WBB: Abilene Christian Wildcats Preview
ACU reached the Super 16 of the WNIT in their first national tournament appearance since the 2021 Women's Basketball Invitational. How do they follow it up in 2025-2026 before moving to the UAC?
It’s a well-known fact that most teams which perform well in either WBIT, WNIT, or WBI play usually experience a momentum bump a year later. Look at CBU, who won the WBI in 2023 and parlayed that momentum into the second sweep of titles in their WAC history a year later, earning a date with UCLA in NCAA tournament first round action.
Abilene Christian is one such team looking to continue that trend in this final season of WAC membership, returning five of their top six scorers including Preseason Player of the Year contender Payton Hull.
Let’s take a look at the 2025-2026 Wildcats, which will feature a nearly equal mix of returners and newcomers…
Head Coach:
Julie Goodenough (14th season at school, 33rd season as a head coach)
Last Year:
22-13 Overall & 9-7 WAC (T4 Regular Season, lost in quarterfinals of WAC tournament, WNIT Super 16 participant)
Career Record:
539-363 (.598),
At ACU: 250-143
Returners:
7
Natalia Chavez-Shot just under 31 percent from 3-point range with 23 made 3-pointers against DI opponents.
Erin Woodson-Had ten games in double-digit scoring after January 18, including a stretch of four in a row in late January and mid February. Had seven games of three or more made 3-pointers last year. Set a new career mark for scoring on January 30 in Moody against CBU with 23 points in a losing effort.
Breanna Davis-Had four games of five assists or more in a three and a half week stretch from mid-January to mid-February.
Payton Hull-Closed the year averaging 20.8 points per game on 48 percent shooting (41 percent from 3-point range) over her last four contests. That includes back-to-back 25+ point performances against Central Arkansas and Illinois State. Hull will likely start as WAC Preseason Player of the Year when we reach October’s media day.
Meredith Mayes- Second Team All-WAC selection, 11.3 points, 7.2 rebounds, and 36 blocks which led the team. That blocks number was also good enough for T3 across the WAC.
Emma Troxell- Averaged 11.1 points and 5.2 rebounds per game, team leader in made 3-pointers a year ago. Set a career-high in scoring on March 13 against Utah Valley in the WAC tournament quarterfinal loss with 20 points.
Aimee Flippen-Had a solid stretch of five games in mid-November where she saw double-digit minutes but reached that mark just once in February and March. There is still a decent amount of size in the WAC so the Wildcats could use any improvement from the 6’4” sophomore this season.
Key Losses:
Bella Earle (13.9 points, 7.1 rebounds, 2.4 steals, 4.2 assists per game; All WAC-first team selection)
Newcomers:
HS Freshman-Molly and Emma Daugherty, Bree Riley, and Riley Grohman
Molly Daugherty was a 1,000 point scorer at the high school level in South Carolina while sister Emma averaged between two and three assists per game over the final three years of her prep career.
Riley scored just over 2,900 points at the HS level and was a four-time Houston Chronicle first team selection.
Grohman holds the Jim Ned HS records for career points, steals, assists, and steals. She averaged between 3.8 and 5.0 assists per game for the duration of her HS career while jumping from 10.4 points per game as a Freshman to 17 as a senior.
Portal-Jazmyn Stone
Stone is a College of Charleston transfer who closed her time on the East Coast with six of her final eight games in double-digit scoring. Tied a career-high with five made 3-pointers on March 2nd against UNCW and jumped from 25 percent shooting beyond the arc to just over 30 last year.
JC Transfer-Jordyn Coleman
Last year Coleman led the NJCAA (all junior colleges except California) in offensive rebounds with 210 and was fifth in total rebounding at 403. Over the course of her career at Triton College she recorded 44 double-doubles (a 70 percent rate) and was in double-digit scoring 55 times (87 percent).
Outlook:
ACU will enter the WAC’s last dance as a contender for a regular season title with five of their top six scorers back from a team that made the WNIT Super 16 and very nearly reached the Great 8.
Everyone knows about ACU’s high-powered offense, which last year was fifth in scoring at just under 69 points per game in WAC games and fourth in field goal percentage.
But it was the Wildcats improvement defensively under first-year assistant and now Associate Head Coach Yannick Denson that turned heads. ACU was 14th nationally in turnovers forced per game at 21.49 and 30th in steals per game at 10.5.
With a newfound love of defense and one of the conference’s top offenses look for ACU to be in the hunt to win their first regular season title since 2019, when they were Southland Conference members.
“We pride ourselves on playing defense the right way and Coach Denson deserves a lot of credit for bringing out our love of being on that end of the court,” said Emma Troxell in a summer episode of the Straight Outta WAC podcast. “Even though we went the furthest of any WAC team in the postseason and last year’s champion is gone we’re approaching this year as if we are the hunters, chasing something we haven’t yet won.”
Scheduling Tidbits:
It was announced in early July that the Wildcats will be spending Thanksgiving at the Elevance Health Ft. Myers Tip-Off. Their opponents in the Shell Division will be Northwestern and Bradley.
Before that the Wildcats will play four games in 12 days against three Southland opponents (v UIW, v UTRGV, and @ SFA), and an American Athletic Conference opponent at North Texas.
They’ll also host a pre-Christmas MTE with Montana, Buffalo, and WAC foe Tarleton State making the trip to Moody Coliseum. Buffalo won the WNIT last season under former head coach Becky Burke, who left during the offseason to take the Arizona job vacated when Adia Barnes left for SMU while Montana lost by a point to Montana State in the Big Sky tournament final.
ACU will open WAC play at Utah Tech and Utah Valley over the New Year’s weekend before returning to play four of five at home. That includes Tarleton State twice, UT Arlington, and Southern Utah. The road game in that stretch is a trip to CBU on January 15 for an 11am Pacific Time tip-off.
The Wildcats will play three of their final five games at home which includes games against Utah Tech, Utah Valley, and CBU. They’ll finish at UT Arlington on March 7.