The Tucker Center for Research on Girls & Women in Sport at the University of Minnesota has released its annual Women in College Coaching Report Card, which documents the percentage of women in all head coaching positions for women’s teams at 94 colleges and universities in seven NCAA Division I conferences.
During the 2025–2026 academic year, women represented 47.5 percent of head coaches at the analyzed institutions — a decline of 0.2 percent from the prior academic year and the first decrease in the last 13 years. About 10 percent of head coach positions for women’s sports were turned over from 2024–2025 to 2025–2026, and less than half of those positions were filled by women. Among the coaches who did leave their positions, women were three times more likely to be fired or non-renewed and over four times more likely to resign than men head coaches. During this time period, three male head coaches of women’s teams and zero women head coaches moved to athletic administration
There is significant variation in women’s representation among head coaches by specific sport. Among the 28 sports included in the report, 100 percent of women’s acrobatics and tumbling and wrestling collegiate teams were coached by a woman. In contrast, only 10 percent of women’s fencing teams had a woman head coach. Women head coaches are well represented among women’s lacrosse (94.3 percent), field hockey (87 percent), and softball (78.5 percent) teams, and significantly underrepresented among women’s diving (16.4 percent), track and field (18.3 percent), and cross country (21.3 percent) teams.
Among the analyzed colleges and universities, Michigan State University had the highest percentage of women head coaches of women’s teams (81.8 percent), followed by the University of Cincinnati (80 percent), the University of California, Los Angeles (78.6 percent), and the University of Central Florida (77.8 percent). On the other hand, the institutions with the lowest representation of women head coaches of women’s teams were West Virginia University (18.2 percent), the University of Kansas (18.2 percent), Creighton University (22.2 percent), and Auburn University (23.1 percent). By conference, the Big Ten earned the highest conference percentage of women head coaches (57.8 percent) and the Big 12 had the lowest percentage (40 percent).
The report also found a major underrepresentation of women of color as head coaches of women’s collegiate athletic teams. In the 2025–2026 academic year, women of color were only 7.3 percent of head coaches of women’s teams, a decline of 0.2 percent from the prior year. Across all analyzed institutions, 44 percent employed zero women head coaches of color. Furthermore, there were 10 sports that had zero women head coaches of color at any institution in the report.
“Constantly scrutinized and overburdened by double standards, many women coaches find their authority diminished and resources depleted by the evolving demands of college athletics,” the authors write. “This deep personal and systemic toll causes some to burn out and exit, while others are actively forced out of the coaching pipeline — ironically, just as women’s sports are thriving. Until athletic departments actively change the culture, back women coaches, value their expertise, and respect the right of women to lead, intercollegiate athletics will continue to lose invaluable role models and leadership.”