Northwestern Wildcats women's basketball
| Northwestern Wildcats women's basketball | |||
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| University | Northwestern University | ||
| Conference | Big Ten | ||
| Location | Evanston, IL | ||
| Head coach | Joe McKeown (8th year) | ||
| Arena |
Welsh-Ryan Arena (Capacity: 8,117) |
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| Nickname | Wildcats | ||
| Student section | Wildside | ||
| Colors | Purple and White |
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| Uniforms | |||
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| NCAA Tournament second round | |||
| 1980, 1987, 1991, 1993 | |||
| NCAA Tournament appearances | |||
| 1979, 1980, 1981, 1982, 1987, 1990, 1991, 1993, 1997, 2015 | |||
| Conference tournament champions | |||
| 1990 | |||
The Northwestern Wildcats women's basketball team is the intercollegiate women's basketball program representing Northwestern University. The school competes in the Big Ten Conference in Division I of the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA). The Wildcats play home basketball games at the Welsh-Ryan Arena on the university campus in Evanston, Illinois.
The Wildcats began play in women's basketball in 1975, with Mary DiStanislao as the first head coach, who coached for five seasons, with the final two resulting in appearances in the AIAW Tournament. In 1980, Annette Lynch took over as head coach, leading the team to postseason appearances (AIAW and NCAA) in her first two seasons, with the latter (1981) being the first season in the Big Ten Conference.
In 1984, Don Perrelli became head coach of the Wildcats. In his 15 year tenure, he led the team to 5 appearances in the NCAA Tournament, a Big Ten title in 1990 (with a 24–5 record, 15–3 conference record, which remains their only conference title), and a NWIT appearance. Perrelli retired after the 1998–99 season.
June Olkowski took over, coaching Northwestern for five seasons, but she was fired after finishing 10th or worse each time, never winning more than three conference games. Beth Combs was hired to coach the Wildcats in 2004, but she was fired after four seasons, highlighted with winning only 7 conference games in 4 years and never finishing higher than 10th place.
Joe McKeown was hired for the 2008 season. After a 10th place finish in his first season, they finished tied for 8th in the conference (good enough to qualify for the WNIT) the following season, their highest finish since the 1998 season. After appearing in the WNIT twice in the following four seasons, the Wildcats returned to the NCAA Women's Division I Basketball Tournament in 2015, their first appearance since 1997, in a season where they had their highest finish in the conference (1994) since 1996.
The Wildcats have appeared in the Women's National Invitation Tournament (WNIT) three times, having a combined record of 5–3. They also appeared in the National Women's Invitational Tournament (the precursor to the WNIT, with 8 teams instead of the traditional 64 the WNIT has) once, having a record of 3–1.
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