South Carolina Women’s Basketball coach Dawn Staley has been named NCAAW Coach of the Year by the Associated Press.
Her Lady Gamecocks finished the season at 32-1 (16-0), with their only blemish being an out of conference loss to No. 20 Indiana early in the year. They burned through the SEC without losing a game, earning SEC regular season and tournament titles.
The Gamecocks almost certainly would’ve been the top seed in the NCAA Tournament, with a resume unmatched by any team in the nation.
Coach Staley’s team defeated three of the top five schools in the country, having beaten No. 3 Baylor, No. 4 Maryland, and No. 5 UCONN. They also took down No. 9 Mississippi St, No. 16 Kentucky, No. 17 South Dakota, No. 18 Texas A&M, and No. 24 Arkansas throughout the course of the year.
Dawn Staley has been at South Carolina since 2008, where she’s amassed a record of 305-98, winning over 75% of her games on the sidelines with the Lady Gamecocks. According to 247 Sports, her career SEC winning percentage of .726 is second most all-time, behind only legendary coach Pat Summit.
An aside, it’s also only fitting that her senior guard Tyasha Harris received this year’s Dawn Staley Award which recognizes the player that best exemplifies the skills that Staley possessed in her playing days – ball-handling, scoring, distribution, and a will to win.
**All rankings based on final AP poll