WBB: Summer Mailbag
118 days until the opening night of college basketball and our WAC Hoops Nation readers have left a few questions to tackle on this week after the Fourth of July...
July 1 has come and gone which means the departures of defending champion GCU and Seattle are final. Now it’s time to look towards 2025-2026 and one last campaign with the WAC in its current incarnation.
I’ll tackle those questions here and offer some realignment thoughts as well…
It’s no secret that the Trailblazers struggled to score last year with an offense that averaged just under 61 points per game while shooting at a nearly 36 percent rate (32 percent from 3-point range). The Warren Twins will definitely help in that department (in 2023-2024 they combined to average 30.5 points per game while connecting on 123 3-pointers at a nearly 37 percent rate). Add to that the returns of Ellie Taylor (an all freshman WAC selection), Paige Cofer (who won a Newcomer of the Week award), Brie Crittendon, along with Chardonay Hartley (sixth in assists per game nationally) and the pieces are there for Utah Tech offensively. Is there room for improvement defensively? Definitely, but adding the Warren Twins back into the fold should give them the ability to win games they might not have last year.
If it was October and I had to do a preseason poll for media day I’d probably start the Trailblazers at No. 2.
ACU will be my preseason favorite to win the regular season title at this point. Even though they lost a bunch in Bella Earle and Zoe Jackson they’ll still have a lot back, including my pick for preseason Player of the Year in Payton Hull.
Very good question Alan…
Certainly, the addition of Gia Adams (who won Newcomer of the Year honors in 2023-2024 while at UT Arlington) is huge for a Texan side that lost a lot from their regular season runner-up and WNIT team last year.
The question is outside of her and Jakoriah Long where will the points come from? I have no doubt Tarleton State will still be one of the WAC’s best defensive units but they’re going to have to score points to keep up with the CBU’s, ACU’s, Utah Tech’s, and UT Arlington’s of the world.
I wouldn’t be shocked to see the Texans up there but right now I see them somewhere in the middle of the pack.
At this point there has been no official announcement about the conference scheduling format to be used this season.
If it’s anything like last year expect conference schedules to be released sometime in the next three to six weeks which puts us in early to mid-August.
Finally, Darth Dad asked for some general thoughts on realignment and what it’s done to the WAC.
While I’m sad to see the conference, that has existed since John F. Kennedy was in the White House, concluding their existence it’s not surprising.
The WAC has long lived off of Division I teams making short stays before going onto greener pastures and teams moving up from Division II. However, they just came up against losses that couldn’t be replaced.
In fact CBU’s Jarrod Olson pointed out to us last season in his preseason podcast episode that of the teams that were in the WAC when the Lancers arrived in 2018 Utah Valley will be the only program remaining just eight years later.
That’s a crazy amount of conference turnover in less than a decade.
For reference the WAC in 2018 had Missouri-Kansas City (Summit League), New Mexico State (CUSA), UTRGV (Southland), Cal State Bakersfield (Big West), Chicago State (NEC), Seattle U (WCC), and GCU (Mountain West).
When we talked with Utah Valley coach Dan Nielson last summer he predicted that contraction to more regionally based conferences was a distinct possibility.
I don’t know that anyone saw it coming this quickly but nonetheless it’s here and here to stay.
There are things that realignment can’t take away however…
The wonderful experiences I’ve had traveling across this conference that I hope to add to in this coming season.
The passionate fan bases that I’ve gotten to interact with over these last several years.
The relationships built with coaches, broadcasters and school personnel across this conference.
That’s what I’ll remember just over nine months from now when the curtain closes on #WACVegas 2026.
But for now, let’s all just enjoy the journey.