Former WNBA player Meredith joins Virginia coaching staff

Virginia women’s basketball head coach Joanne Boyle has announced the hiring of La’Keshia Frett Meredith as an assistant coach. Frett Meredith, a former All-American and four-time All-SEC honoree at Georgia, will work primarily with the Cavalier post players.

As a professional basketball player, Frett Meredith played seven seasons in the WNBA, including making four appearances in the Western Conference Finals, after a two-year stint in the American Basketball League. Frett Meredith retired from the WNBA to take a full-time coaching position at her alma mater, serving as an assistant coach for Georgia from 2005-11. For the past two seasons, she hasserved as the Lady Bulldog’s director of basketball operations.

“We are very excited to have La’Keshia join the Cavalier staff,” Boyle said. “With a young post group, it is going to be a great asset to have someone with her vast levels of experience and knowledge to mentor, guide and transform our team. La’Keisha was a dominant player who had tremendous success in both the collegiate and professional ranks and she has maintained that same passionate desire and ability to win in her coaching career. I cannot wait to see the positive impact she is going to have on the Virginia basketball program.”

In 1997, Frett Meredith was a first-round draft pick in the ABL, where she played two seasons for the Philadelphia Rage. After the ABL folded, she was drafted by the SanAntonio Sparks, beginning a seven-year WNBA career that included playing for the Sparks (1999-00), the Sacramento Monarchs (2001-03), the Charlotte Sting (2004) and the New York Liberty (2004-05). All but one of the teams reached the playoffs, including trips to the Western Conference Finals in 1999, 2000 and 2003. She also played overseas in Hungary, Israel, South Korea and Spain.

As a player, Frett Meredith enjoyed remarkable success at the prep, collegiate and professional levels. She was the 1993 National Prep Player of the Year and then helped lead Georgia to back-to-back Final Four appearances and consecutive SEC titles. Within the professional ranks, her teams advanced to the WNBA playoffs in six of her seven seasons in the league.

While atGeorgia, Frett Meredith was the 1994 SEC Freshman of the Year and was namedAll-SEC by league coaches each of her four years, earning first-team recognition as a sophomore, junior and senior. She was a Naismith All-America pick as a junior and earned All-America recognition from Naismith, the U.S.Basketball Writers Association and the Associated Press (third team) as a senior in 1997. All told, Frett Meredith helped lead Georgia to a combined 98-27 (.784) record from 1993-97. Frett Meredith scored 1,980 points in her Bulldog career, ranking sixth on the career scoring list, and ranked eighth with 842 rebounds.

Frett Meredith was a three-time All-American at Phoebus High School and then headlined one of the most celebrated recruiting classes in women’s hoops history that featured five of USA Today’s top-20 prospects in the nation. Frett Meredith and her classmates Kedra Holland-Corn and Tracy Henderson went on to become three of the top-15 overall picks in the 1997 ABL Draft, the first draft conducted when professional women’s basketball emerged in the U.S. following the 1996 Atlanta Olympics.

Frett Meredith received her bachelor’s degree in consumer economics from Georgia in 1997 and has been pursuing a master’s degree in business administration from Maryland University College.

Frett Meredith replaces former assistant Ashley Earley on the staff. In June, Earley, who spent one season on the Cavalier coaching staff, accepted a position as an assistant coach at her alma mater, Vanderbilt.