Sources: Robin Pingeton will return for a 15th season at Mizzou
The Mizzou women's basketball season ended 26 days ago with a 66-60 loss to Florida in the opening round of the SEC Tournament. Since then, there has been absolutely no word on the future of Robin Pingeton. But multiple sources have now told PowerMizzou.com that Pingeton will return for a 15th season on the Tiger bench in 2024-25.
The Tigers finished 11-19 with 12 consecutive losses last season. They were 11-7, 2-3 in SEC play when they traveled to Kentucky on January 21st. The Wildcats won that game 76-71 and Mizzou has not won since.
Missouri has now gone four consecutive seasons without qualifying for the NCAA Tournament (it was canceled following the 2019-20 season). At the end of last season, then Director of Athletics Desiree Reed-Francois laid out clear expectations for the program entering 2023-24.
"We will not apologize for wanting our student-athletes to experience the NCAA Tournament," Reed-Francois told PowerMizzou.com last March 24th.
It became clear that would not happen relatively early in this season. Following the final home game of the year on February 29th, Pingeton sounded like a coach not at all confident she would get another chance to coach at Mizzou Arena.
"I'm a firm believer in being where my feet are about being present about controlling what I can control, winning the day," Pingeton said when asked about her future. "That's what we talk to our players about on a daily basis. And I think it's really important that I'm in a place that I'm modeling that behavior for them."
But ten days before that game, Reed-Francois had been announced as the new athletic director at Arizona. Missouri has not replaced her permanently. Marcy Girton has been serving as Mizzou's Interim AD for the last six weeks, but has made no public comments, either on Pingeton or anything else regarding Mizzou athletics. PowerMizzou.com has been told Girton is doing no interviews while holding down the position. At the time of publishing this story, no one from Mizzou athletics, the Board of Curators or University administration has made any comment on Pingeton's future.
Pingeton has just one year remaining on her contract. She has a base salary of $400,000 per year plus another $100,000 in guaranteed non-salary compensation. Should Missouri have chosen to fire her, it would have owed her approximately $233,000.
Missouri's leading scorer from last year, Hayley Frank, has exhausted her eligibility. Mama Dembele, Mizzou''s leader in steals and assists, third-leading rebounder and fourth-leading scorer, entered the transfer portal and committed to South Florida.
Pingeton is 236-199 overall in 14 seasons at Mizzou. She is 91-135 in conference play, spanning two seasons in the Big 12 and 12 in the Southeastern Conference. Her four NCAA Tournament appearances came consecutively from 2016 to 2019. Those teams all featured Sophie Cunningham, the leading scorer in program history. In 11 years without Cunningham on the roster, Pingeton is 144-160.
PowerMizzou.com will update this story as necessary.
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