As the Hillsdale College women’s basketball team enters its second season under head coach Charlie Averkamp, the program also is welcoming an exciting new face as an assistant coach.
Brianna Brennan, a graduate assistant at Division I Eastern Illinois and a former two-sport star at the NCAA Division II level, joins the Chargers as the lead assistant for the 2021-22 season.
“Brianna is a perfect fit for our coaching staff here at Hillsdale,” Charger head coach Charlie Averkamp said. “She is a rising star in the profession and we are very excited to have her join our program.
“Her experience as a player at Gannon and a Graduate Assistant Coach at Eastern Illinois will be invaluable to our student athletes in building this program and setting the expectations we need to meet to get to the next level as a team.”
Brennan has spent two years with the Panthers in a graduate assistant role, working with a program that posted a 30-27 record the past two seasons and made the Ohio Valley Conference tournament in both 2020 and 2021.
At Eastern Illinois, she helped the program with scouting, managed game day operations and equipment, and played an important role in individual skill development as well.
A Michigan native who grew up in Woodhaven, a suburb of Detroit, and starred at Woodhaven High School, Brennan played three years of women’s basketball at Gannon University in Erie, Pennsylvania, helping the Knights to two NCAA Tournament appearances during her time with the team and finishing 11th in Gannon history in career blocked shots with 80.
Brennan also starred on Gannon’s volleyball team as a middle blocker, appearing in the NCAA Tournament in both 2016 and 2017 and helping the Knights to their first-ever NCAA Division II Final Four appearance in volleyball in 2017.
During her time at Gannon, she also created the Shooting for Smiles Basketball Clinic, developing and helping fund and direct an annual basketball camp for people with special needs.
After graduating from Gannon in 2017 with a B.A. in Education, Brennan spent a year coaching at the AAU level with the Erie Irish program, as well as teaching in the Fairview School District in Fairview, Pennsylvania, before taking the graduate assistant job at Eastern Illinois. She also earned a master’s degree in Sports Administration while coaching the Panthers, in 2021.
https://hillsdalechargers.com/sports/wbkb/2021-22/releases/Brianna_Brennan_Assistant_Hired
