The offseason is here, with all of Arizona’s sports done for 2024-25 season and the 2025-26 campaigns still a little ways away.
Which makes this a great time to step back and see how all of the Wildcats’ programs are doing and how they’ve handled the move from the Pac-12 to the Big 12
Over the next few weeks we’ll take a look at each of the UA’s men’s and women’s athletic programs to see what shape they’re in and what prospects they have for the near future. We’ll break down each team and evaluate how it is performing under its current coaching staff, looking at the state of the program before he/she arrived and comparing it to now while also evaluating how that program fits into its new conference.
Next up: Becky Burke’s women’s basketball team
How it looked before
Arizona athletic director Desireé Reed-Francois hired former University at Buffalo head coach Becky Burke after a tumultuous parting with former Wildcat great Adia Barnes.
Barnes was hired by former AD Greg Byrne as the lowest-paid coach in the Pac-12. She took a moribund program that no one outside Tucson—and only a few within Tucson—cared about to the Final Four in five years. The community support exploded with Arizona regularly leading the Pac-12 in attendance and selling out the 2019 WNIT championship game.
The Wildcats made the postseason every year it was held from 2018-19 through 2024-25, after which Barnes left for SMU. The Wildcats were also headed for a high seed and hosting rights in 2019-20 before the pandemic caused the postseason to be canceled.
Three of the five postseason appearances were in the NCAA Tournament, giving Arizona its first appearances in the Big Dance since 2005. The other two postseason runs were in the secondary tournament. Those included marching to the WNIT title in 2019 before that tournament was demoted to tertiary status by the WBIT.
The program had double-digit wins in all but one of Barnes’ seasons and won at least 18 games in each of her final seven years at Arizona. They won at least 20 five times in her nine years at the helm.
On the downside, Barnes had bled a lot of transfers out of the program since the WNIT run and had conflicts with some of her players and their parents in recent years. She had also become increasingly unhappy with what she considered inadequate support for women’s basketball since the change in leadership both within the department and at the university.
Where things stand now
It’s difficult to say where the team stands now because almost everyone is new on both the coaching staff and the roster. The only returning player is Montaya Dew. Others either transferred out before Barnes left or followed her to SMU.
Burke put together a roster fairly quickly, but almost all of it is unproven at this level. The roster consists primarily of players who transferred from mid-major programs or were committed to Buffalo before the coaching change.
The staff will also be learning the ropes at this level. Only associate head coach Ashley Odom has coached or recruited at the power conference level. The team also has ties to the WNBA with former Wildcat and long-time Phoenix Mercury assistant Julie Hairgrove. Director of basketball operations Lauren Flaum and two creatives were retained from the previous staff, but the rest of the coaching and support staff come from mid-major programs, are Burke’s former players and staff members, and/or have not been in college or professional basketball in recent years.
Big 12 vs. Pac-12
When it comes to women’s sports, it would probably be easiest just to copy and paste, “The Big 12 isn’t the Pac-12.”
That’s true when discussing softball, volleyball, gymnastics, soccer, beach volleyball, swimming and diving, and just about every other sport known to womankind. Women’s basketball is no different if you look at history, but it wasn’t the case last year. The Big 12 didn’t have the star power of the old league, but it had more depth in 2024-25.
The old Pac-12 put a higher percentage of teams into the 2025 NCAA Tournament with 58 percent of former members of the Conference of Champions advancing to the Big Dance compared to 44 percent of the Big 12. In both cases, that came down to seven teams, but finishing in the top half of the Big 12 didn’t mean a berth like it did in the Pac-12. The Big 12 had more teams advance beyond the round of 64 (4 vs 3) and more end up ranked at the end of the season (5 vs 2), but the old Pac-12 had teams advance further.
The Big 12 started the season with five ranked teams, including Iowa State in the AP top 10. That number would drop over the course of the season and ISU did not live up to the hype, but when all was said and done, five Big 12 teams were in the AP Top 25.
Utah was the only one of the former Pac-12 teams to make the NCAA Tournament out of the Big 12, although both Arizona and Colorado went to the WBIT. The end of the Pac-12 and the retirement of Tara VanDerveer saw Stanford take a step back.
USC and UCLA made huge additions in the transfer portal and were two of the best teams in the country. Both got No. 1 seeds in the tournament. The Bruins made it to the Final Four. USC fell short after an injury to star JuJu Watkins in the Sweet 16 but still advanced to the Elite 8.
Oregon State took the WCC Tournament crown to advance to March Madness. Oregon, California, and Washington all made it back to the tourney after missing in recent years. When Utah was included, that was almost 60 percent of the old Pac-12 making the Big Dance, even with Stanford’s NCAA streak ending.
The Big 12’s best seed was TCU, which got a No. 2 seed. They ended the season as the No. 6 team in the AP poll after being the second team on the “others receiving votes” list to start the year. Joining them were Baylor, Kansas State, West Virginia, Oklahoma State, Utah, and Iowa State. Arizona and Colorado were in a battle for an eighth berth, but both ended up on the wrong side of the bubble and played in the WBIT.
When all was said and done, the Big 12 put five teams in the final AP poll: TCU (6), Kansas State (13), Baylor (18), West Virginia (21), and Oklahoma State (24). Only two former Pac-12 teams ended with a ranking: UCLA (3) and USC (5).
One big question
How will Burke and her players handle their first year of Power 4 competition?
Burke’s pre-Arizona experience came in NAIA, Division II, and mid-major Division I leagues. Buffalo played in the MAC, which was the 16th-ranked league last season based on NET. The Bulls faced one Power 4 team all season. They beat Rutgers in the WNIT. The Scarlet Knights went into the tournament at 11-19 and finished 13-20. They were 3-15 in the Big Ten.
Burke has been extremely successful at every stop she has made. Whether that transfers to Power 4 basketball is the question.
As for her players, only returning Dew has played extensive minutes in a major conference, and she is coming off her second knee injury in as many years. While Arizona got transfers from Texas Tech, Kansas, and Virginia, only one of them played last season. She saw just 34 minutes on the court.
There are some very promising newcomers on the team. Kamryn Kitchen was a top 100 recruit before enrolling early at Virginia and redshirting last year. Ogheneruona (Miracle) Akpotayobo was an Auburn commit that several Power 4 teams recruited when she decommitted from the Tigers. Mickayla Perdue was the Horizon League Player of the Year last season. All of them have the potential to be great, but they will be getting used to a different level of play.
How the team does the first year could have an impact on future recruiting, so getting off to a good start could be key to Burke’s tenure at Arizona.
Lead photo by Ryan Kelapire