| Coaching Career |
| 2016 - present |
| Head Coach, University of Wisconsin |
| 2012-16 |
| Head Coach, George Washington |
| 2008-12 |
| Associate Head Coach/Recruiting Coordinator, Notre Dame |
| 2003-08 |
| Assistant Coach, Notre Dame |
| 2002-03 |
| Director of men's basketball operations, UNC-Greensboro |
| 2000-02 |
| Assistant Men's Basketball Coach, Elon University |
| 1999-2000 |
| Assistant Men's Basketball Coach, Le Moyne College |
| 1996-99 |
| Assistant Men's Basketball Coach, Cornell University |
| 1995-96 |
| Undergraduate Men's Basketball Staff Assistant, Duke University |
| Coaching Honors |
| 2015 Atlantic 10 Coach of the Year |
| 2008-09 BasketballScoop.com National Assistant Coach of the Year |
| Wisconsin Notable Athletes |
Abby Laszewski
2020 Honorable Mention All-Big Ten |
Marsha Howard
2019 Second-Team All-Big Ten; 2018 Honorable Mention All-Big Ten |
Imani Lewis
2020 Second-Team All-Big Ten; 2019 Honorable Mention All-Big Ten |
Cayla McMorris
2018, 2017 Honorable Mention All-Big Ten |
Avyanna Young
2017 Honorable Mention All-Big Ten |
| Academic All-Big Ten |
| 2019-20: Carmen Backes, Niya Beverley, Diamond Bragg, Kara Crowley, Courtney Fredrickson, Suzanne Gilreath, Abby Laszewski, Imani Lewis, Alex Luehring, Sydney Mathiason |
| 2018-19: Niya Beverley, Courtney Fredrickson, Suzanne Gilreath, Kelly Karlis, Abby Laszewski, Grace Mueller, Lexy Richardson, Kendra Van Leeuwen |
| 2017-18: Suzanne Gilreath, Malayna Johnson, Grace Mueller, Lexy Richardson, Kendall Shaw, Kendra Van Leeuwen |
| 2016-17: Malayna Johnson, Ashley Kelsick, Taylor Kuhn |
| Notable Athletes |
Jonquel Jones, George Washington
Two-time honorable mention All-American; 2015 Atlantic 10 Player of the Year; 2016 WNBA first-round draft pick |
Caira Washington, George Washington
Two-time first-team All-Atlantic 10; 2014 A-10 Rookie of the Year |
Kayla McBride, Notre Dame
Two-time All-American; 2014 ACC Player of the Year; 2014 WNBA first-round draft pick |
Natalie Novosel, Notre Dame
2011 honorable mention All-American; 2011 first-team All-Big East |
Jacqueline Batteast, Notre Dame
Two-time All-American; 2005 Big East Player of the Year; 2005 WNBA second-round draft pick |
Lindsay Schrader, Notre Dame
2010 Honorable Mention All-American; Two-time first-team All-Big East |
Charel Allen, Notre Dame
Two-time Honorable Mention All-American; Two-time first-team All-Big East; 2008 WNBA third-round draft pick |
Success breeds success and that’s exactly what head coach Jonathan Tsipis is bringing to the Wisconsin women’s basketball program. Following the success of other Badger teams, Tsipis is looking for the same as he rebuilds the UW program.
“I’ve seen Wisconsin, in so many other sports, win championships,” Tsipis said. “I kept saying, ‘Why can’t Wisconsin (women’s) basketball do that same thing?’”
“He knows what it takes to play at a championship level, and then you go out and do it on your own,” Director of Athletics Barry Alvarez said. “I liked the fact he went out and took his own team and built it.
“He’s a guy that will get out in the community and sell the program. He was everything I was looking for.”
The 2015 Atlantic 10 Conference Coach of the Year, Tsipis was named the seventh head coach in Wisconsin women’s basketball history on March 31, 2016.
Rebuilding a program
In his first four years at Wisconsin, Tsipis is creating a foundation for success.
In 2018-19, UW wrapped up its most successful season in nearly a decade, finishing the season with a 15-18 mark, the most wins since 2010-11. The Badgers also went 4-14 in Big Ten play, surpassing their B1G win total from the last three seasons and winning four conference games for the first time since 2014-15.
Wisconsin advanced to the quarterfinals of the Big Ten Tournament for the first time since 2013. Wisconsin won two tournament games for the first time since 2009 as it was seeded No. 13 in the tournament, upsetting No. 12 Penn State before downing No. 5 Ohio State in the second round.
Individually senior Marsha Howard earned second-team All-Big Ten honors, the first Badger named second team since 2014, and freshman Imani Lewis was named honorable mention All-Big Ten, the first Badger rookie honored since 2005. Howard was also named a two-time Big Ten Honor Roll pick and Lewis was named a Big Ten Freshman of the Week.
In his four years, five Badgers have earned eight All-Big Ten honors while 27 have earned Academic All-Big Ten honors, including a record 10 in 2019-20. Two athletes have also recorded 1,000 career points in the past four seasons--Cayla McMorris in 2017-18 and Howard in 2018-19.
Tsipis also won his 100th career game as Wisconsin downed Illinois on Feb. 22, 2017.
Making a national statement
Tsipis (SIP-iss) spent four seasons as the head coach at George Washington University, re-establishing the Colonials as a national power and a dominant team in the Atlantic 10. He inherited a team that went 11-18 the year before he arrived and led them to a 55-11 record, two A-10 titles and consecutive NCAA tournament appearances in the last two seasons. In his four years, GW was 92-38 (.708).
After a debut season that ended with a 14-16 mark, Tsipis guided George Washington to a 23-11 overall record in 2013-14, tying for second in the conference and advancing to the third round of the WNIT. The Colonials were one of the top offensive teams in the country, ranking 35th in the country, averaging 76.1 points per game. That was a 17.2 points per game improvement from the previous season. Freshman Caira Washington was named the A-10 Rookie of the Year.
In 2014-15, Tsipis was voted the Atlantic 10 Coach of the Year after leading GW to a 29-4 record, setting a program mark for wins and winning percentage. The Colonials won the A-10 regular season and tournament titles, earning their first berth in the NCAA tournament since 2008. George Washington was ranked as high as 19th in the national polls, ending the year ranked 25th in the USA Today Coaches Poll.
The Colonials established themselves as one of the top rebounding teams in the nation, leading all of Division I teams with a plus-13.8 rebounding margin. Junior Jonquel Jones was named A-10 Player of the Year and Defensive Player of the Year as well as honorable mention All-America by the Associated Press and WBCA.
George Washington returned to the NCAA tournament in 2016, recording its third-straight 20-win season by going 26-7. The Colonials won a share of Atlantic 10 regular season title at 13-3 and won their second straight conference tournament title. Jones repeated as an AP and WBCA honorable mention All-American and was a first-round WNBA draft pick, selected sixth overall by the Los Angels Sparks. She also was a candidate for several national player of the year awards, including the Naismith Trophy, Wade Trophy and Wooden Award.
“That starts with the outreach with the high school coaches and the AAU coaches. It’s going to be an open-door policy—practice, shoot-arounds, games -- as much as we can have that involvement.
“Wisconsin is just a state that prides itself on blue-collar work and I love that fact that kids would have that option to say, ‘I can go to Wisconsin and write the next history of women’s basketball.’”
Learning under a legend at Notre Dame
Tsipis arrived at George Washington after serving on the coaching staff at the University of Notre Dame for nine seasons, including his last four years as associate head coach and recruiting coordinator. The Fighting Irish compiled a 228-77 record during his tenure, advancing to the NCAA tournament every year.
Under Hall of Fame coach Muffet McGraw, Tsipis aided the Fighting Irish to five Sweet 16 appearances, including national runner-up finishes his last two seasons. As the coordinator of its nationally-ranked recruiting efforts, Notre Dame had one of the nation’s top-20 recruiting classes in each of his nine years, including three top-10 classes.
One of CollegeInsider.com’s Top 10 assistant coaches in the nation in 2011, and a 2009 BasketballScoop.com Assistant Coach of the Year, Tsipis mentored four All-Americans and eight WNBA draft picks, including five first-round selections, at Notre Dame. His student-athletes also earned eight All-Big East selections, and three were invited to USA Basketball National Team trials.
Tsipis’ success stories include All-Americans Natalie Novosel, Jacqueline Batteast, Charel Allen and Lindsay Schrader.
On the court, Tsipis helped coordinate Notre Dame’s game plans that resulted in more than 30 wins over nationally-ranked opponents, including six wins over perennial power Connecticut.
Starting a coaching career
Tsipis went to Notre Dame after one season as the director of men’s basketball operations at UNC-Greensboro, where he worked under Fran McCaffery, now the head men’s basketball coach at Iowa. He spent two seasons as an assistant men’s coach at Elon University in North Carolina and one year as the top men’s assistant at Le Moyne College in Syracuse, New York.
Tsipis also spent three seasons on the men’s basketball staff at Cornell University and one year as a student staff assistant at Duke under legendary coach Mike Krzyzewski.
Basketball runs in the family
Basketball runs in the Tsipis family, as his father Lou played for the Greek national team at age 15, had a standout career at Baldwin-Wallace College in Berea, Ohio, and later played professionally in Greece. A member of the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame (1987; lifetime member as an official) and Hellenic Sports Hall of Fame (1997), Lou Tsipis also coached at the high school and collegiate levels for more than 20 years.
Tsipis’ brother Dean played at Case Western Reserve in Cleveland and his sister LuAnn Damiris was a three-sport letterwinner at Baldwin-Wallace. In addition, his niece Amanda played basketball at Notre Dame from 2004-08, serving as team captain her final year and winning the program’s Spirit Award each of her four seasons.
Born in Cleveland, Tsipis grew up in Hinckley, Ohio, and moved to Durham, North Carolina, as a junior in high school. He graduated from North Carolina in 1996 with a bachelor’s degree in pharmacy. He and his wife Leigh are the proud parents of two children, daughter Emily and son Joshua.
| Tsipis Year-by-Year Record |
| Wisconsin Head Coach |
| Year |
Record |
Pct. |
Big Ten |
Pct. |
Finish |
Postseason |
| 2019-20 |
12-19 |
.387 |
3-15 |
.167 |
12th |
|
| 2018-19 |
15-18 |
.455 |
4-14 |
.222 |
13th |
Big Ten Tournament Quarterfinals |
| 2017-18 |
9-21 |
.300 |
2-14 |
.125 |
13th |
|
| 2016-17 |
9-22 |
.290 |
3-13 |
.188 |
T11th |
|
| 4 years |
45-80 |
.360 |
12-56 |
.176 |
|
|
| George Washington Head Coach |
| Year |
Record |
Pct. |
A-10 |
Pct. |
Finish |
Postseason |
| 2015-16 |
26-7 |
.788 |
13-3 |
.813 |
1st |
A-10 Champions; NCAA First Round |
| 2014-15 |
29-4 |
.879 |
15-1 |
.938 |
1st |
A-10 Champions; NCAA First Round |
| 2013-14 |
23-11 |
.676 |
11-5 |
.688 |
T2nd |
WNIT Third Round |
| 2012-13 |
14-16 |
.467 |
7-7 |
.500 |
T7th |
|
| 4 years |
92-38 |
.708 |
46-16 |
.742 |
|
|
| 7 years |
125-99 |
.558 |
55-57 |
.491 |
|
|
