Last season, CSU’s Women Basketball Team became the first team in Mountain
West history - men’s or women’s - to win the conference championship 4 straight years. Then twice Mountain West player of the year Ellen Nystrom and All Conference star Elin Gustavsson graduated, and are now playing professionally in Spain. So, what’s up for 2017-18? This week Past President Stacy Plemmons will introduce CSU Women’s Basketball head coach Ryun Williams, the Wyoming state high school “Mr. Basketball 1988”, and twice Mountain West Coach of the year (2014, 2016).
Born in Gillette, Wyoming, Williams graduated from Campbell County High School and played junior college basketball at Sheridan College before transferring to the University of South Dakota. From 1993 to 1995, Williams was men's basketball assistant coach and women's volleyball head coach at Sheridan, then women's basketball head coach 1995 to 1998, earning two Wyoming Conference Coach of the Year awards.
Williams moved up to the NCAA Division II in 1988 as Wayne State College (Nebraska) head coach. In ten seasons with Wayne State, Williams led the team to two NCAA Tournaments (2006 and 2008) and earned Northern Sun Intercollegiate Conference Coach of the Year honors in 2006 for Wayne State's first NCAA Tournament appearance in history.
In 2008, Williams became the University of South Dakota women's basketball head coach, his first Division I coaching position. At the time, South Dakota was moving up from Division II. In Williams's last season as head coach, SouthDakota was 23–8 with a WNIT appearance.
Williams became head coach at Colorado State in 2012. After an 11–19 record his first season his team has won four-straight Mountain West Conference regular season titles, appearing in the WNIT and WNCAA Tournaments. His overall record at CSU is 115-46 (.714) and 70-18 (.795) in conference play.