NCAA releases an “aspirational” five-year strategic framework for women’s basketball

For the first time, the NCAA released a cross-divisional strategic plan for a single sport. Featuring women’s basketball, the report is touted as a five-year strategic framework to advance the sport and provide guidelines for decision-making across all three divisions.

One main aim of the report is to help disseminate positive information about the sport across the spectrum, from college administrators to high school coaches. Lynn Holzman, the NCAA vice president for women’s basketball, held an online press conference for media an hour before the release of the report.

“In my opinion it is a fair statement to say that over the course of the last two Final Fours, the two championships, we’ve started to see a turn in how women’s basketball is being consumed, the way its being perceived, and…the way leaders are talking about women’s basketball,” Holzman said. “I think the tide has turned to bring back some optimism around our sport.”

Over, 1,000 stakeholders were involved in developing the strategic plan. The steering committee included NCAA officials, athletic directors and coaches. Of the key partners and stakeholders, the only media entity listed was ESPN.

“Throughout the process, with the individuals we engaged, there has been an enthusiasm,” Holzman said. “There’s also been an underlying message, that by engaging all these different stakeholders, we needed to make sure that we arm them with positive, factual information about what women’s basketball was about. So, that as we work with athletic directors, commissioners and other leaders throughout intercollegiate athletics, that we change the way they were talking about women’s basketball.”

The report is organized around themes in the acronymic phrase, TIP (teamwork, inclusion, passion) for excellence and integrity. The goal areas of the report focus on the buzzwords leadership, transformational student-athlete experience, quality compensation, memorable championships and building affinity. A cross-divisional steering committee will oversee implementation of the plan.

While Holzman described the goals of the report as aspirational, she added “we’re not going to sit back on our heels, we’re gonna push, we’re gonna be innovative.”

The NCAA is accepting feedback about the plan via email: wbbstrategicplan@ncaa.org

The full report is below as a slideshow, click the first image to enter a full screen slideshow. You can also download it as a PDF file.