Head Coach Kiley Hill closed out his fourth season in 2022-23 campaign.
The Catamounts were led during the 2022-23 campaign by Kyla Allison who was second-team All-Southern Conference by the coaches and third team by the league media. Allison was also named the Ann Lashley Inspiration Award Winner.
During the 2021-22 season, he helped lead the Catamounts to the most wins since the 2016-17 season. For the third-straight year, Hill helped guide players to postseason honors. Catamount player Joi Reid earned a spot on the 2022 Southern Conference All-Defensive Team - a first in program history.
In the 2020-21 season Hill helped lead WCU to a No. 7 seed in in the 2021 SoCon tournament is the highest for the Catamount program since the 2016-17 season.
It was also during the 2020-21 season Hill hit his 300th career win as a head coach.
Hill ended his first season at the helm of Western Carolina women’s basketball with what seemed like a not so stellar season, but the wins and losses can’t account for the strides and program records the Catamounts had in his first season.
Under Hill’s tutelage, the Catamounts won five games – one more then the team had in the previous two seasons. Western Carolina also won two Southern Conference games, one on the road and one at home – the most by WCU since the 2016-17 season.
Both SoCon wins were ground-breaking for a program that had struggled for over 10 years. Hill’s coaching of the team saw Western Carolina defeat perennial power in the conference Mercer for the first time in the team’s previous 17 meetings. Another streak was broken a few weeks later when the Catamounts knocked off Chattanooga in Chattanooga defeating the Mocs on their home court for the first time since 2009 and ending a 21-game losing streak.
Player development was also on Hill’s agenda and it paid off ten-fold. Sophomore guard Jewel Smalls was named SoCon Player of the Week twice in the 2019-20 season, SoCon Player of the Month for November and SoCon Student-Athlete of the Week. Lauren LaPlant was also named Student-Athlete of the Week. End of season accolades included SoCon All-freshman honors for Andrea Martin Ruiz and Alyssa Walker along with Smalls earning SoCon All-Conference third team by the media.
It wasn’t just honor’s for Catamount players under Hill, the team and individuals made strides as well. LaPlant broke the program record for most three-pointers in a season-ending with 80. The team also broke the program record for most three-pointers on the year concluding the year with 215.
Three different Catamounts saw scoring increases under Hill: LaPlant (361 – 12 points per game); Tembre Moates (245 – 8.2 points per game) and Smalls (379 – 12.6 points per game). Smalls also had 11 double-doubles – the most based on recorded records and ended the year with 286 rebounds – ranked fourth in the WCU record books.
Hill was named head women’s basketball coach at Western Carolina University on July 8, 2019.
A veteran coach with more than 25 years’ experience in collegiate women’s basketball including 17 as a head coach, Hill comes to Western Carolina after spending the last three seasons as the associate head coach at Conference USA-member, Southern Miss in Hattiesburg, Miss. His experience also includes a 16-year stint as the head coach at Valdosta State in Georgia, and a four-year term at West Alabama in Livingston, Ala. – one as head coach preceded by three as the assistant coach and recruiting coordinator.
As the associate head coach at Southern Miss, Hill helped the team amass a record of 56-40 including a 23-11 tally in the 2016-17 season that finished with a return to the Conference USA championship game. Hill's experience helped an undersized squad, nicknamed the “Feisty Bunch,” rank 11th nationally for total steals (370) and finish No. 20 in steals per game (10.9).
In the 2017-18 season with the Eagles, Hill helped 10 players surpass their career-highs in season points. Jayla King joined the 1,000-point club with 1,023 points, and Shonte Hailes led C-USA in assist-to-turnover ratio at 2.4, while also leading the conference in 3-point field goal percentage at 45.2 percent.
This past season, 2018-19, Hill and the Eagles strung together a record of 18-14, reaching the second round of the Women’s Basketball Invitational (WBI) postseason tournament before being edged by North Alabama 69-65. The Eagles had an All-Conference USA selection as the team ranked third in the conference in scoring defense limiting opponents to an average of 59.1 points per game while also ranking second in steals (8.9).
Hill came to Southern Miss following a 16-year stint as head women's basketball coach at Valdosta State where he compiled a 279-177 record. He established himself as one of the top NCAA Division II coaches in the nation and was recognized as the 2012 Women's Basketball Coaches Association's (WBCA) South Region Coach of the Year. He stacked that on top of being named the Gulf South Conference (GSC) East Division's Coach of the Decade. During his time at Valdosta, Hill garnered the GSC East Coach of the Year twice.
Hill advanced to postseason play 14 times during his tenure at VSU. Ten of his 16 teams ranked in the Top-10 or no lower than 25th in the nation in team defense. He had six teams finish in the top two in the Gulf South Conference Eastern Division and collectively, averaged 19 wins over his last 10 seasons.
During his tenure, Hill coached three All-Americans, two GSC All-Decade team selections, a GSC Female Athlete of the Year and 22 of his players earned all-conference plaudits. Not only did his teams perform well on the court, but off the court as well as his teams produced 28 academic all-conference accolades and were twice named to a WBCA Academic Honor Roll while boasting a team GPA of 3.0 or higher.
Hill joined the VSU staff in 2000 after a year as the head coach at the University of West Alabama that was preceded by three seasons as the assistant coach and recruiting coordinator. While on the bench at UWA from 1996-2000, Hill helped orchestrate the program’s first 20-win season since 1982 and produced four all-conference performers and six all-academic conference selection.
A four-year letter winner on the baseball diamond and a 1995 graduate of Arkansas Tech in Russellville, Ark., Hill got his start in collegiate coaching at his alma mater as a graduate assistant.
Hill is married to the former Molly Longing and the couple has two children; Whitley and Skyler.
Hill's YEAR-BY-YEAR RECORD AT WESTERN CAROLINA
2019-20 - 5-25
2020-21 - 6-18
2021-22 - 7-23
2022-23 - 9-21
Hill's RECORD AT VALDOSTA STATE
279-183
Hill's RECORD AT WEST ALABAMA
15-5
OVERALL RECORD: 321-275
