JMU women’s basketball wins over Florida and Villanova, 23-4 overall (14-0 in the Sunbelt). Dukes is slowly looking at some of the top 50 teams across the country, and has been voted in the latest AP Top 25 polls.
Is this the best team since Sean O’Regan became the program’s head coach ahead of the 2016-17 season? O Coach O’s two best teams before were 2018-19 (group went 29-6 and played the WNIT semi-finals) and 2019-20 (25-4 before Covid ended the season early did).
The 2018-19 team dealt with injuries that played a key role in the heartbreaking CAA quarterfinals. As a result, the team did not play the NCAA tournament.
The 2019-20 team was on track to the tournament before the pandemic hit, potentially winning the NCAA tournament. The team led by Kamia Smalls was incredible. The Dukes should have beaten Maryland at home early in the season, but blew the slow lead away. Still, they defeated Villanova, St. John’s, Liberty, UCF and more. They went 16-2 in the CAA regular season, beating their opponents (Towson and Drexel) over 30 points in the second meeting, revenging both losses.
This 2024-25 team is mixed with that group. The Duke beat Florida and Villanova 23-4. Three of the four losses came to the top 15 teams of the latest AP Top 25 votes, including No. 1 Notre Dame and No. 2 Texas. They have no bad losses.
Do NCAA Tournaments appear on cards?
Dukes is in the fringe of a massive conversation, but it is unlikely that Dukes will win a massive bid with a Zero Quad 1 win (0-3 record). JMU is 24-1 with Quad 2-4.
However, they are a great favorite for winning the Sun Belt Tournament and its automatic bids into the NCAA Tournament field. JMU is the only Sunbelt team in the top 100 in the net, with Dukes in 53rd place. There is an earthquake gap between the Duke and the rest of the meeting.
Anything is possible in a conference tournament, but Dukes has mostly locked up Pensacola’s top two seeds. The new tournament format means that the JMU team that seeded No. 1 or No. 2 will only need to win two games to win the conference title. It’s a very viable job given the Dukes’ 14 consecutive wins this year.
JMU is in a good position to create an NCAA tournament, with the Dukes poised to score 11 or 12 seeds. ESPN’s latest bracket has Dukes as the No. 12 seed playing West Virginia in Knoxville, Tennessee.
Compare the Duke with the 2019-20 team
The 2019-20 team could have had a slight more star power on top of the lineup with the Kamias Malls, averaging 18.6 points per game, with 47.1% shooting as a shooting guard. She shot 38% from the 3-point range and 87.4% from the free throw line, averaging 5.3 rebounds and 2.8 assists per game.
Not only did Smalls have been the best player in the CAA in 2019-20, but he was drafted in the third round of the 2020 WNBA Draft, and then played professionally overseas. Payton McDaniel (16.3 ppg) was a Dukes star in 2024-25, and while the redshirt junior small forward will one day play professionally, he says he’s as efficient or athletic as the peak small It’s difficult. Still, McDaniel is a rebounder (8.2 per game) and defender (54 steels and 19 blocks in 27 games compared to the 40 steel and the Smalls’ 10 blocks in 2019-20) than the Smalls did in their final season. They do a lot too.
With Kiki Jefferson on the 2019-20 roster, it brings the team to the top in terms of star power as Jefferson has grown into a mid-murger star and an eventual Louisville transfer and a productive ACC player. The Dukes 2019-20 team featuring Jackie Benitez, Lexie Barry and Kayla Cooper Williams had a wealth of high-level professional caliber talent.
Dukes’ current iterations thrive at its depths. The four Dukes, who are packing scoring punches to complement McDaniel’s excellence, averaged over 10 points per game.
Kozlova, Barnes, and McDaniel all average at least 7 rebounds per game, while Scott, Jamia Hazell, Zakiya Stephenson, and Bree Robinson handle backcourt missions. Scott is primarily a scorer, and Hazel handles the ball and can score consistently within the 3-point line. Stevenson leads the team with 83 assists, with Robinson (45 steel) potentially becoming the team’s best boundary defender.
O’Regan’s current team may be his best built roster. There is star power, but there is also the balance and depth that the 2019-20 team lacks.
To be the best team of coach O, the Dukes need a league title and an appearance in the NCAA Tournament. With the NCAA Tournament victory, JMU’s women’s basketball team has acquired the team to the Elite Company as they have not made it to the next round of Big Dance since 2014, when JMU defeated Gonzaga in the opening round. JMU has not created Sweet 16 since 1990-91.
The Dukes need to create March Madness before they dream of running a deep tournament, but the depth, experience and balance of the team will result in the NCAA Tournament getting a valid stretch goal. It’s been a few years since O’Regan led his team with so many promises.
Photo courtesy of JMU Athletics Communications
