The Marquette women’s basketball team will enter a new era in the 2024-25 season.
Former head coach Megan Duffy has left after leading the program to its best start in program history and an NCAA Tournament birth this past season in her fifth year with Marquette.
The Virginia Tech Hokies named Duffy as their eighth head coach Wednesday, replacing Kenny Brooks who coached the team for eight seasons before joining Kentucky.
Duffy signed a six-year contract with the Hokies worth $5.5 million, who finished first in the Atlantic Coast Conference this season and made the Round of 32 in this year’s NCAA Tournament.
Marquette vice president and director of athletics Bill Scholl said the criteria for the school’s new head coach search are strict.
“There are a few things that are non-negotiable: you need to have a clean NCAA record, you have to want to do things the right way and you have to be a great fit at Marquette,” Scholl said in an exclusive interview Wednesday with Kristin Parisi.
Here are five candidates to become the new leader of the Golden Eagles:
Ginny Boggess
A familiar name in the Marquette program, Boggess was an assistant under former head coach Carolyn Kieger and is currently the women’s head coach at Monmouth University.
Boggess led the Hawks to a second-round finish in the WNIT and a second place finish in the Coastal Athletic Association this past season. Monmouth’s 22 wins were the most in a season under Boggess.
In her five years at Marquette, Boggess was the lead recruiting coordinator and was key in player development, helping to recruit Chloe Marotta, Natisha Hiedeman and Lauren Van Kleunen among others.
Kristen Gillespie
Gillespie, who just finished her seventh season with the Illinois State Redbirds, finished last season with a 22-12 record, which included a nail-biter loss to the Golden Eagles on Dec. 1o, 2023, 64-62.
She led the Redbirds to a Missouri Valley Conference title in 2022-23, winning 24 games and advancing to the conference’s tournament title game.
Gillespie has reached one NCAA Tournament with Illinois State, which resulted in a 98-58 loss to the No. 2 seed Iowa Hawkeyes in the first round in 2022.
Tony Greene
Another former Marquette assistant, Greene just finished his third year as an assistant with Baylor, who made the Sweet 16 before losing to USC 74-70.
He only spent a season at Marquette as an assistant in 2020-21, working in player development, recruiting and scheduling.
He has 25-plus years of coaching experience and has helped the Bears hold opponents to just 26.3% from the three-point line this past season, which ranked 8th in the country.
Tamara Inoue
Inoue has been very successful as UC Irvine’s women’s head coach for eight years. Including a NCAA tournament appearance this season, she led the Anteaters to a Big West regular season title in the 2022-23 season and has four 20-win seasons since taking over in 2016.
Her squads have finished tied for second or better in the conference the last five campaigns, including a second place finish this past season.
Inoue boasts one of the better defenses in the country with opponents scoring 55.7 points per game, which ranks 14th nationally. The Anteaters averaged 10.3 steals per game last season (33rd in the country) and forced 18.8 turnovers a game (42nd nationally).
Kellie Harper
Harper was let go by Tennessee on Apr. 1, 2024 after five seasons. She has 29 years of coaching experience, 17 of which have resulted in NCAA Tournament appearances. Seven other seasons ended in WNIT berths.
She is one of two coaches to ever take four different teams to the Big Dance.
A former player under Pat Summitt with the Volunteers, Harper won three national titles as a member of the team.
Harper led the Vols to back-to-back Sweet 16 appearances in her last two seasons at the helm.
This story was written by Trevor Hilson. He can be reached at trevor.hilson@marquette.edu or @hilsontrevor on Twitter/X.