college level, it’s amazing, and I’m super grateful to have everyone.

“Just having the comfort of my people in the stands when things may not be going great and even when things are super good, that’s really what keeps us grounded.”

In choosing Oshkosh, she became the second Seckar to wear the Titan uniform, joining her older brother Reed, a four-year player for the Titan men from 2022-2026. Basketball runs in the Seckar family starting with their dad, Frank, who enjoyed a stellar career at Vanderbilt that still has him in the Top 5 in the SEC program’s all-time record book in career steals, 3-pointers, and assists. After leading Vanderbilt in scoring as a senior, he went on to play professionally in Europe, spending time in leagues in Germany, Slovakia, and the Netherlands before returning back to his hometown of Oshkosh. Their mom, Jodi, was a great player in her own right, playing point guard at Oshkosh West High.

“Ever since I can remember, I feel like it’s been basketball, whether it be watching my brother play growing up or watching some of my dad’s film,” Paige said. “It’s been super great. I feel like a lot of what I’ve learned has come from my dad, my brother, and my mom, with them taking time being in the gym with me growing up throughout all these years. They’ve really built me into the player I am today. There’s so much knowledge my dad and brother have that they’ve been able to feed into me as well. I’m super lucky to have them.”

Through the last two years, they have been there to see her tremendous trajectory, accomplishing things never before done in Oshkosh history individually while helping the program to incredible highs. Last March, Seckar stepped up off the bench with 10 points in 17 minutes in the Titans’ first Final Four appearance since 1996. Now they are back in Salem, ready to stand on the biggest stage in Division III women’s basketball once again. And they don’t plan on going home before Saturday’s national title game.

“We want some revenge,” Seckar said. “It didn’t go the way we wanted it to while we were there last year (with the semifinal loss to Smith), so we want to make it count this year. It was a big goal of ours to get back [to the Final Four] this season. We’re here now, and we want to make the most of it.”

Thursday’s National Semifinals Schedule

Numbers ahead of team names are overall NCAA Tournament seed per NPI

5:00 PM ET | No. 2 UW-Oshkosh (28-3, No. 5 D3hoops T25) vs. No. 6 Denison (28-2, No. 6 D3hoops T25)

7:30 PM ET | No. 1 NYU (29-0, No. 1 D3hoops T25) vs. No. 4 Scranton (31-0, No. 2 D3hoops T25)

Both games will be streamed on ESPN+ (subscription required). For those looking for radio broadcasts, you should be able to listen online to Oshkosh/Denison on 90.3 WRST-FM Oshkosh (link) and NYU/Scranton on WUSR-Scranton (link). D3hoops.com will have its live scoreboard running, and on-site coverage from Salem throughout the night.

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I’ll have more to come on both last night’s games and Thursday’s national semifinals in the days ahead. But for now, here’s my recap on how it all played out, from New York City, to Scranton, Pennsylvania, to Lexington, Virginia, to Oshkosh, Wisconsin.

Scranton’s defense carries the day in decisive win over Concordia-Moorhead

Final Score: Scranton, 67, Concordia-Moorhead, 42

Game-Shifting Stretch — It was still an eight-point game with 8:56 in the second quarter, as the Cobbers did their best to keep pace with the determined Lady Royals. But then Katie Gorski took over. The junior pushed Scranton’s lead to 12 on a layup with 8:01 left, then came up with a steal and raced ahead of the defense for a second-straight layup. After Olivia Hanson countered for Concordia, Gorski hit a 3 off an assist from Jenna Sloan, as Scranton’s lead ballooned to 15. Gorski’s 7-0 run by herself was part of a larger 13-2 spurt for the hosts, who led convincingly, 38-21, at halftime.

Key Performers — Katie Gorski followed her 23-point game on Friday against Bates with a 13-point effort in Saturday’s win, shooting an efficient 6-of-9 along with 5 rebounds. The Pine Brook, NJ native was an impressive 16-of-23 from the field this weekend.

Scranton PG Kaeli Romanowski added 10 points, 9 rebounds, and 4 assists, with the latter two being team-highs.

MIAC Offensive Player of the Year Maya Metcalf led Concordia’s effort, with 17 points and 6 rebounds against a tough Scranton defense.

Number to Remember — Scranton’s on-ball defense was top-notch all night, producing 15 steals, which marked the Lady Royals’ 13th game of the season with 15 or more steals. It helped produce 21 points off turnovers for the hosts.

Historical significance — Scranton head coach Ben O’Brien heads to his first Final Four in four seasons leading the Lady Royals, with an incredible record of 116-6 in that span. This will also be Scranton’s first national semifinal appearance since 2019.

NYU punches its ticket back to Salem with its 91st consecutive win

Final Score: NYU, 72, UW-La Crosse, 47

Game-Shifting Stretch — Brooke Batchelor and Olivia Lagao combined for three 3s and an 11-0 NYU run in the first three minutes of the second quarter, taking the Violets’ lead from 17-12 to 28-12 in the blink of an eye. The Violets went on to outscore UWL, 21-8, in the 10 minutes leading into halftime, giving them separation that carried into the second half.

Key Performers — Brooke Batchelor had a game to remember for NYU, hitting six of the seven 3-point attempts she took as part of a 22-point performance. The junior guard also grabbed 6 rebounds and had 2 steals.

Zahra Alexander also added to the 3-point onslaught, going 2-of-3 from beyond the arc and 7-of-11 from the field. She was NYU’s leading scorer off the bench, with 19 points.

For La Crosse, Jenna Welsch led her team in made field goals (5) and had 10 points to go along with 5 rebounds.

Number to Remember — 48. That’s how many 3s NYU has made in this tournament—the Violets had 11 against La Crosse—tying the Division III tournament record. NYU tallied a total of 28 3s in this weekend’s wins over Hardin-Simmons and La Crosse.

Historical Significance — NYU won its 91st consecutive game, surpassing UConn’s 90-game streak, which previously stood as the second-longest streak in college hoops history. The Violets also advance to their third consecutive Final Four, where they will aim for a third-straight national championship.

Denison knocks off Washington & Lee in tough road environment

Final Score: Denison, 77, Washington & Lee, 64

Game-Shifting Stretch — W&L pulled back within two, 58-56, on a Mary Schleusner putback with 4:42 left. The momentum seemed to be building in the Generals’ favor, but Denison’s Molly Dorighi knocked down a 3 from the left wing on the ensuing possession and Ada Taute followed with a 3 of her own just 19 seconds left on the heels of Morgan Kress’ block for the Big Red. Denison’s lead widened to eight on that clutch trey, and it never dipped below five over the final four minutes.

Key Performers — W&L’s Mary Schleusner willed the Generals back into the fight after trailing 38-28 at the half, putting up a 12-point, 10-rebound double-double in the third quarter alone. The do-it-all senior forward left everything she had on the floor, scoring 27 points and grabbing 29 rebounds for the Generals, giving her the top three single-game rebounding performances in NCAA D3 Tournament history.

Denison’s victorious effort was led by Ada Taute, who scored 24 points and came up with a couple of clutch shots late, none bigger than her 3-pointer with 4:11 to go. Taute shot 10-of-16 from the field and made all 3 of her 3-point attempts.

Anelly Mad-toingué was Denison’s defensive enforcer in the post, blocking 6 shots to go along with her team-high 15 rebounds, 10 of which came on the defensive end.

Number to Remember — 7. Denison made 7 field goals over the final 10 minutes, shooting 58.3% in the fourth quarter to seize control. The Big Red was also 11-of-14 at the FT line in that closing stretch.

Historical Significance — After coming into this season having never reached the second weekend of the tournament, Denison is heading to its first Final Four in program history. Saturday’s win also tied the program record for single-season wins (28), set in 2010-11.

UW-Oshkosh wins rematch with Chicago in convincing fashion

Final Score: UW-Oshkosh, 73, Chicago, 56

Game-Shifting Stretch — Chicago found a rhythm early in the second quarter, going up 17-13 on a Kate Gross layup with 7:12 until halftime. But the Titans refused to be held back on their home floor, and an Avery Poole 3 on the very next trip down the floor swing the game in Oshkosh’s favor. Abbey India’s layup soon gave the hosts back the lead, and from Poole’s 3 until Paige Seckar’s old-fashioned three-point play with 14 seconds left in the quarter, Oshkosh went on a 17-0 run. That spurt gave the Titans a 30-17 lead at halftime, as they led by double-digits for the entirety of the second half.

Key Performers — Paige Seckar showed up in a big way for Oshkosh, with 15 points, 11 rebounds, 3 assists, and 3 blocks. The sophomore controlled the paint and played all 40 minutes, impacting the game in several different ways on both ends of the floor.

Sammi Beyer put up 22 points for Oshkosh, accounting for half of her team’s eight 3-pointers as part of a 8-of-16 shooting performance.

After coming up with a couple of key plays in Friday’s dramatic win over Hope, Annabelle Spotts stepped up again for Chicago, hitting four 3s in a 22-point game for the sophomore forward.

Number to Remember — 12. That was the assist differential between the two squads, as Oshkosh tallied 15 assists to Chicago’s 3. It played into the overall success on the offensive end for the Titans, who posted their third-highest single-game shooting percentage (51.9%) of the season.

Historical Significance — For the first time since 2014, a WIAC team will make back-to-back appearances in the national semifinals, with UW-Whitewater being the last to do so in its national runner-up finishes in 2013 and 2014. Oshkosh will make its fourth Final Four appearance in program history in Salem.

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