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BYU women's basketball players (from left) Brinley Cannon, Delaney Gibb and Hattie Ogden answer questions during Big 12 Media Day in Kansas City, Mo,, on Tuesday, Oct. 21, 2025.

Courtesy BYU Athletics

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BYU women's basketball head coach Lee Cummard answers questions during Big 12 Media Day in Kansas City, Mo,, on Tuesday, Oct. 21, 2025.

Courtesy BYU Athletics

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BYU women's basketball players (from left) Hattie Ogden, Brinley Cannon and Delaney Gibb poses for photos during Big 12 Media Day in Kansas City, Mo, on Tuesday, Oct. 21, 2025.

Courtesy BYU Athletics

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During its first two years in the Big 12 Conference, the BYU women’s basketball team has been looking up at the top of the league.

The Cougars finished tied for ninth in 2023-24 with a 6-12 record and was 4-14 (tied for 12th) last season. The program went through big changes over the offseason, replacing head coach Amber Whiting with assistant Lee Cummard and bringing in seven players who weren’t on the roster in 2024-25.

While answering questions at Tuesday’s Big 12 Women’s Basketball Media Day, Cummard said there are some consistencies among the teams at the top of the league the Cougars can adopt.

“They’re really well coached, and they have really good players,” Cummard said. “I feel like the coaches at the top keep it pretty simple for their group, and they get really good at what they do. They adjust a little bit, but it’s little tweaks. It’s nothing major, week to week, or game to game.

“I would like to foundationally be who we are and just improve over the course of the year. I think the coaches at the top do a great job of putting the best players in position to make plays for their team offensively and defensively. They’re solid and foundationally who they are as a team.”

Another common theme among the teams traditionally at the top of the Big 12 is experience. The programs winning conference titles and earning NCAA Tournament berths not only have seniors but grad transfers and others who have been through the wars of conference play.

BYU’s returning group, led by sophomore first team All-Big 12 selection Delaney Gibb, are growing in that kind of experience.

“I think something that we frequently saw against the best teams in the conference last year was they were physical and they were tough,” Gibb said. “They were the ones who were the aggressor. I’ll say that. They were assertive and they made sure that they started off the game strong and they finished the game strong.

“I think one thing we can take away from that is to make sure that every single night, anything can happen. We need to make sure that we start the game strong and we finish the game strong. That’s something that with experience and with time and with building connections throughout our team, we’re going to be able to improve on. We still have a young team. We had a young team last year, but we’re definitely experienced and creating trust in each other is going to help with that.”

Brinley Cannon was also a freshman on last year’s team.

“I learned a lot,” Cannon said. “I would say the biggest takeaway that I learned was just that it’s a long season. The Big 12 is super competitive, and there’s going to be a lot of ups and downs, and really, all you can really focus on is one game at a time, working on doing your job and contributing how you can to your team.”

The Big 12 coaches who voted in the preseason poll put BYU at 10th heading into the 2025-26 season.

The Cougars believe they can do better than that.

I think the toughness side to it, to be the aggressors coming out, we’re going to be the ones being physical,” senior Hattie Ogden said. “Then I also think we’re going to pride ourselves on playing together, making the right play for our teammates, and having fun with it together, enjoying the moment. I mean, senior year, that’s what I would hope for, but I think that that’s kind of the mindset of our whole team.”