ALBANY, N.Y. – The College of Saint Rose announced that Whitney Edwards has been named the head women’s basketball coach.
Edwards brings a wide breadth of experience to the Golden Knights program. An NCAA Division I standout player, she has coached at all three NCAA levels throughout the past 14 years. She is also a former assistant coach at fellow Northeast-10 Conference member Stonehill College and has successfully recruited the Northeast Region corridor from Ontario to Maryland.
“We are thrilled to welcome Coach Edwards to the Golden Knight family. Whitney brings a wide range of experience to our program having coached in all three NCAA divisions, including the NE10. A highly respected coach, committed to the overall development of student-athletes on and off the court, Whitney is a passionate teacher of the game, a dynamic recruiter, and will bring tremendous energy and passion for our women’s basketball program. We look forward to competing for and bringing NE10 championships to Saint Rose under her leadership,” said Lori Anctil, Associate Vice President and Director of Athletics.
Edwards arrives in the Capital Region following a three-year stint as an assistant coach at Northeastern University in Boston. She helped develop three All-Conference performers and had a hand in guiding the program to its first-ever WNIT bid. Her day-to-day responsibilities centered around coaching the guard position and the team’s defensive systems.
Edwards was an assistant coach at her alma mater the University of New Hampshire and SUNY Plattsburgh, in addition to Stonehill, prior to her Northeastern tenure.
She spent 2015-17 on the sidelines at New Hampshire where she helped the Wildcats make a 14-win improvement from her first to second seasons in Durham. Edwards served as the program’s recruiting coordinator and laid the ground work for a talent base that set a single-season program record with 26 wins in 2016-17. The Wildcats also captured the America East regular-season championship and had four players garner All-Conference honors.
Edwards was at Stonehill from 2013-15 where she helped recruit student-athletes from throughout the Northeast that provided the foundation for a program record of 44-15 throughout her tenure. The Skyhawks made two NCAA Tournament appearances during that span and advanced to the 2015 East Region Final. They also captured the NE10 regular-season title, before closing out the year ranked No. 13 in the nation.
Edwards began her coaching career in 2010 at SUNY Plattsburg where she was promoted to Associate Head Coach prior to the 2012-13 campaign. She developed a pair of point guards that concluded the 2012-13 season ranked first and third in the SUNYAC in assists average. She also helped organize alumnae relations, co-instructed the C.H.A.M.P.S. life skills initiative, and was the co-advisor for the school’s Student-Athlete Advisory Committee (SAAC).
An advocate of lifelong learning, Edwards obtained a master’s degree in leadership from SUNY Plattsburgh in 2015 and is scheduled to complete a second master’s in leadership with a concentration in sport and social change from Northeastern this month.
She earned her bachelor’s degree in sociology with a minor in deaf studies in 2007 from New Hampshire, where she was a four-year letter winner and two-time captain of the women’s basketball team. She was named the 2007 America East Defensive Player of the Year and was a member of the America East All-Defensive Team in both her junior and senior seasons. She closed out her stellar career second on the Wildcats’ all-time lists in steals (229) and assists (382).
Edwards has also participated in the assistant coaches’ United State Marine Corps Leadership Workshop, held at Parris Island in 2014, and the United States Marine Corps Coaches Leadership Workshop, which took place at the Marine Corps Officer Candidates School in Quantico, Virginia in 2016.
Story Courtesy: David Alexander, Assistant A.D. for Communications
Photo Courtesy St. Rose Athletics
Tagged with: D2 NE10 St. Rose
