VERMONT SPORTS HALL OF FAME

Photo Credit- BC Ath. Communications

University of Vermont

Coach-basketball

Inducted 2022

In seven seasons as the head coach at the University of Vermont, Cathy Inglese was the architect of the remarkable turnaround and growth of the UVM women's basketball program. The Catamounts success spurred a state-wide boom in female basketball in the state.

Inglese was the head coach at Vermont from 1986-1993 leading UVM to unprecedented success with its first two conference titles in 1992 and 1993, and its first two trips to the NCAA Women's Basketball Tourney. While at UVM, Inglese was named America East Coach of the Year (then the NAC) three times, 1990, 1991 and 1992, and was a finalist for National Coach of the Year in 1991.

The Catamounts went an amazing 79-9 over her last three campaigns including a combined 57-2 mark in 1991-92 and 1992-93, with both losses in the NCAAs. In those two years Vermont was the winningest team in the nation and became the first team to go unbeaten in the regular season in back-to-back seasons. Her final two Vermont teams won a then NCAA-record 52 straight regular season games. The second of her two trips to the NCAAs included hosting a first-round game at Patrick Gymnasium against Rutgers. 

She continued to have success in her 28 seasons as a Division I head coach. Inglese went from UVM to Boston College in the Big East from 1993 to 2008. She guided BC to seven NCAA Tournament appearances, including three trips to the Sweet 16 and its first-ever Big East Championship, making the move to the ACC in 2006. Ironically the last of her 273 wins at Boston College was over Vermont, in the second round of the 2008 Women's NIT.

From 2009-2014 Inglese led the women's basketball program at the University of Rhode Island. On December 1, 2012 she won her final game at Patrick Gym defeating Houston Baptist 59-36 in the TD Bank Classic. Over her last two seasons she was on staff at Fairleigh Dickinson and at Hofstra. 

Inglese was inducted into the Southern Connecticut State Athletic Hall of Fame in 1992, her alma mater where she was a basketball and softball standout, and also was named to the Connecticut Softball Hall of Fame. She was named to the Connecticut Women's Basketball Hall of Fame in 1996, the New England Basketball Hall of Fame in 2003, the UVM Athletic Hall of Fame in 2008 and the Boston College Varsity Club Hall of Fame in 2014. She tragically passed away in 2019.