Virginia fires women’s basketball coach Amaka Agugua-Hamilton after making 1st Sweet 16 since 2000
Virginia fired Amaka Agugua-Hamilton as head coach of the women’s basketball program on Saturday.
Agugua-Hamilton led the Cavaliers to the Sweet 16 for the first time since 2000. She went 70-58, including a 29-42 mark in ACC play.
Virginia became the first double-digit seed to reach the regional semifinals since 2022 and pulled off the upset of the tournament, knocking off No. 2 seed Iowa on the road in double overtime in the second round.
They became the first First Four team to advance this far before falling to TCU.
“I thought we had some really good moments in that game,” Agugua-Hamilton said after that loss. “But the third quarter got away from us. … We came up short, but that doesn’t take away from our season or the growth we’ve had with our program.”
South Carolina coach Dawn Staley, who starred at Virginia as a player, said she had just heard about the coaching change.
“I did reach out to our athletic director at Virginia and she just told me they did part ways. I don’t know why. We’ll talk,” Staley said. “I did reach out to coach Mox to check on her. I didn’t have time to have a conversation with her. I don’t know what went wrong. She had them on the right track.”
Staley said she hopes Virginia gets it together.
“We got a deeply rich tradition at UVA on this stage and we hope to get our team back there one day sooner than later,” Staley said of her alma mater.
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AP March Madness bracket: https://apnews.com/hub/ncaa-womens-bracket and coverage: https://apnews.com/hub/march-madness