Courtney Banghart named new UNC women's basketball coach

Chapel Hill, N.C. — Princeton University's Courtney Banghart was named the next head women's basketball coach at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill on Tuesday.

"Carolina is adding another great leader to its family of championship-winning head coaches," a university statement said. "Courtney Banghart, the winningest women's basketball coach in Princeton history who was named one of Fortune Magazine's Women's 50 Greatest Leaders in 2015, has been hired as the University of North Carolina's new head women's basketball coach."

Banghart will replace Hall of Fame coach Sylvia Hatchell, who resigned this month after an investigation by a Charlotte law firm determined she used racially insensitive comments and pressured players to play through injury.

Hatchell, a 2013 Hall of Fame inductee, is the winningest women's basketball coach in Atlantic Coast Conference history. She has a career record of 1,023-405 and is 751-325 mark in 33 years at UNC-Chapel Hill with a national title in 1994.

In announcing Hatchell's resignation, UNC Director of Athletics Bubba Cunningham said officials concluded that the women's basketball program "needed to be taken in a new direction" for the "best interests of our university and student-athletes."

In a teleconference on Tuesday, Banhgart expressed her excitement about the position, which will move her close to her sister, who currently lives in Chapel Hill. She said she is looking forward to "literally changing lives."

"It wasn't that I was looking to leave," she said, referencing Princeton. "It's that UNC really drew me in."

Banghart is in New Jersey now but will travel to Chapel Hill on Wednesday to meet the players.

Banghart will sign a five-year contract, according to the university's statement, which was approved by the school's Board of Trustees. She is set to earn $650,000 in her first year, with a base salary of $250,000.

The board held an emergency meeting on Tuesday morning to discuss the hiring of a new women's basketball coach. It ended immediately after closed session.

Banghart was the 2015 Naismith Coach of the Year after she led the Tigers to a 30-0 regular season. In 12 years at Princeton, she has record of 254-103 overall, 137-31 in the Ivy League, eight NCAA Tournament appearances and seven Ivy League championships. In 2015 Fortune Magazine named her of the world's 50 greatest leaders.

"I'm so grateful to everyone who has made Carolina what it is: the women who have worn the Carolina blue, Coach Hatchell who hung a banner, the men's program that brought us the Jumpman, the outstanding coaches who have been a model of consistent excellence, and the alumni who have loved this place with all their hearts,'' Banghart said in UNC's statement.

Banghart, 40, played at Dartmouth College and spent four years there as an assistant coach before taking the head coaching position at Princeton. She has a master's degree in writing and leadership development.

She is a member of the Board of Directors for the Women's Basketball Coaches' Association and of the NCAA Women's Basketball Oversight Committee.