Women coaches to meet in D-I girls basketball final for first time since 1990

After Champlain Valley won its semifinal on Monday night, Ute Otley wondered the last time Vermont's Division I high school girls basketball championship game featured two women head coaches.

The answer — not since 1990 — surprised Otley.

"The fact it hasn't happened since 1990, it feels like a really long time ago," Otley said Wednesday afternoon. "I don’t know how to characterize how I feel about it. It's not necessarily in a good or bad way, it's just notable."

That drought of 33 years ends tonight with Otley's top-seeded Redhawks (19-1) taking on Jade Huntington's No. 3 St. Johnsbury Hilltoppers (15-6) in the D-I title game at the University of Vermont's Patrick Gym.

"It’s great that there are two female coaches and both want the best for their teams and raising awareness that when you set your mind to things great things happen," Huntington said.

The last time two women faced off for the Division I crown in girls basketball, legendary coach Jean Robinson and her Essex Hornets defeated Patti Wilcox's Mount Anthony Patriots when the championship game was played at Barre Auditorium.

"Those are names from the past," Huntington said.

Back then, the Indiana-raised Otley was about to graduate from Dartmouth College after a decorated four-year career while Huntington, Vermont's all-time leading scorer who starred at Oxbow, was in the middle of helping Vanderbilt reach the Sweet 16 of the NCAA Tournament.

The Otley-Huntington matchup on the sport's biggest stage should be recognized, Otley said, but also serve to point out the lack of women coaches in girls basketball. Of the 13 Division I schools, there are only three women leading programs: Otley, Huntington and Erin Mears at Burr and Burton.

That's a slight uptick from three years ago when Otley was the only woman in charge of a D-I squad.

"I’m not saying it’s a big deal or some kind of crazy barrier, I’m always just surprised by how few of us there are," Otley said. "There isn’t a flood of women coaching girls in Vermont. It’s a question I’ve always had."

Otley said she's didn't have a woman coach until she arrived at Dartmouth in 1986. While male coaches played pivotal roles in her development and love of the sport, Otley reflected on the absence of a female voice outside her mother during her upbringing.

"My experiences with men coaches were good, but girls need to have strong female role models," said Otley, who has compiled a 245-16 record with five titles and an upcoming ninth championship appearance in 12 seasons at the Hinesburg powerhouse. "I didn’t get a professional female role model until college."

Huntington had a different experience at Oxbow, where she steered the Bradford school to three state titles and totaled 2,114 career points between 1984-1988. There, Huntington excelled under Mona Garone, one of several women coaching greats in Vermont at the time — a list that includes Robinson, Bellows Falls' Jayne Barber, South Burlington's Sheila Burleigh and Mount Abraham's Connie Larose.

After Vanderbilt, Huntington served as an assistant at Colorado State and coached Becky Hammon, who led Las Vegas to the 2022 WNBA crown.

"I was never raised that because I was a woman or girl I can't do this," Huntington said. "The I can't message I received was, I was a small-town girl in Vermont who wouldn't be able to make it."

Huntington said she's admired Otley and her program, even before she took over at St. Johnsbury for the start of the COVID-impacted 2021 season. Otley's CVU squad broke Oxbow's modern hoops winning streak, which Huntington helped established.

"I have the utmost respect for Ute. She’s made great things happen, rising the game of basketball for girls," Huntington said. "She’s a champion at heart in terms of how she works and makes things happen."

Huntington and St. Johnsbury celebrated National Girls and Women in Sports Day this year by having an all-women officiating crew for their home game vs. Burlington.

"I want young people — male or female — to think they can achieve something," said Huntington, who also works at St. Johnsbury. "It really comes down to the work you put into it."

Otley, a teacher at CVU, said she's happy for Huntington and St. Johnsbury's success. She said she wants to see more women enter the coaching field, for any level. Otley's coaching staff has included a few of her former players: Emily Kinneston, a two-time BFP Miss Basketball award winner, is on the CVU bench this winter.

"It’s a great thing for Vermont basketball to have teams being coached by females succeeding. It’s good for the girls, it’s good for Division I and the Metro," Otley said. "I would love to see more of that and that doesn’t mean I’m anti-male coaches coaching girls. I had a perfectly awesome basketball upbringing."

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Contact Alex Abrami at aabrami@freepressmedia.com. Follow him on Twitter: @aabrami5.

Tonight's D-I title game

Teams: No. 1 Champlain Valley (19-1) vs. No. 3 St. Johnsbury (15-6)

Site: Patrick Gym

Time: 7 p.m.

Note: CVU is in search of its first title since 2017 and sixth overall since 2013. ... St. Johnsbury defeated CVU in championship-game matchups in 2018 and 2019.

This article originally appeared on Burlington Free Press: Vermont high school girls basketball: Otley, Huntington to end drought