The Murray State University Board of Regents has voted to extend the current contract of head women’s basketball coach Rechelle Turner four years, through the end of the 2025-26 season.
“Under Coach Turner’s leadership, our student-athletes have excelled in their development as students, persons, players and professionals,” said Director of Athletics Kevin Saal. “Coach Turner and her staff have worked tirelessly to build a championship culture, positioning us well for the upcoming transition to the Missouri Valley Conference. We look forward to continuing this program’s growth and development under Coach Turner’s leadership.”
“When we assumed leadership of this program in 2017, it was our intent to build a program that would pursue excellence on and off the floor, with class and character,” said Turner. “We wanted our women’s basketball program to represent our university in a manner that would make everyone who loves Murray State proud. Five years later, thanks to the efforts of our players and staff, I believe we have built a brand that is worthy of respect and that is fundamentally rooted in a culture of doing things the right way.”
“I am grateful to President Bob Jackson, the Murray State Board of Regents and Kevin Saal for the confidence expressed in our staff through this extension, which allows us to continue our growth in the years to come,” Turner continued. “Maintaining continuity and stability is critical in our efforts to tackle the challenges of growing a highly successful program and I am looking forward to pursuing our goals and building upon our progress as we transition into the Missouri Valley Conference. It is an honor to coach at such a great university and we are all excited about the future of Murray State women’s basketball.”
Turner’s players have also excelled in the classroom over the past five years. During that time, her teams have earned four of the top five team semester GPAs since 2004, including the best in that time period during the spring of 2020. Currently, 13 of Turner’s 16 players have a cumulative GPA of 3.0 or higher, including seven over 3.5 and one perfect 4.0.
In five years, Turner has engineered a complete overhaul of the program both on and off the court, which has led the Racers to renewed success under her tutelage. The Racers 2021-22 season has been one for the record books, as Murray State tied its record for regular-season wins with 21. For the second straight season, the Racers advanced to the OVC semifinals in 2021-22 and have now won an OVC tournament game in back-to-back years for the first time since the 2006-07 and 2007-08 seasons. Individually, she coached sophomore Katelyn Young to OVC Player of the Year honors and saw a school-record four Racers receive All-OVC honors.
Through five seasons, Turner is 76-72 overall, 48-44 in OVC play, has qualified for the OVC tournament in each of her five seasons and finished a career-best third in the league in 2021-22. She is the program’s all-time leader in both All-OVC selections and OVC Players of the Year with five and two, respectively.
She has coached two players to 1,000-point careers in her time at Murray State, Macey Turley and Katelyn Young, with the latter becoming the second fastest to reach the milestone in program history. In addition, Turner has established Murray State as one of the top free throw shooting teams in the nation, ranking in the MSU top-ten all time in four of her five seasons and finished the 2021-22 season at sixth in the nation. Murray State also finished this past season in the top 10 nationally in fewest fouls, field goal percentage, free throws made, free throw percentage, personal fouls per game and rebound margin.
Photo Courtesy Murray State Athletics
https://goracers.com/news/2022/3/11/womens-basketball-turner-receives-four-year-extension.aspx
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