The final basketball recognition of the 2025-26 season was unveiled last week when the Illinois Basketball Coaches Association released its Coaches of the Year list, honoring 334 college, high school and junior high coaches, as well as two Special Olympics Unified and wheelchair coaches.

At the college level, Olivet Nazarene University women’s coach Lauren Glenn was named an NAIA Coach of the Year after her Tigers had a season for the record books.

Glenn’s 300th career win came in an 81-80 victory over Indiana South Bend in the Chicagoland Collegiate Athletic Conference Tournament championship game, a win that gave the Tigers their first regular-season and tournament sweep of the CCAC. They played in their first National Championship Tournament in five years, bowing out in the second round.

Trios of both boys and girls coaches were recognized at the high school level – boys coaches Adrian Provost (Bishop McNamara), Chris Pickett (Kankakee) and Doug Krop (Wilmington) and girls coaches Bethany Stritar (Manteno), Anthony Videka (Cissna Park) and Barry Bauer (Watseka/Milford).

All three boys coaches led their teams to historic seasons. In his 14th and final season leading the Fightin’ Irish, Provost led McNamara to a 29-6 record, the most wins in school history, and a Class 2A sectional title, the program’s seventh.

A couple miles south at Kankakee, Pickett and the Kays also set a new school record with 29 wins. They won their third straight Class 3A regional title behind four-star phenom Lincoln Williams, the Daily Journal Player of the Year and Steve Tappa Illinois Media Player of the Year in Class 3A.

In Wilmington, Krop and the Wildcats tied the 1957-58 team for the most wins in school history, as their 22-10 record gave them their first season of 20-plus wins since 1985-86. And their Class 2A regional championship plaque was the program’s first since 1997-98.

Stritar and the Manteno girls program made history of their own. Led by Daily Journal Player of the Year Maddie Gesky and a program-changing senior class, the Panthers set a new program wins standard for the second year in a row, finishing 27-7. With back-to-back Class 2A regional titles, they doubled the program’s plaque total to four.

South of the city, a pair of veteran coaches who coach at one another’s alma maters found themselves recognized again. Bauer and the Warriors had their fifth straight 25-win season after a 25-5 year.

Led by four-time Class 1A All-Stater and all-time scoring leader Addison Lucht and fellow three-time All-Stater Lauryn Hamrick, Videka and Cissna Park made it four straight regional championships and back-to-back undefeated runs through the Vermilion Valley Conference with a 26-3 campaign. Videka earned his 200th win as the school’s high school coach with a 48-38 win at Manteno Jan. 19.

St. Anne was one of four local IESA boys or girls teams to reach state, joined by the Bishop McNamara and Manteno eighth grade girls and Bradley Central seventh grade boys. The Giants made the Class 8-1A State quarterfinals and finished with an 18-5 record.