Mickayla Perdue spent six years in college basketball, but she still wasn’t ready for it to be over when she suffered a season-ending injury in her only year at Arizona. She won’t get back on the court, but she will stay in the game as a coach at Eastern Illinois.
Perdue and her colleagues will try to lead the Panthers back from a disappointing 4-27 season. She will work under third-year head coach Marqus McGlothan, who took over on an interim basis in 2024-25 and became the permanent head coach prior
to the 2025-26 season. The team went 18-12 in his interim year.
Perdue brings a wealth of experience from playing for different coaches. She also has experienced different levels of team success.
She spent her first two years at Toledo under current Miami Hurricanes head coach Tricia Cullop. She didn’t play much as a freshman. She sat out as a redshirt her sophomore year.
Perdue transferred to Division II Glenville State in 2022-23 and saw her fortunes dramatically change. She helped the team go 33-3. They won the Mountain East Conference Tournament and reached the DII Final Four. She averaged 17.7 points per game while appearing in all 36 games. She started 33 times.
Her success at the DII level led her back to DI with a two-year stint at Cleveland State. The Vikings went 29-6 her first season and 27-10 her final season. Those seasons both ended in the postseason with a WBIT appearance in 2023-24 and a WNIT appearance in 2024-25.
Perdue was once again a star for her squad. She was named the Horizon League Newcomer of the Year her first season in Cleveland. She was the Horizon League Player of the Year her final year with the Vikings.
Perdue scored 17.3 ppg in 30.4 mpg in 2023-24. She appeared in 35 games with 29 starts. In 2024-25, she started all 37 games the Vikings played. She scored 20.0 ppg in 33.0 mpg.
Perdue started in 14 of the 15 games she played at Arizona, but a wrist injury knocked her out of the lineup early in conference play. She scored 17.1 ppg in 33.3 mpg.
Perdue returns to her roots in the Midwest, where she grew up and spent five of her six years in college. Her climb from a freshman who saw just 5.4 minutes per game in nine contests at Toledo to the leading scorer who played a career high in minutes per game at Arizona can provide motivation for young players just starting to walk the same path.
