The new Big 12: What to know about league’s four women’s basketball additions (2024)

photo by: AP Photo/Jessica Hill

Arizona head coach Adia Barnes talks with Arizona forward Breya Cunningham, right, in the first half of a first-round college basketball game against Syracuse in the NCAA Tournament, Saturday, March 23, 2024, in Storrs, Conn.

At first glance, the colossal shift in the makeup of the Big 12 Conference for women’s basketball might seem like a boon to the teams remaining in the league.

Oklahoma and Texas, which were the top two teams in the league last season — one won the regular-season title, the other the conference tournament — are gone.

In their place are four new teams that finished fifth, sixth, seventh and 11th in their own previous league, the Pac-12 Conference.

But to characterize that as a win for Kansas, as well as the likes of Kansas State, Iowa State, Baylor and West Virginia, would be to neglect the strength of the Pac-12. The upper level of that league included a top NCAA Tournament seed in USC (which knocked KU out), two No. 2 seeds in Stanford and UCLA and a No. 3 seed in Oregon State.

As No. 5 seeds, Colorado and Utah were right on par with Oklahoma, which gave the Big 12 such fits last year, and Arizona was a tournament team after making it out of the First Four. Only Arizona State appears on the less threatening side, as it continues to rebuild under Natasha Adair.

Here’s a quick look at all four of these teams, which could certainly shake up the Big 12 hierarchy in their first season.

photo by: AP Photo/Jeff Chiu

Arizona guard Jada Williams brings the ball up against Stanford during the first half of an NCAA college basketball game in Stanford, Calif., Friday, Feb. 23, 2024.

Arizona

Longtime coach Adia Barnes has led the Wildcats to four straight NCAA Tournament appearances, one of which (2021) yielded a one-point loss in the national title game, after Arizona had previously missed the tournament every year since 2004-05.

Last season saw two double-digit scorers leave the team during the season, depleting the roster, and then two more of the Wildcats’ top players get selected in the second round of the WNBA Draft.

One key bit of hope for the 2024-25 season comes from Jada Williams, who started 28 games in her first collegiate season and was named to the Pac-12 all-freshman team while averaging 9.5 points and 2.4 assists per game.

The product of Blue Springs, Missouri, who was once committed to UCLA out of high school, remains on the roster, as do three other players who were true freshmen at Arizona last year in Breya Cunningham, Skylar Jones and Brooklyn Rhodes.

The Wildcats, who were thin last year due to their midseason departures, have restocked the roster with high-major transfers, including 6-foot forward Sahnya Jah from national champion South Carolina and 5-foot-9 guard Paulina Paris from North Carolina.

photo by: AP Photo/Darryl Webb

Arizona State’s Jalyn Brown (23) shoots against Colorado’s Charlotte Whittaker (45) during the second half of an NCAA college basketball game Sunday, Jan. 7, 2024, in Tempe, Ariz.

Arizona State

The Sun Devils have gone a combined 4-32 in conference games since Adair took over following the retirement of 26-year head coach Charli Turner Thorne, but will get a new set of foes in the Big 12.

In preparation, ASU’s offseason haul has included some well-traveled transfers from Big 12 foes, including Jazion Jackson, who was an effective two-way player at both North Texas and UTEP before suffering a season-ending injury ahead of her lone year at Texas Tech, and Kennedy Fauntleroy, a unanimous conference freshman of the year at Georgetown who did not last long at Oklahoma State.

The Sun Devils have some serious size on the roster, with seven players who are 6-foot-3 or taller, including transfers Kennedy Basham (Oregon) and Nevaeh Parkinson (UC Irvine), as well as returning forward Kadidia Toure, who played in 31 games while starting seven last season.

The most critical returnee of all will be Jalyn Brown, who only received honorable mention status from the Pac-12 last season but averaged 17.3 points and 4.0 rebounds while shooting 35.3% from deep on more than 100 attempts.

Brown will be at the center of any kind of bounce-back campaign for ASU after it had the Pac-12’s second-worst scoring offense and worst scoring defense last year.

photo by: AP Photo/David Zalubowski

Colorado guard Frida Formann (3) shoots over Washington State guard Tara Wallack (1) in the second half of an NCAA college basketball game Saturday, March 2, 2024, in Boulder, Colo.

Colorado

JR Payne’s rebuild seems to be coming to fruition, as the Buffaloes moved past a period of four seasons with 17 combined conference victories and have now made back-to-back trips to the Sweet 16, most recently locking down Kansas State at Bramlage Coliseum before losing to Caitlin Clark and Iowa in the following round.

Last year’s Buffaloes tallied a lot of steals and dished a lot of assists. They were led in both categories by fifth-year senior guard Jaylyn Sherrod, who has exhausted her eligibility and spent some time in camp with the New York Liberty. Center Aaronette Vonleh, who averaged a team-high 14 points per game in 2023-24, will be on the other side next season, as she transferred to Baylor.

That leaves Danish graduate student Frida Formann, a 5-foot-11 guard, as CU’s top returning scorer. She was one of the Buffaloes’ extremely potent outside scorers last year, as both she and Maddie Nolan shot more than 42% on a high volume of attempts. Nolan is also gone, and in fact Formann will be just one of three players (along with Sara-Rose Smith and Kindyll Wetta) who played for CU last season.

There are four freshman coming in, plus (like Arizona State) a few faces familiar to Big 12 basketball viewers, such as Lior Garzon, who started at Oklahoma State last year and once set OSU’s single-season 3-pointer record. She should fit in nicely alongside Formann. Nyamer Diew (Iowa State) will look to reclaim her early-season form from the 2023-24 campaign, while 6-foot-5 center JoJo Nworie hopes for a fresh start after back-to-back season-ending injuries at Texas Tech.

photo by: AP Photo/Tyler Tate

Utah guard Gianna Kneepkens (5) claps to get a teammates attention during an NCAA basketball game on Monday, Nov. 6, 2023 in Salt Lake City, Utah.

Utah

Last year’s star Alissa Pili was a first-round pick in the WNBA Draft, not a surprise after she averaged a whopping 21.4 points and 6.6 rebounds for the Utes.

But 6-foot guard Gianna Kneepkens has a chance to step into the spotlight during the 2024-25 campaign. A former Pac-12 freshman of the year and all-conference pick, Kneepkens was scoring 17.8 points through eight games before suffering a season-ending foot injury.

She will rejoin a Utah lineup that remains mostly intact at the top besides Pili, with all-conference honorable mentions Jenna Johnson, Kennedy McQueen and Inês Vieira all back after starting more than 30 games last season. That means the Utes get back most of an efficient offense that led the Pac-12 in both field-goal percentage and 3-point field-goal percentage last year, even as Utah’s season-long bombardment had six players attempting at least 90 3-pointers.

The majority of this year’s new talent is young, but there are a couple of veterans entering the fold in two 6-foot-3 forwards: Chrya Evans from Michigan and Mayè Tourè from Rhode Island, where she averaged 12.5 points and 7.6 rebounds in her last of four seasons.