In his first year of head coaching at the college level, Jeff Walz took the Louisville women’s basketball program to its first-ever Sweet 16. It’s been 18 years since that feat, and Walz has led the Cardinals to a total of 12 Sweet 16s, eight Elite Eights, four Final Fours and two national championship games.
He will be the first to stress that his program’s accomplishments over this span are worthy of celebration rather than regret over never winning an NCAA title. At the team’s most recent Final
Four in 2022, he downplayed the sting of never winning the big one, saying, “We’re not gonna define the past 15 years on one game,” meaning the two title games that were lost.
Here’s the full quote:
It’s our fourth Final Four in 15 years. We’ve been to I think seven Elite Eights. We’ve played in the last four Elite Eights. So I think we’ve done alright, I don’t know. It’s not too damn bad. Now, we haven’t won a national championship. I understand that, I’m the first to say that. We played for two. And unfortunately for us, I think the two that we lost in 9 and 13, the UConn teams, both those teams, would probably be ranked in the top 5 of all women’s basketball teams—ever. So we just had a sucky year. To play them in 9 and 13.
But overall, you go back the last five years, I think we’re either the third or fourth winningest program in women’s basketball. And if you go back 10, I think we’re in the top 5 or top 6. I think we’ve done pretty damn well. And when I hear people say, ‘What are you gonna do to get over the hump?’ What hump is there to get over? Besides winning a national championship, and I know—it’d be wonderful.
But we’re not gonna define the past 15 years on one game, knowing a program that had never been to a Sweet 16—ever, in the history of the program, which I think was 32 years—and now we’ve been to four Final Fours—I’m not sure anybody expected that. So I’m pretty damn proud of what we’ve done here, and we’re gonna continue it.
Still, Walz is a fierce competitor, and while he may reduce the shortcomings and rightfully pump up the accomplishments, he remains the coach most-starving for a natty.
Well, 2025-26 was not expected to be the year. The Cardinals began the season ranked No. 20.
But now they are ranked No. 8. Quietly, they have been creeping up the rankings while the SEC and Big Ten teams get all the attention. They’ve been taking care of business in the weak ACC, sporting a perfect conference record. And while they still fall shy of being considered national championship contenders, Louisville (18-3, 8-0 ACC) is threatening to make an Elite Eight run, which is simply par for the course for this program.
The Cardinals made five-straight Elite Eights from 2018 to 2023 and were a No. 2 seed in Swish Appeal’s hypothetical bracket in 2020, when the NCAA Tournament was canceled. In 2018 and 2022, they advanced to the Final Four.
The premature departure of the team’s best player in Hailey Van Lith (via transfer to LSU) contributed to the end of this streak, as they earned a No. 6 seed in 2024 and fell to No. 11 seed Middle Tennessee in the first round. The writing may have been somewhat on the wall that the streak would end, but they had made it to the national quarterfinals the previous year as a No. 5 seed. Last year, they were a No. 7 seed and lost to Van Lith, who was spending her fifth collegiate year at TCU, in the second round.
So here they are, two years removed from the streak, not expected to get back to that level this season, yet doing just that.
It’s a testament to Walz, the players he brings in and the culture they’ve developed together.
Louisville is a national power, period. And they had never made a Sweet 16 before Walz arrived, though they were trending in that direction under previous head coach Tom Collen with No. 9-seed first-round bids in 2005 and 2006 and a No. 6-seed second-round bid in 2007 before Walz took over in 2008. The greatest player in program history—eventual WNBA superstar Angel McCoughtry—had already been recruited and was on the 2006 and 2007 squads before collaborating with Walz on the first of his two national runner-up bids in 2009.
Since McCoughtry, Shoni Schimmel, Myisha Hines-Allen, Asia Durr, Dana Evans and Van Lith have starred at the KFC Yum! Center, each earning a special place in Louisville lore. As with the other national powers, the baton is passed and there is little doubt that the program will consistently advance deep into the Big Dance.
This year’s iteration, however, lacks a true superstar, with nobody on the Wooden Award Midseason Top 25 Watch List. Laura Ziegler, who leads the team in rebounding (7.4 per game) and is third in scoring (10.4), was on the Preseason Top 50, and both her and Taj Roberts, who leads the team with 12.7 points per game, made the Naismith Award Preseason Top 50. Neither is shining quite as bright as the dominant stars on the other top teams, but they are contributing to winning. And they’re getting help from their supporting cast.
On Sunday, it was now-second-leading-scorer Imari Berry (11.4) dropping a career-high 33 points to ignite a 13-point comeback and overtime victory over fierce ACC rival NC State on the Wolfpack’s home court. In the game before that, an important win at then-No. 23 Notre Dame, sixth-leading scorer Reyna Scott (8.1) stepped up with her own career-high of 20.
With Skylar Jones (9.8), Elif Istanbulluoglu (9.5), Mackenly Randolph (7.4) and Anaya Hardy (6.3) all bunched together near Roberts, Berry, Ziegler and Scott, the Cardinals have a plethora of options they can turn to for scoring. They’re doing just fine without someone scoring 13 or more points per game, producing 83 a contest for 17th in the nation. They also excel on the boards, placing 18th with a margin of 9.6. And they take care of the ball with just 12.4 turnovers per game (16th).
While the Wolfpack are unranked, they were No. 9 to start the season and feature one of the best players in the country in Khamil Pierre, who had 26 points on Sunday. Being challenged by them shouldn’t be seen as too much of a setback for Louisville, especially when the thrilling comeback victory provides so much momentum. It is so sweet for Louisville any time they can beat NC State, a team that has frequently been atop the ACC with them in recent memory. (In 2021, the No. 1 seed Cardinals fell to the No. 2 seed Wolfpack in the conference tournament’s championship game by just two points.)
Louisville’s only losses this season have been to the No. 1 and 2 teams in the nation (UConn and South Carolina), and No. 11 Kentucky. Their quality wins have come against No. 17 Tennessee (by 24) and three teams receiving votes in UNC (by 10), Notre Dame (by 13) and NC State (by eight in overtime). They only lost to the mighty Gamecocks by two! Plus, they lost to the Huskies and Wildcats by respectable margins of 13 and 10, respectively.
That’s a very good resume, especially in terms of having no bad losses. Thus, the No. 8 ranking. Thus, the threat of a return to the Elite Eight.
This was expected to be a bit of an off year, perhaps not much better than the last two. Yet, Louisville has proven they’re the same old Louisville.
We won’t discover much if the Cards earn a massive blowout victory Saturday vs. Boston College, as the Eagles (4-17, 0-8 ACC) are dead last in the Power 4 in overall winning percentage. Louisville actually only faces one currently ranked opponent over the remainder of the regular season (No. 21 Duke on Feb. 5).
However, if they can cruise to the ACC regular-season and tournament titles, earn a high seed in the Big Dance and advance to the later rounds, they will be rewarded with great challenges, the likes of which you know a coach like Walz and a program like Louisville relish.
