Bowdoin Assistant Coach Kate McCann Earns Prestigious WBCA Thirty Under 30 Honor

Kate McCann arrived in Brunswick last summer as a first-year assistant coach at Bowdoin College. Nine months later, the Women's Basketball Coaches Association placed her among the 30 most promising young coaches in the country.

McCann has been recognized among the nation's rising stars in the coaching profession, earning a spot on the WBCA Thirty Under 30 team for the 2025-26 season. The Women's Basketball Coaches Association announced the honor on March 24, 2026. This is the 11th year of the WBCA Thirty Under 30 program.

The program, presented by Morgan Stanley Global Sports and Entertainment, honors 30 up-and-coming coaches aged 30 and under from across all levels of basketball, celebrating not only on-court excellence but also a coach's commitment to mentorship, community service, and overall impact on student-athletes.

The recognition comes at the end of a season that gave McCann plenty of on-court credentials to point to. In her first year with the Polar Bears, McCann helped lead Bowdoin to a 25-3 overall record and a 10-0 mark in NESCAC play, becoming the first team to post consecutive perfect regular seasons in the league in a decade. Bowdoin finished as the NESCAC runners-up and advanced to the second round of the NCAA Division III Championship, finishing the year ranked 11th in the nation.

A 2023 graduate of Mount Saint Mary College, McCann earned her Master's Degree in Athletic Leadership from Springfield College in 2025, where she also served as a graduate assistant coach for the last two years. She helped lead Springfield to 37 wins over those two seasons, including an appearance in the 2024 NCAA Division III Tournament. Before that, McCann captained the Mount Saint Mary team her senior season, was a national member of the NCAA Student Athlete Advisory Committee, appeared in 35 career games in a COVID-shortened collegiate career, helped the Knights to the 2022 Skyline Conference title, and earned Academic Honor Roll recognition.

McCann becomes the third Bowdoin recipient of the honor, joining current head coach Megan Phelps, who received it in 2019, and former assistant coach Abby Kelly, who earned it in 2024.

WBCA Executive Director Danielle Donehew congratulated the honorees, saying the association was "pleased to recognize this up-and-coming talent" and celebrated their work "on the basketball court as teachers" alongside "the extensive role they play in impacting the lives of their student-athletes."

McCann will be recognized alongside all Thirty Under 30 honorees at the 2026 Final Four in Phoenix.