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Welcome Coach Ganiyat Adeduntan
WASHINGTON – No stranger to the Nation's Capital and the Atlantic 10 Conference, Ganiyat Adeduntan has been named women's basketball head coach for the George Washington Revolutionaries.
After a four-year stint as Head Coach at Colgate, including school-records in overall and conference wins this season, and back-to-back 20-win seasons and WNIT appearance in 2023-24 and 2024-25, the Athens, Georgia native returns to the Smith Center sidelines where she was GW's top assistant coach for three seasons and spent four years overall from 2017-2021, punctuated by an A-10 Championship and NCAA Tournament appearance in 2018.
"Coach Adeduntan is the right leader to return GW women's basketball to the top of the A-10 and the national stage," said Associate Vice President and Director of Athletics Michael Lipitz. "She is a program-builder, evidenced by the remarkable turnaround she engineered at Colgate, an elite recruiter, a relentless competitor, and a skilled tactician and teacher of the game. Moreover, she builds deep, authentic relationships with her student-athletes on- and off-the-court. We're thrilled to welcome Coach G home to Foggy Bottom."
Adeduntan reflected on her path back to GW and the opportunity ahead to rejoin the nation's elite.
"I am overjoyed to be the next women's basketball head coach at George Washington University," said Adeduntan. "GW holds a special place in my heart, and I am grateful to President Granberg and Michael Lipitz for entrusting me with this program. This university is in one of the best cities in the world, and offers a world-class education with a history and tradition of winning in women's basketball. GW is a place where we can win at the highest level of competition. We will strive for excellence in everything we do and work relentlessly to win championships here. I am excited and fired up to get to work."
At Colgate, she led the Raiders to historic results. Before Adeduntan's hire, Colgate had won 129 games total over 16 years and recorded just two winning seasons in conference play since 2000. In the last three seasons under her leadership, Colgate has won 59 games and posted a winning record in the Patriot League each year.
Colgate's 23 overall wins and 13 conference wins this season were the best in school history. The success of Adeduntan's squad was driven by a relentless defense and a focus on the fundamentals which saw the Raiders rank sixth nationally in free throw percentage, 35th in assist-to-turnover ratio and 43rd in scoring defense in the country, while pacing the conference in rebounding margin and turnover margin.
In 2023-24, behind the nation's best three-point field goal defense, Colgate finished 20-14 overall and 10-8 in Patriot League play, en route to capturing their first 20-win season since 2003-04. Adeduntun and the Raiders finished second in the Patriot League standings last year – its highest finish in more than two decades – with a defense that led the Patriot League and ranked 15th nationally in opponents points per game.
With one of the top defensive units in the country, Colgate challenged itself at every opportunity, scheduling top-seeded 2025 NCAA Tournament team UCLA, as well as opponents from the ACC, Big East and A-10. Last season Colgate earned the program's first-ever win over a Big East opponent when they knocked off Providence, 54-41, in the second round of the WNIT to become the first team in Patriot League history to advance to the Super Sixteen of the WNIT.
Previously at GW, while learning the ins-and-outs of the powerhouse program, Adeduntan worked directly with the development of guards and wings. Under her guidance, George Washington produced two All-Conference guards in two years in Mei-Lyn Bautista and Brianna Cummings. Having also assisted with the scouting of opponents, community service initiatives, serving as housing and compliance liaison, and overseeing student-athletes' academic progress, there is not a corner of George Washington with which Adeduntan is unfamiliar, paving the way for a strong start.
Originally coming to GW after spending three seasons as an assistant coach at Northeastern University, she helped engineer a nine-win turnaround from her first season on the staff with the Huskies to her second season as the Huskies improved from four wins in 2014-15 to 15 wins in 2015-16.
A 1,000-point scorer and All-ACC performer as a four-year letterwinner at Florida State, Adeduntan also excelled in the classroom as a four-time ACC All-Academic honoree. She earned her both her Bachelor of Science in Nursing and Master of Science in Nursing (Nurse Practitioner) from Florida State, and her Doctorate in Nursing Practice from Northeastern.
Go Beyond the Bio with Coach G.
HEAD COACHING RECORD
YEAR OVERALL CONFERENCE POSTSEASON
2024-25 23-9 13-5 WNIT
2023-24 20-14 10-8 WNIT Super 16
2022-23 16-14 10-8
2021-22 6-24 4-14
- dmvpiranha
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Re: Welcome Coach Ganiyat Adeduntan
It's a solid hire, albeit not flashy. The familiarity at GW is definitely a plus, although it came in the Rizzotti era (again I don't have any animosity towards Rizzotti, but it's a fact that the offense began to flounder with her recruits). However, Adeduntan deserves to be judged separately and has spent time as a HC since then at Colgate. Expect WBB to continue playing at a slow pace.
Pros:
- Adeduntan has won 20 games in back to back years. That is historic at a place like Colgate, which is not an easy job. Prior to her arrival, that had only been done once in the program's history (the one time they made the NCAA tournament in 2003-04).
- Colgate has made the WNIT two straight years. That would definitely be a step in the right direction at GW after the past several years.
- The Raiders have continued to improve under Adeduntan's watch. Per Bart Torvik, they were 319th in year 1, 243rd in year 2, 202nd in year 3, and 146th currently this year. The offense has also continued to improve over time. Colgate is 104th nationally this year. That would certainly be a welcome sight at GW.
- Player development. This is a major one. If I remember correctly, Taylor Golembiewski was originally a GW commit. She is posting career best ppg numbers and shooting from 3 in her senior year.
- In Adeduntan's last three years, Colgate has been around top 100 in turnover rate. Given the ball security issues under McCombs, this would also be very refreshing. They are also decent in turning other teams over.
- Colgate has been a dominant defensive rebounding team the last two years, ranking top 15 in defensive rebound percentage the last two years.
- The Raiders shoot the ball well at the FT line (again a major change) however they rarely get there. They also keep other teams off the line though. Colgate has also been roughly top 50 in three point percentage the last two years which would be a much needed change at GW.
Cons:
- Colgate won 23 games this year, but most are of the empty calorie variety. They beat no one worth caring about in OOC play. McCombs won 28 games her penultimate year at Stony Brook (and finished with a Bart Torvik rank of 145 in her last year, similar to Colgate's rank now) however that didn't really translate at GW.
- The Raiders have zero marquee wins under Adeduntan. Some of the other names rumored like Vickers had won multiple games against P6 competition this year.
While I would have tried the high major assistant route after the last two sitting head coach hires didn't work out I fully support Coach G and by all accounts she seems very likable and a grinder. It will be worth seeing how her philosophy changes at GW. You can't really recruit transfers at the Patriot league level but that will be a requirement in the A10. I'm also curious whether any players follow her from Colgate. Looking forward to the new era!
- creeksandzeeks
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Re: Welcome Coach Ganiyat Adeduntan
If this hire was announced in early April, I think I'd be thrilled. I don't know if we swung big early and missed, or if we settled too fast.
Coach Adeduntan is a great person, and a very good coach, and I think will have a lot of winning seasons at GW. I'm not sure I'm optimistic about a lot of Conference Championships or Tourney runs, but a lot of that has to do with staff and resources. I grade this a B or B+, which after the last couple of seasons is fine enough for me.
- gwstudent2024
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Re: Welcome Coach Ganiyat Adeduntan
Here's our GW Basketball Insiders episode about the hiring of Adeduntan:
YouTube:
Spotify:
Apple Podcasts:
Amazon Music:
We talked about her background, the transition from Patriot League to A-10, and the search process along with a bit of talk about A-10 men's teams performances in the NCAA Tournament and NIT