Kate Popovec didn’t think she was going to be hired as the 10th head coach in Bradley women’s basketball history.
The desire to be a head coach burned, but Popovec was initially unsure if she wanted to leave Northwestern, where she played basketball for two years and served as the associate head coach since 2017.
But thanks to constant encouragement from her family, fianceé, fellow staff at Northwestern and Bradley athletic personnel, Popovec saw her dream fulfilled as she was introduced as the new Braves head coach at a press conference at Renaissance Coliseum on Tuesday.
“Ever since I’ve been in college, I’ve dreamed of running my own program,” Popovec said. “I was afforded tremendous opportunities as a young coach, but there is a reason why I have so badly wanted to be in this profession and that’s relationships. I learned early that you win with people.”
With Bradley University president Stephen Standifird, provost Walter Zakahi, Missouri Valley Conference commissioner Jeff Jackson, her parents and many others in attendance, Popovec shared her path to Bradley, which started with a connection from NU.
The newest head coach on the Hilltop already had a working relationship with Vice President for Intercollegiate Athletics Chris Reynolds, who was one of the first to contact Popovec about the women’s basketball head coach position. Reynolds was the Deputy Director of Athletics for Operations and Administration at Northwestern when Popovec was the Director of Player Development in 2014.
“Everything that Kate stands for and all the experiences that she has had [point] to success at a high level,” Reynolds said.
For Popovec, the option of leaving her alma mater, where she helped the Wildcats to berths in the WNIT and NCAA Women’s Tournament, left her with a difficult dilemma.
“It’s been an absolute whirlwind,” Popovec said of her last few weeks. “I think the hardest part for me was leaving Northwestern. It’s my alma mater; it’s a place where I’ve had a great five years of my life, and I love the people at Northwestern. They were really encouraging as I embarked on this journey.”
Popovec’s first stint on the Wildcat coaching staff as the Director of Player Development was sandwiched between roles as the Director of Basketball Operations at La Salle University in the 2013-2014 season and an assistant head coach at Colgate for the 2016-17 campaign.
Before she even turned 30, Popovec returned to Evanston in 2017 and served under head coach Joe McKeown, who, according to Popovec, was one of the biggest ambassadors in the country for Title IX and women’s sports.
“When you look at Kate’s bio…she’s very accomplished,” Reynolds said. “More importantly, [coaching] is about developing our young women. The thing we go after in the athletic department goes beyond wins and losses and hanging banners. We want to represent something very special to this community.”
Popovec said her impression of Bradley when it first showed up on her radar was the academic tradition, which she believes is among the best in the MVC. Further research led her to fall in love with the campus, the basketball tradition in Peoria and its Midwestern setting, as Popovec is an Ohio native.
The new face on the Braves’ sideline emphasized heavily during the press conference that getting to know and coach the right people leads to success. Within the last few weeks, she has enjoyed every aspect of meeting the Bradley community: from the fans at the public press conference to her players whom she went out to dinner with last week and to the Bradley staff that hired her.
“It was within 24 hours of our first conversation that they took the time to drive to Chicago, meet me for breakfast and offer me something I’ve always dreamed of: a chance to run my own program,” Popovec said. “I think the best thing is that I get to meet a whole new group of people and mentor a whole new group of student-athletes.”
“I’ve been told that Peoria loves Bradley basketball and there has not been a day since I accepted this position that that has not been felt,” she later added.
During the press conference, Popovec listed four tenants that she plans to build the Bradley program on: family, accountability, resiliency and joy. They all provide a foundation for her past and what she hopes to accomplish at Bradley.
“When you talk about family, you have to embody family and the reason I’m able to do that is because of mine,” Popovec said with her parents, Ken and Renee, in the front row.
Popovec’s fianceé Oliver Goss, who was the Director of Basketball Operations for Northwestern’s women’s basketball team, reassured her of her potential. In fact, he believed that she would get the job at Bradley as soon as it opened.
“As much as I hate to admit it, he was right,” Popovec said.
Popovec said her tenant of resiliency will be tested this year, as the Braves are coming off a 4-24 season with multiple key pieces either graduating or entering the transfer portal. The head coach job is Popevec’s first and she plans to bring some new faces with her onto her staff as well.
“I think I’m not too far removed from my [playing] experiences, which is really great,” Popevec said. “I think it’s also important to have staff that aren’t too far removed from their experiences as well so that’s something I’ll look to bring in when we decide on that.”
Defense is Popovec’s bread and butter, as the Wildcats ranked among the top teams in the nation in many defensive categories. She plans to bring in a defensive set called “Blizzard,” a hybrid between man and zone coverage, which she laughingly admits will take some time for the Braves to get used to.
“Turnovers and steals lead to more possessions on the offensive end and that’s where I want our girls to feel like they can play with freedom,” Popovec said. “We will defend hard, and we will allow our team to play.”
The Braves program won’t be rebuilt in a day, and Popovec has made that clear. However, if anything about her is immediately noticeable, it is confidence and Popovec has enough of it to believe that she can bring joy, her fourth tenant of coaching, to the Braves program.
“Winning is really hard, but it is also so worth it,” Popovec said. “I have held up championship trophies and there is nothing like it. I want to bring that feeling back to Bradley.”
