Five NCAA WBB Storylines That Deserved More Coverage This Year

There was a lot of great stories this year in women’s basketball. Who deserved a bit more shine? We bring you a few…

We had a lot of great storylines in women’s college basketball this year. From a return to glory for UConn, a Battle of LA renewed, a fifth Final Four for Dawn Staley to Ta’Niya Latson’s superstar moments at Florida State, the year had a bit of everything.

But there were a couple that we at No Cap Space WBB felt could’ve gotten a bit more play and we’re sure there are some you thought should’ve too. So we’ll make this interactive for folks in order to give everyone a chance to plug the story they wanted to see more of. Leave a comment under our story with someone or something that you thought earned some more column inches or airtime and put someone else on game!

1. Khamil Pierre’s Star Turn

Usually, when a player gets snubbed from some type of major award we end up fixated on the omission. But the bummer is that if we had spent half as much time on the snub as we did on the achievements then it probably doesn’t happen. It’s not as if Vanderbilt was completely ignored by the wider women’s basketball media this year but I guess I was expecting more from their primary media partner. ESPN has a lot on their plate in terms of sports to cover but I guess I thought there would be a little more pomp from the TV product when it came to the SEC. You had a defending champion, Oklahoma and Texas coming into the league and several elite freshmen making their debuts along with a resurgent Tennessee. I get that the singular star of the year was JuJu Watkins but when you consider the goals of these networks — to promote and drive interest in their properties — I think I was surprised to see a lack of zeal in pushing what was on their air.

Which is how we ended up in a world where Khamil Pierre isn’t an All-SEC first teamer in spite of being one of two key cogs in bringing Vanderbilt back to prominence. Maybe it’s a failure of imagination on the part of marketers or maybe it’s just been too long since Vandy was relevant to the women’s basketball world. But for a player to regularly be putting up 20-10 lines and not be positioned alongside her freshman running mate, who was breaking records JuJu and Caitlin Clark didn’t even break, was a big miss. She’s a phenomenal player and deserved a much bigger seat at the table even if Vandy wasn’t a title contender this year.

2. The Ascendant A-10

Pound for pound, I think the A-10 is the most interesting non power conference in America. For the last four or so years, there’s been three or more teams that are NCAA Tournament quality units and their conference tourney is always a bloodbath at the altar of chaos. Aaron Rousell’s Richmond Spiders were good enough to warrant an 8 seed, beat Mississippi State in the first round of the tournament and gave UCLA some early fits. Although the other teams in the mix — George Mason, Davidson and St. Joe‘s — didn’t fare as well in March, this was still a spectacular year for the A-10 and another season that the selection committee should take note of.

Typically it takes a few seasons of legitimately elite play in a mid-major for people to take notice and maybe this was the eyebrow raiser season. I thought Richmond deserved a little bit more buzz given their dominance this year and George Mason was a sensational story on a number of levels. Their A-10 conference tournament title got them their first ever NCAA bid and Vanessa Blair-Lewis’ success at GMU is another door opener for HBCU coaches. Then factor in Davidson, who was so injured at the end of the 2023-2024 season that they literally just packed it in and said “enough is enough”. That same group made it to the A-10 Final. Generally, it was a pretty fun conference season with great players and interesting teams. It might be an annual call to arms from here on out but maybe watch the A-10 a bit more.

3. Katie Dinnebier’s Swan Song

I don’t always advocate for players to transfer up a level from mid-majors, but every now and then there’s a special one that I just want to see against top competition. Even if it’s just a grad transfer season, getting that chance would be worth it. Katie Dinnebier is one of those individuals. If you haven’t followed Drake women’s basketball, Dinnebier has been the Bulldogs engine and a fixture on a team regularly contending for MVC titles. This year, tasked with basically doing it all, the guard more or less did.

23.4 points, 4.5 rebounds, 7.2 assists and 2.5 steals per game on 50% shooting from the field. Thats absolutely preposterous regardless of system or usage. She was one of the national leaders in scoring and assisting while playing 35 minutes per game. In the last six games of the regular season, Dinnebier scored at least 30 points in each matchup and had a slew of 40+ point performances this year. She was on my USBWA All-American ballot and should’ve been on many others.

The MVC was another A-10 type league that had about four or so NCAA Tournament caliber teams that all duked it out for a regular season title. While Drake wasn’t the best of the bunch this year, Dinnebier deserved more national play for her performances and her ability to almost single-handedly keep the Bulldogs in contention. She’ll be going to pharmacy school instead of trying for the WNBA so if this is the end, we at NCS tip our caps to one of the great underrated NCAA seasons we’ve seen in quite some time.

4. Arizona’s Mess and Resolution

I’m pretty stunned at how little national attention the situation at Arizona got. What I know of the end of the Adia Barnes era in Tucson is, it was a toxic relationship that couldn’t be salvaged. Some may blame the administration for not doing what they could to set up a coach who had made the 2021 NCAA championship game for success. Others may turn their ire to that same coach who faced allegations of fostering a negative program culture. Former players took to social media to cryptically throw shots at Barnes specifically. In short, the vibes have been awful all year and it’s kind of surprising that we didn’t get more this year about what exactly what was going on.

Barnes ended up leaving Arizona and taking the job at SMU. Perhaps most interestingly, she brought a few of her former Wildcat players with her. So…so much for everyone on the roster having an issue with the coach, culture or staff? In the aftermath of these types of moves, the knives can occasionally come out. So maybe we’ll still get that story at some point, be it from Barnes’ point of view or the U of A’s. Buffalo head coach Becky Burke is headed to Tucson and now gets the thankless task of trying to rebuild that program. But generally, I was surprised how under the radar the story was until just a few days ago.

5. Lisa Fortier’s Fight

Lisa Fortier had a quote after Gonzaga’s WCC Tournament loss that’s stuck with me for weeks. The Bulldogs head coach was asked about what this senior class meant to her especially in light of the last year. Fortier sat at the podium and said, in essence, that she was in the same seat in 2024 lying to the press about not having cancer. Kind of puts things into perspective, doesn’t it? Her diagnosis became public after the season and her treatments began this summer and into the fall.

To coach, recruit, or try to run a program while undergoing procedures to fight cancer is a Herculean effort. We wanted to do a story on it early in the year but Gonzaga was understandably a little reticent. Sometimes you don’t want to draw attention to yourself in that way or have to stand in front of a mic to talk about the difficulties of cancer treatment. But I would be remiss if I didn’t highlight just how much of a warrior Lisa Fortier has been for the last year and a half. She is one of the best in the business, immensely successful as a coach and a model for us to follow in more ways than one.