The 2025-26 Marquette women’s basketball season came to an end on Selection Sunday when the Golden Eagles were not included in the WBIT or the WNIT fields. That means MU’s last game of the year was actually back on March 7, when they lost 57-44 to Creighton in the quarterfinals of the Big East tournament.
In any case, it’s been a while since 1) Marquette played a game and 2) Marquette knew that they were doing playing games this season. With that in mind, it’s not terribly surprising that news about
the future might start wandering out into public view, and it seems that we have some news of that variety to discuss.
On Sunday morning, redshirt junior Charia Smith posted on Instagram for the first time since Christmas, and the tone of her language indicates that she’s done at Marquette. I have to couch it a little bit because she doesn’t explicitly say she’s done, but also, the message is fairly obvious.
For posterity’s sake:
closing this chapter with so much gratitude. thank you for everything marquette! excited for this next chapter!
Closing a chapter, a thank you to Marquette, talking about a new chapter…. yeah, that sounds like she won’t be returning to the Golden Eagles for her fourth and final year of eligibility. If you want a little bit more confirmation, you can look at the comments, where MU guard Olivia Porter says “Go be great kid!” and MU women’s lacrosse goalie Mikayla Yang says “going to miss u.”
2025-26 was the best of Smith’s three active seasons at Marquette, posting career highs in games played, games started, minutes, assists, and points. She played in 28 of MU’s 30 games this season, staying on the bench at home against UConn on February 14th and at home against St. John’s on December 29th. She also started six times this season, getting the nod while head coach Cara Consuegra was bringing Skylar Forbes off the bench for a stretch in late January and early February for still unclear reasons.
Smith does still have a year of eligibility, as she missed the 2023-24 campaign due to a knee injury. I don’t know what to take away from the fact that Smith isn’t explicitly saying she’s entering the transfer portal in her post, but if she is going to be graduating from Marquette in May after four years in Milwaukee, it’s entirely possible that she’s just wrapping up her time in college basketball altogether.
And so, let’s update the scholarship chart, and then start glancing at the trouble alarm button…….
The loss of Smith moves Marquette to eight projected players for 2026-27 and seven open roster slots. That projected player count does include Aryelle Stevens, who missed this past year after a summer Achilles tear and still has at least one year of Division 1 eligibility as a result. She was not honored on Senior Day, so all signs point to her returning, and so she’s on the list.
You can’t even play 5-on-5 in practice with this roster, so I presume that head coach Cara Consuegra and her staff will be launching a strong search for multiple players in the transfer portal. Adding anyone who would be in their sophomore or junior year next fall would be a welcome addition for balancing the roster, as Marquette projects to have zero juniors next season and just little used reserve Kam Herring as a sophomore. That’s in addition to the five women who should be seniors on the roster next year, and that’s where getting sophomores and juniors is relatively important. If Marquette brings in transfers with multiple years of eligibility remaining, that helps solve the burgeoning roster problem for future seasons as well. Adding seniors who would only be in Milwaukee in 2026-27 only solves a problem in the immediate sense without addressing the fall of 2027 or 2028.
We’ll see what happens in a week or two, I guess?
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