Get to know Matthew Mitchell, Houston’s new women’s basketball coach
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A coach that had been away from college basketball for several years was hired by Houston to reinvigorate a downtrodden program.
Sound familiar, Houston fans? That was what the Cougars did in hiring Kelvin Sampson in 2014, six years after Sampson had coached in college, and obviously, that has turned out to be a home run hire for Houston, with Sampson taking the Coogs to two Final Fours, including later this week.
What Kelvin Sampson said on Houston clinching Final Four berth: 'It's their moment'
Now, Houston athletic director Eddie Nunez believes his recent hire of Matthew Mitchell to lead the women’s basketball program can pay similar dividends to what Sampson did for the Cougar men’s team.
Houston hires successful former SEC coach to take over women's basketball program
Mitchell, who has 311 career wins spanning both Morehead State and Kentucky while leading Kentucky to three Elite Eight appearances, returns to coaching after a five-year absence mainly due to health reasons. But he’s ready to take on the challenge of turning around a Houston team that had its last winning record in 2021-22 and is coming off a 5-25 season.
On Tuesday, Mitchell was officially introduced at a press conference. Here’s what he had to say.
The eighth head coach of Houston women’s basketball, Matthew Mitchell! 👏 pic.twitter.com/iJfLhpH800
— Houston Women's Basketball (@UHCougarWBB) April 1, 2025
Mitchell on his early connections with Houston
“I have some unique connections to the city that will be so important to us. My dad worked real, real hard to build a business, and one of the first luxuries that we were provided living in rural Mississippi was a satellite dish; big satellite dish, kind of looks like what’s out at NASA maybe, but we got one out on the side of our yard, and that opened up the world of the Houston Astros to the Mitchell family. And so we, since 1985, have been watching the Houston Astros.
“In 1988, we took our vacation here to the Astrodome to watch the Houston Astros and dad and mom bought me a pair of Air Jordans on that trip, and to to be standing here almost 40 years later as the head coach of Houston at a Jordan Brand school is a bit surreal right now.”
Mitchell on how he will approach recruiting: ‘We start inside and go out’
“It’s going to be so important that we start inside and go out. And so the number one priority for us is the city; the city of Houston is an epicenter of top-notch basketball talent, and I want every player to know that Houston is a place where they can come and play at the very highest level, chase championships, chase being their very best, get an incredible education and build a life that prepares them for their future.
“We are open for business here in the city of Houston, at the University of Houston, and it’s going to be so important to us. Some of the greatest talent in the world is also in our state. The state of Texas is full of incredible basketball talent, full of incredible academic talent, and we want Houston to be an outstanding option for them to come and reach their goals as players and as students.
“And then we’re such a dynamic city, an international city, you’re able to get here from all over the country, you’re able to get here from all over the world. And so we will be open also to the best players that fit our culture, that fit our method of doing things.
“And I just cannot tell you the most attractive thing to me is our ability to connect great people to this great place, and we just have an immense, immense opportunity to do that to all the high school coaches out there in Houston, all the club coaches in Houston, all the high school coaches and club coaches in the state of Texas. We want to be visible, accessible and inspiring to you as a basketball program.”
Mitchell on returning to college basketball after taking several seasons off for health reasons
(Mitchell stepped down from Kentucky after the 2020 season as he was still feeling side effects from a concussion sustained from an accident while on a family vacation to Mexico.)
“I have come to the realization that what I do best is coach college basketball, and I think the time away has really helped me prepare even further to navigate. … We’re going to need strong leadership right now in this new world and in this new era of figuring things out and change is difficult, change is hard and I think right now, strong leaderships is important as it’s ever been and that’s what I’ve been working on is strengthening my leadership.”
Mitchell on what sold him about Houston: ‘This is so much potential’
“Gratitude is so full in my heart, so full of gratitude that Houston is the place. This is a place, this is a city, this is a university where we can build the best possible basketball program for a young person to come and reach their dreams, reach their competitive dreams, reach their academic dreams, and it is all going to happen here at Houston.
“I cannot tell you how excited I am that this is where we landed. This is so much potential, there’s so much we have going for us, and we just have to get in and do the work now. There is zero, zero impediment to the success that we can have, and we just have to find other people to join us.”
Mitchell on Houston men’s basketball coach Kelvin Sampson
“I got a coaching video a few years back of Coach Sampson, and stolen an underneath out-of-bounds play from him that we’ve made a few buckets, so I’m already appreciative of him. He helped us win a few games already with his coaching prowess.”
Mitchell on Houston football coach Willie Fritz
“I have so, so much respect for Willie and his journey and his career. Appreciate you being here, Coach; I cannot wait to work with you. I have so much admiration for your journey, and have so much to learn from you.”
Mitchell on assembling his coaching staff
“We’re working on that and very excited about the direction we’re in, and we’ll start announcing those staff members closer to the end of the week and it’s forming and we still have a ways to go, but very excited about what’s developing there.
“The most important thing is alignment in our staff, and so we’re looking for people with high energy, because we have a heavy lift in front of us, there’s no doubt about it, but we can get it done. So we’re looking for hard-working people, people who can connect, people who want to serve this community. … This opportunity is just so immense, and so I’m confident that we’re going to put together a great staff that gets the job done and gets it done in excellent fashion.”
Mitchell on the coaching style he will bring to Houston: ‘I love to have speed’
“We want it to be exciting, and so we will adjust to winning with what we’re able to put together for next year but long term, the vision is up-tempo, offense and defense. That’s how we were able to build a championship program at the University of Kentucky and have sustained success, but it’s going to be aggressive, it’s going to be up-tempo.
“We’ll gain inspiration from our great track program here at Houston and be inspired by their speed. I love to have speed, and so we’ll have an entertaining style.
“That’s one thing I want to tell the fans is that we need to earn their loyalty, and we’re going to do that, and we’re going to try to do that before we ever play a game with just how we conduct ourselves. But we need fans to take a leap of faith here and believe that we’re going to get this done, it’s so important. What an unbelievable building we have here to compete in, so we need to work really hard to give the fans something to cheer about. But I think when you see a team playing extremely hard and completing with great effort and great energy, I think fans connect to that, so it will all be based on that, and we’ll be excited about building the team here.”
