The perfect head coach hire for Florida, Pitt and every WBB power conference opening

Women's college basketball coaching silly season has arrived, with a number of head coaching positions across the landscape already coming open. More openings will likely trickle out, but at the moment we have five among power conference programs.

What route will those teams go to fill those holes? High-major assistants? Successful mid-major coaches? Former power conference head coaches looking for a second chance? There are a number of ways to go, but all of these programs have one thing in common: they really, really need to get this hire right.

Boston College: Alisa Kresge

Joanna Bernabei-McNamee had some solid years at Boston College, winning 20-plus games twice and making the WBIT in the 2024-25 season. Unfortunately, she followed that up with a 5-26 campaign, the worst season in program history. It was time to make a change.

The Northeast is a tough place to compete in women's basketball, with UConn kind of just dominating the scene up there while a number of good players end up at an Ivy. There's a reason Boston College hasn't made the NCAA Tournament since 2006.

Getting a coach who knows the environment up there would be smart here. Vermont's Alisa Kresge stands out as a strong option here, as she's led the Catamounts to five consecutive seasons with 20-plus wins. Would she want to go from a competitive mid-major where she has a shot to make the NCAA Tournament each year to a spot that's probably the worst job in the ACC at the moment? Good question, but Boston College really needs to show they're serious about women's basketball and opening their wallet up a bit to go after Kresge would help prove that.

Florida: Yolett McPhee-McCuin

There have been conflicting reports about how much Florida is willing to invest in its next women's basketball coach. One reporter suggested the team would only be willing to pay about $700K, while others have said that Florida will pay what it takes to find the right coach.

If the latter scenario is true, then the team has to at least try to go after Ole Miss' Yolett McPhee-McCuin. Is she gettable? Who knows, but we've seen plenty of women's basketball coaches leave one power conference school for another, and Florida could have the resources to compete at a level beyond what Ole Miss does, if the Gators are willing to pony up the money. But it's likely going to take a lot of assurances not only in terms of McPhee-McCuin's potential contract, but also about the level of funding available to be competitve in the transfer portal. McPhee-McCuin did a great job building through the portal at Ole Miss.

Northwestern: Carrie Moore

After leading the Wildcats since 2008, Joe McKeown has retired, opening the door for Northwestern to make its first hire in almost two decades.

This is a program that's pretty far away from competing, making just two NCAA Tournament appearances in McKeown's tenure. It doesn't feel like Northwestern is a team that will make a splashy hire, instead potentially going the route of bringing in a successful mid-major coach.

Enter Harvard's Carrie Moore. I think bringing in an Ivy League coach makes a lot of sense considering Northwestern's focus on academics, and Moore has been incredibly successful with the Crimson, leading the program to 20-plus wins in two of her first four seasons. To put that into perspective, Harvard had one 20-win season in Kathy Delaney-Smith's final seven seasons as the head coach.

Penn State: Daniel Barber

Penn State needs someone who understands how to put together a program in this new era. Who better than an assistant coach who is under 40 but has spent time as a recruiting coordinator at three major schools, including Penn State?

Daniel Barber currently coaches at Arizona State, a program that just produced a major turnaround in head coach Molly Miller's first season at the helm, and Barber's presence was a big part of that. Barber has shown he deserves a head coaching position, and while traditional wisdom might say he needs to start off at a mid-major, I'm not sure conventional wisdom really matters these days. I mean, Rutgers moved quickly to hire LSU assistant coach Gary Redus, a move that's been viewed as a major plus for the program. Penn State should follow that path by hiring Barber to the position. It will take some time to build a winner in State College, and Barber has the time and the knowledge to be the guy who does it.

Pitt: Samantha Williams

I don't really know what's going on at Pitt. The team went 1-17 in ACC play and moved on from head coach Tory Verdi, who is being sued by multiple former players for abuse. Pitt went the mid-major head coach route in hiring Verdi and it didn't work out at all, so maybe it's time to go with the high-major assistant approach.

Mississippi State assistant Samantha Williams fits that bill, and the fact that she was an assistant at Tennessee when current Pitt athletic director Allen Greene was in Knoxville certainly helps her make a case.

Williams also does have prior head coaching experience, spending two seasons at Eastern Kentucky and turning the program around quickly before taking the Tennessee assistant job. Turning around Pitt won't be as easy as turning around EKU was, but Williams has the experience and coaching know-how to improve things for the Panthers, even if turning the program into an ACC contender feels unlikely.

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