Courtney Rosholt Banghart (born May 11, 1978)[1] is an American basketball coach who is currently the head women's basketball coach at North Carolina. Prior to North Carolina, she served as head coach at Princeton from 2007 to 2019.

Courtney Banghart
Banghart coaching North Carolina in 2024
Current position
TitleHead coach
TeamNorth Carolina
ConferenceACC
Record96–56 (.632)
Biographical details
Born (1978-05-11) May 11, 1978 (age 46)
Manchester, New Hampshire, U.S.
Playing career
1996–2000Dartmouth
Position(s)Guard
Coaching career (HC unless noted)
2000–2003Episcopal HS
2003–2007Dartmouth (assistant)
2007–2019Princeton
2019–presentNorth Carolina
Administrative career (AD unless noted)
2000–2003Episcopal HS
Head coaching record
Overall350–159 (.688)
Tournaments5–12 (NCAA)
1–2 (WNIT)
Accomplishments and honors
Championships
  • Ivy League regular season (2010–2013, 2015, 2018, 2019)
  • 2× Ivy League tournament (2018, 2019)
Awards

Playing career

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Born in Manchester, New Hampshire, Banghart graduated from Souhegan High School in Amherst, New Hampshire and Dartmouth College, also in New Hampshire. As a guard, Banghart played for Dartmouth from 1996 to 2000, including the Dartmouth teams that won the 1999 and 2000 Ivy League titles.[2][3] She holds Dartmouth records for three-pointers in a game, season, and career.[2]

Coaching career

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From 2000 to 2003, Banghart was athletic director and head coach of the girls' basketball and girls' tennis teams at Episcopal High School in Alexandria, Virginia.[2]

As an assistant coach at Dartmouth, Banghart helped lead Dartmouth to two Ivy League championships, and two NCAA appearances in 2005 and 2006. Dartmouth went 70–44 those seasons including 41–15 in Ivy League play.

In 2007, Banghart became the head coach for the Princeton Tigers. Her teams there won five outright Ivy League championships from 2010 through 2015, and, as a result, appeared in five NCAA Division I women's tournaments and a sixth "at-large" appearance in 2016. Her best team was the 2014–15 unit, which went 30–0 in the regular season and defeated Green Bay in the 2015 NCAA tournament—the first NCAA tournament win in program history.[4] That same season saw Banghart notch her 164th win as Princeton head coach, vaulting her past Joan Kowalik to become the winningest coach in Princeton women's basketball history.

On February 3, 2017, against Dartmouth, her alma mater, Banghart notched her 200th win as a head coach.[5] She tallied her 250th career win on March 2, 2019, against Harvard.[6]

In April 2017, Banghart was selected to be an assistant coach for the 2017 USA Basketball Women's U23 national team, which is composed of women, age 23 or younger, who are currently freshmen, sophomores or juniors in college.[7] The team competed in and won the inaugural U24 Four Nations Tournament in Tokyo, Japan.[8]

On April 30, 2019, Banghart was announced as the new head coach at North Carolina.[9] Her first two seasons at Carolina had their share of ups and downs; however, Banghart's early Carolina tenure picked up steam on the recruiting trail, with all four signees in Carolina's 2021 recruiting class being named to the women's Jordan Brand Classic event.[10]

Banghart recorded her 300th win as a head coach on February 3, 2022, against Wake Forest. Her Tar Heels team won its twentieth game on February 17 in an upset over the No. 3 ranked Louisville Cardinals, becoming the first Tar Heel women's team to post twenty overall wins and ten conference wins in a season since the 2014–15 campaign. The 2021–22 Tar Heels' 13 wins in ACC conference play are the most since the 2012–13 season, when Sylvia Hatchell's team won 14 ACC games.

Recognition

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In 2015, the United States Basketball Writers Association named Banghart as Coach of the Year.[11] Fortune named her one of the World's 50 Greatest Leaders for "taking charge of a mediocre team that had never made the NCAA tournament" while ensuring players met Princeton's academic standards.[12][13]

Head coaching record

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Statistics overview
Season Team Overall Conference Standing Postseason
Princeton Tigers (Ivy League) (2007–2019)
2007–08 Princeton 7–23 4–10 6th
2008–09 Princeton 14–14 9–5 3rd
2009–10 Princeton 26–3 14–0 1st NCAA first round
2010–11 Princeton 24–5 13–1 1st NCAA first round
2011–12 Princeton 24–5 14–0 1st NCAA first round
2012–13 Princeton 22–7 13–1 1st NCAA first round
2013–14 Princeton 21–9 11–3 T–2nd WNIT second round
2014–15 Princeton 31–1 14–0 1st NCAA second round
2015–16 Princeton 23–6 12–2 2nd NCAA first round
2016–17 Princeton 16–14 9–5 2nd WNIT first round
2017–18 Princeton 24–6 12–2 1st NCAA first round
2018–19 Princeton 22–10 12–2 1st NCAA first round
Princeton: 254–103 (.711) 137–31 (.815)
North Carolina Tar Heels (Atlantic Coast Conference) (2019–present)
2019–20 North Carolina 16–14 7–11 T–11th Postseason cancelled
2020–21 North Carolina 13–11 8–9 8th NCAA first round
2021–22 North Carolina 25–7 13–5 T–3rd NCAA Sweet Sixteen
2022–23 North Carolina 22–11 11–7 T–6th NCAA second round
2023–24 North Carolina 20–13 11–7 T–7th NCAA second round
North Carolina: 96–56 (.632) 50–39 (.562)
Total: 350–159 (.688)

      National champion         Postseason invitational champion  
      Conference regular season champion         Conference regular season and conference tournament champion
      Division regular season champion       Division regular season and conference tournament champion
      Conference tournament champion

References

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  1. ^ "Women's Basketball Coaches Career". NCAA. Retrieved March 6, 2024.
  2. ^ a b c "Courtney Banghart". Princeton University Athletics. Retrieved November 25, 2016.
  3. ^ "basketball". 1999-11-29. Archived from the original on 1999-11-29. Retrieved 2021-06-01.
  4. ^ Princeton 2014-15 season statistics
  5. ^ Murphy, Chris (February 6, 2017). "Women's Basketball Nets Two Huge Wins". dailyprincetonian.com. Retrieved March 6, 2024.
  6. ^ "Tigers Honor Seniors With Thrilling 61-58 Win; Banghart Earns 250th Career Victory". Princeton Athletics. March 2, 2019. Retrieved March 5, 2019.
  7. ^ "Jeff Walz, Courtney Banghart And Michelle Clark-Heard To Lead 2017 USA Basketball Women's U23 National Team". usab.con. April 19, 2017. Archived from the original on August 7, 2017. Retrieved June 30, 2017.
  8. ^ "Women Capture U24 Four Nations Tournament Title". usab.com. August 15, 2017. Archived from the original on August 16, 2017. Retrieved August 15, 2017.
  9. ^ Wilcox, Ryan (2019-04-30). "UNC women's basketball names Courtney Banghart as its new head coach". Daily Tar Heel. Retrieved 2019-04-30.
  10. ^ "Four Tar Heels Named to Jordan Brand Classic Girls National Team". GoHeels.com. May 24, 2021.
  11. ^ "Banghart Named Coach of the Year". Valley News. April 6, 2015. Retrieved April 6, 2015.[dead link]
  12. ^ Maine, D'Arcy (March 26, 2015). "Princeton's Courtney Banghart Joins Taylor Swift And Pope Francis On List". ESPN. Retrieved March 6, 2024.
  13. ^ Casey, Tim (January 10, 2015). "At Princeton, a Student of Sports Leadership Successfully Applies Her Research". The New York Times. Retrieved November 25, 2016.
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