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In 15 seasons as a head coach of the Green Wave, Lisa Stockton is the winningest coach in the history of Conference USA. She has compiled a 300-155 record at Tulane, including a 129-83 Conference USA mark. Her lifetime record of 363-182 in 18 seasons as a head coach is good for a winning percentage of 66.7 percent. Her 300th victory for the Green Wave came at the 2009 Conference USA Women's Basketball Championship at Fogelman Arena, as Tulane rolled over Tulsa in the first round. Stockton concluded her 13th season at Tulane much like her first: with a conference Coach of the Year award and a trip to the post-season. The 2006-07 Conference USA Coach of the Year led her team to the regular season title, and a 26-7 overall record, and a trip back to the post-season with a second round appearance in Women's National Invitational Tournament. Her teams have made nine NCAA Tournament appearances (1995-2003). She guided the Green Wave to C-USA regular season titles during the 1996-97, 1998-99 and 2006-07 seasons, and won C-USA Tournament crowns in 1997, 1999, 2000 and 2001. With 300 wins at Tulane, Stockton has more wins than the previous five Green Wave coaches earned in 19 years. Five Tulane players have gone on to play in the WNBA, including two --Barbara Farris with the Detroit Shock in 2003 and Janell Burse with the Seattle Storm in 2004 -- who have earned WNBA championships. Others have joined the professional ranks in other leagues, most recently 2007 graduate Jami Montagnino. Blending athletic achievement and academic success, every student-athlete to play all four years with the Green Wave has completed their degree. In 1994-95, Stockton took the reigns of the Tulane program and led her first team to a 19-10 record and the first NCAA appearance in school history while earning Metro Conference Coach of the Year honors. That season kicked off a string of nine consecutive NCAA Tournament appearances, as her 1995-96 squad turned in her first of eight 20+ win seasons at Tulane. In 1996-97, her squad set a school record with 27 wins, earning its first C-USA title, and winning the program's first-ever NCAA Tournament game as the Green Wave advanced to the second round. The Green Wave tied its school record with a 27-5 mark in 1999-2000, winning the Conference USA tournament and advancing to the NCAA Second Round again. Stockton's 2000-01 squad finished 22-10, won the C-USA tournament again and the Green Wave won 24 games in 2001-02. The ninth-straight NCAA Tournament trip followed in 2002-03. Despite miss the post-season in 2003-04 and 2004-05, Stockton's most challenging season came in 2005-06, as she guided the Green Wave through a turbulent season off-the-court as Tulane and New Orleans endured the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina. Displaced to Lubbock, Texas for the fall semester, her student-athletes attended classes at Texas Tech, practiced in other school's facilities and worked with a limited support structure. Upon returning to New Orleans, yet still off campus in December, Stockton faced the challenges of preparing a team for play in a city in which the team couldn't even find an open place to get food past 7 p.m. The Green Wave returned to campus for the start of the spring semester, and Stockton's team rallied with a 9-6 finish, advancing to the quarterfinals of the C-USA Tournament, a triple-overtime loss at host SMU, and a 15-12 overall record. Calling 2006-07 her "most enjoyable and rewarding season as a coach," she guided a team picked sixth in the C-USA preseason poll to the program's first outright regular season Conference USA Championship and second trip to the WNIT. A 1986 graduate of Wake Forest who finished a four-year career as the Demon Deacons' all-time leader in scoring, assists and steals, Stockton began developing her coaching style at North Carolina, where she earned her master's degree while serving as a volunteer assistant coach with the Tar Heels. A year later, she made her head coaching debut at Greensboro College, taking over a team that had never had a winning season. All Stockton did her first year was guide the team to a 20-7 record, earning Dixie Intercollegiate Conference Coach of the Year honors in the process. She followed that with a 25-12 record in 1988-89 before earning her second Coach of the Year honor after the 1989-90 campaign. Stockton left Greensboro College after the 1990 season to become the top assistant at Georgia Tech. During her four-year stay in Atlanta, Stockton helped the Yellow Jackets to a 63-52 record, a WNIT Championship and a berth in the 1993 NCAA Tournament, the first ever for the school. In 1994, the woman who had spent her whole life surrounded by basketball and had succeeded in making it her career, reached even greater heights when she was named the sixth women's basketball coach in the history of Tulane University. In 2007, CitiBusiness named Stockton one of its women of the year. After serving on the C-USA Women's Basketball Task Force, in 2008-09 she began a three-year term serving on the Division I Women's Basketball Issues Committee. From the beginning, Stockton and Tulane have been a perfect fit; in part, the coach believes, because her educational experience at Wake Forest was similar to the ones her current players face at Tulane. Stockton appreciates the value of putting academic priorities first, and at Tulane the coach doesn't just say it, she has lived it. "A school like Tulane is absolutely the best environment for student-athletes, and for a coach," Stockton said. "We attract people who are goal-oriented and who are achievers. Student-athletes don't come here unless they're serious about basketball and academics. That's the kind of school I went to, and I'm so glad I did." In her 15 seasons, Stockton has built Tulane into a winning program with victories over ranked programs, tournament championships and a succession of All-Americans and future professional players piling wins on top of wins. "I'm proud of our run of NCAA tournaments and conference championships," Stockton said. "I'm proud of the tradition we've built." |
 
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