Tennessee names Caldwell new women’s basketball coach

The Lady Volunteers have named Kim Caldwell as their new women’s basketball coach, the school has announced.

 University of Tennessee Vice Chancellor/Director of Athletics Danny White announced Sunday that Kim Caldwell, the 2024 Spalding Maggie Dixon NCAA Division I Rookie Coach of the Year, has been chosen to lead the Lady Volunteers. She will be introduced Tuesday at a press conference on campus.

“From the beginning, our goal has been to find a dynamic head coach who can restore our women’s basketball program to national prominence. Kim Caldwell is the ideal person to lead us,” said White. “Kim has a winning formula that she has successfully implemented everywhere she has coached, with a fast-paced, high-octane offense and pressure defense that has led to remarkable results. In this new era of college sports, it was vital that we found an innovative head coach with a strong track record of winning titles. We are eager to return the Lady Vols to a championship level, and we’re confident that Kim Caldwell is the coach who can lead us back to the top.”

Caldwell becomes the fourth head coach of the Lady Vols in the NCAA era of women’s basketball, which began with the late, legendary Pat Summitt at the helm. A rising star in the profession, Caldwell has quickly made an elite mark at two different levels of the game, earning eight NCAA berths and winning seven conference trophies in her eight seasons as a head coach. She led NCAA Division II Glenville State and DI Marshall to championship seasons with a high-octane attack on both ends of the floor and now takes the reins of the winningest program in women’s hoops history.

“I am honored and humbled to accept the role as head coach of this historic program at the University of Tennessee,” Caldwell said. “I can’t help but reflect on accepting the Pat Summitt Trophy three seasons ago and be moved by the great responsibility and opportunity of now leading and building upon the incredible Lady Vol tradition she built. I am so excited to get to work and can’t wait to see what we all can accomplish together.”

Caldwell earned the aforementioned national recognition from the Women’s Basketball Coaches Association after guiding Marshall to a 26-7 overall record and 17-1 league mark in her first season there in 2023-24. She also was named Sun Belt Conference Coach of the Year after directing the Thundering Herd to both the league’s regular season and tournament titles as well as the school’s second NCAA Tournament berth ever and first since 1997.

Marshall ranked in the top five nationally in seven different statistical categories in Caldwell’s first season with the Herd.  One of the nation’s most prolific scoring offenses, the Herd finished with nine games of 90+ points and five games with over 100 points. Marshall led the nation in three-point field goals attempted and third in three-pointers made per game with over 10 per contest.