The Wildcats are hiring an experienced winner, with success ranging from playing at UConn to coaching at Tufts and Princeton. But how will Berube handle the new landscape of NIL, revenue-sharing and the transfer portal?
It's simple: Carla Berube wins.
The new head coach of Northwestern women's basketball has been successful everywhere she's gone. As a student-athlete at UConn, Berube helped the Huskies win the 1994-95 National Championship and four Big East titles. Berube's first head coaching job was at Tufts, where her team won 80% of its games over 17 years and went to four consecutive Division III Final Fours.
She didn't miss a beat when she jumped to Division I in 2019, leading Princeton to a 26-1 record and the Ivy League title in her first season. Berube has since taken the Tigers to five consecutive NCAA Tournaments and won another four Ivy League crowns.
Winning has followed Berube across three decades and various levels of college basketball, and there's no reason to believe she won't do the same at Northwestern. The Wildcats went a combined 35-81 between the last four seasons, but Berube's track record with instant program turnarounds should instill hope that better days are coming to Evanston.
Can Ivy League success translate to the Big Ten?
The Big Ten is one of the toughest conferences in college basketball and undoubtedly a step above the Ivy League. Just because Berube found success at her past stops doesn't necessarily mean she'll be able to make the leap and bring the 'Cats back to contention against some of the top brands in the sport, right?
Princeton wasn't some lowly automatic bid that coasted through an easy schedule. The Tigers were a powerhouse under Berube, finishing the 2025-26 regular season as the AP No. 23 team in the nation and defeating NCAA Tournament-bound teams like Villanova and Rhode Island. Berube's Princeton teams also took down Power Five opponents Kentucky (2022) and NC State (2023) in back-to-back NCAA Tournaments.
The difference, of course, is that Northwestern has to endure the rigors of a Big Ten schedule for three months, rather than only a handful of nonconference games at the beginning of the season and in March Madness. But history shows a precedent for mid-major coaches remaining successful when making the leap to the highest level.
Princeton head coach Carla Berube looks down the court towards Iowa head coach Lisa Bluder as players on the Tigers' bench advocate for officials to call a foul on a 3-point basket attempt in overtime during a NCAA non-conference women's basketball game, Wednesday, Nov. 20, 2019, at Carver-Hawkeye Arena in Iowa City, Iowa.Look no further than Berube's predecessor at Princeton, Courtney Banghart. Following a 12-year career at the New Jersey university, in which she brought the Tigers to eight NCAA Tournaments, Banghart took the head coaching job at North Carolina. The Banghart-led Tar Heels have secured a winning record in each season, have made six consecutive trips to March Madness and will play in their third Sweet 16 on Friday afternoon.
Coaches who have won as much as Berube don't take long to turn programs around. Arizona State hired Grand Canyon's Molly Miller a year ago, and she turned the Sun Devils from 10-22 to 24-11 with a berth in the First Four in her first season. Kenny Brooks made James Madison a perennial postseason team and hasn't coached a single group with a losing record since moving up to Virginia Tech and Kentucky a decade ago.
Even the men's side has similar cases of success translating across levels. Iowa's Ben McCollum was a four-time Division II national champion at Northwest Missouri State, led Drake to a Round of 64 upset over Mizzou in his first Division I season and now has the Hawkeyes in the Sweet 16 just one year later.
Berube's biggest challenge is a familiar one for NU
There's no question that Berube's scheme and coaching talent were worthy of a Power Four opportunity. What will determine how successful Berube will be in Evanston is the same issue that troubled Joe McKeown during his final seasons at Northwestern: navigating the era of NIL and the transfer portal.
McKeown didn't welcome his first transfer until 2023-24, then finally landed a trio of starters in his penultimate season. Grace Sullivan, a Second Team All-Big Ten honoree this season, was the only one of his six transfers who played more than a year at Northwestern. The Wildcats have paired that with a combined 35-81 record (10-60 B1G) over the past four seasons.
Berube didn't roster a single transfer during her seven years at Princeton, though that was largely a byproduct of the Ivy League's harsh transfer rules. The Ivy League does not allow its schools to grant athletic scholarships or accept graduate transfers, and a very small percentage of players end up transferring into the prestigious academic conference.
Northwestern will give Berube much more flexibility to build her roster and better resources. According to USA Today reporter Mitchell Nordham, the Wildcats were offering candidates a head coaching salary of $800,000 and roughly $1 million in revenue-sharing resources.
The investment puts Berube on the right track to turn the 'Cats around, but there will certainly still be a learning curve as Northwestern looks to compete in one of the toughest conferences in the nation. Nonetheless, Berube is a proven winner and the ideal candidate to return the Wildcats to the postseason.