UW Huskies fire women’s basketball coach Jody Wynn after 4 seasons
Mar 15, 2021, 3:07 PM
SEATTLE (AP) — UW Huskies women’s basketball coach Jody Wynn was fired on Monday after four seasons during which the Huskies were among the worst teams in the Pac-12 Conference.
Wynn was 38-75 overall and a miserable 11-58 in Pac-12 play. The Huskies never finished higher than ninth in the conference standings during any of her four seasons. They went 7-14 overall and 3-13 in conference play this season.
“I want to thank Jody for her contributions to the program the last four years,” athletic director Jennifer Cohen said in a statement. “These decisions are extremely difficult, but we felt it was in the best interest of our current and future Huskies to make a leadership change and move in a new direction with our women’s basketball program.”
The school said a national search for a new coach would begin immediately.
Wynn arrived at Washington in 2017 after eight seasons as the head coach at Long Beach State, a tenure that included an appearance in the NCAA Tournament during her final season.
She faced a tough task coming aboard following the departure of Mike Neighbors for Arkansas. Led by all-time NCAA scoring leader Kelsey Plum, the Huskies were coming off three straight NCAA Tournament appearances and the school’s first Final Four berth when Wynn arrived.
Wynn’s style never seemed to mesh with the Huskies program. Several key players left the program, highlighted by Aari McDonald, who departed before Wynn’s first season and this past season was the Pac-12 player of the year for Arizona.
Washington won three conference games combined in Wynn’s first two seasons. The team seemed to be on a better trajectory last season when the Huskies reached the semifinals of the Pac-12 tournament, but this season represented another step back. Washington lost eight straight at one point during conference play and lost to UCLA in the quarterfinals of the conference tournament.
