ASU reaches principle agreement with Molly Miller to be next women’s basketball head coach

(Photo courtesy Tanielle Gilbert/Grand Canyon Athletics)

Arizona State has agreed in principle to hire Grand Canyon women’s basketball head coach Molly Miller as its new women’s basketball head coach, per Talia Goodman of On3.

Miller will be tasked with turning around the program after the Sun Devils’ previous head coach Natasha Adair managed just a 29-62 record in her three years in Tempe. Arizona State finished at the bottom or near the bottom of the Pac-12 and Big 12 Conferences in each of those three seasons.

While the Sun Devils have struggled, Miller has excelled across the Valley at GCU. Since being named the head coach of the Lopes prior to the 2020-21 season, she’s posted a 117-38 record. Miller had a 2-3 record at GCU against Arizona State. The most recent win came this season at a neutral site game at then-Footprint Arena, which the Lopes took 70-59.

This past season was Miller’s best. She went 32-3 and posted an undefeated 16-0 record in the Western Athletic Conference to win the regular season conference championship. She carried the momentum into the postseason, winning the WAC women’s basketball tournament and making the program’s first appearance in the NCAA Tournament. Her efforts won her the WAC Coach of the Year award.

The 2024-25 season was the culmination of years of hard work for Miller and her staff. She brought consistent winning to an inconsistent program during her five years at the helm of GCU, finishing in the top three four times and top four in all five seasons.

Before Miller can start putting together a game plan to try and take ASU to the other end of the Big 12 Conference, she’ll need to put together a competitive roster. Four Sun Devils have entered the transfer portal in the time between Adair’s firing and Miller’s reported hiring, including the team’s dynamic offensive duo of guards Jalyn Brown and Tyi Skinner.

In this modern era of college basketball, many coaches’ star players follow them in the transfer portal to their new position, however, that won’t be the case for Miller. All of Miller’s starters and main contributors during her last season at GCU are either seniors or graduate students who won’t be able to suit up in the maroon and gold.

Despite entering a new environment without familiar faces, Miller has the experience and coaching talent needed to bring ASU women’s basketball back to its glory days, and she shouldn’t be expected to struggle jumping up to the Power Four level. Miller adjusted quickly to coaching mid-major GCU after six seasons at Division II Drury, where she won the Great Lakes Valley Conference in all six seasons.

Miller knows how to win and she’s done it at every level she’s coached at so far, it’s the type of experience that the current program severely needs.