MADISON – Robin Pingeton has 30 seasons as a head coach under her belt. She has coached 960 games.
She brings a level of experience to the Wisconsin women’s basketball program that it has never had in a head coach at the start of his or her tenure.
There is a level of uncertainty at the start of any season, but at the start of her first season as the Badgers coach, the sense is heightened.
“We’re still a work in progress to be honest with you,” she said. “We know we’ve got a lot of work to do. We know it’s a marathon, not a sprint, and there’s going to be some challenges along the way.”
That snippet gives some insight into the Badgers this season. What should we expect from UW in 2025-26?
Good question. The lack of a definitive answer is part of the reason the season has the potential to be so intriguing and maybe even exciting.
What happens when you combine eight new players and seven reterurners with a coaching staff none of the players have ever played for before? The test case will unfold with the Badgers over the next four months.
“It’s kind of like we’re all freshmen because we’ve never played for Coach P before,” junior guard Laci Steele said. “This is a whole new system for everybody.”
Less than a quarter of Wisconsin’s scoring, minutes played return
A Badgers program in need of a fresh start after a rough 2024-25 campaign, is now filled with players seeking new beginnings or challenges.
The slate is about as clean as you can get. Only 20.9% of the scoring and 23% minutes played return from last year’s squad.
And of the returning Badgers only senior guard Ronnie Porter, who led the team with 32.7 minutes per game, and senior guard Lily Krahn were regulars in the rotation.
More representative of the makeup of this team are players like Steele, graduate guard Destiny Howell and junior guard Kyrah Daniels.
Steele sought a larger role in leaving North Carolina State. Howell and Daniels were ready for greater challenges after excelling at Howard and Missouri State, respectively.
If you look at the UW roster most of the players fit into one of those two categories.
The group comes with an edge, something embodied in the mindset of Howell, who as a former MEAC player of the year, is arguably the team’s most accomplished transfer.
“I think if you look at what I’ve done I don’t really have anything to prove, I just have something to show,” she said. “But going out there with the mentality of having something to prove is like I’m going out there like a dawg. Nothing and nobody is going to get in my head about what I can and can’t do.”
Determining roles will be critical for new-look Badgers
The Badgers added six transfers. Two of those players, Howell and Southern Illinois transfer Gift Uchenna, led their former team in scoring. Two others, Daniels and Stony Brook transfer Breauna Ware, ranked second in scoring on their former squads.
And then there is someone like Steele, who played on a more talented team – NC State reached the Sweet 16 last season and the 2024 Final Four – and graduate forward Shay Bollin, who sat out last season at Illinois due to injury.
Part of the appeal of joining UW was the vision presented by Pingeton, who sold players on the idea of helping turn the Badgers into a winner. UW hasn’t had a winning season since 2010-11.
“I knew that that was something I was going to have to trust because it wasn’t on paper, it wasn’t finished yet,” Howell said of Pingeton’s vision. “It was really about me being able to have that level of trust for her as a coach and know that she was going to come here and execute what she told us she was going to with our team and I think that we’re starting to really see that now.”
How well the puzzle fits will determine how well Pingeton’s first season goes.
“Everybody’s situation is unique. Even with our seven returning players, it’s a fresh start for them, it’s a new chapter for them,” Pingeton said. “I think for some of our players that we were able to recruit in the portal (this was) an opportunity for them to maybe take on a different role than what they had previously, and so it’s just been awesome to be honest with you.”
While the Badgers will have plenty of unknowns at the start of the season, they can expect to face another challenging schedule in the Big Ten. Eleven of its 18 teams are ranked or mentioned in the USA Today coaches poll: No. 4 UCLA, No. 10 Maryland, No. 15 Michigan, No. 16 USC, No. 23 Iowa and No. 24 Ohio State plus Michigan State, Washington, Indiana, Nebraska and Minnesota received votes.
The non-conference portion of the schedule includes a matchup against No. 14 Mississippi, Big East stalwart Marquette and Horizon League favorite UW-Green Bay
The odds are stacked against a quick turnaround for the Badgers, but so far the players are doing the right things to build a good team. What kind of team does Wisconsin have at this moment? The exciting prospect for UW is that no one knows for sure.
“I would say we have a really good, you know, foundation,” Steele said. “I think that foundation is important. If you don’t have standards and you don’t have culture then it’s really hard to know where it can go from there.
“Obviously, we haven’t even played our first game yet (but) I have a lot of faith in this team just because of the foundation.”
This article originally appeared on Milwaukee Journal Sentinel: New coach Robin Pingeton, revamped roster set stage for intriguing season for Wisconsin women’s basketball
Reporting by Mark Stewart, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel / Milwaukee Journal Sentinel
USA TODAY Network via Reuters Connect
