Kyra Elzy earns contract extension through 2027 season

Kyra Elzy has reason to smile after signing a contract extension through 2027. (Photo by Vicky Graff)

If Kyra Elzy needed a vote of confidence for what she’s doing at Kentucky she certainly got it Monday.

Kentucky athletics director Mitch Barnhart signed Elzy to a contract extension through the 2027 season just a few weeks after she led UK to its first Southeastern Conference Tournament championship in 40 years.

Elzy’s team was floundering in mid-February with a losing record but rallied to win 10 straight games, including the SEC title game against eventual national champion South Carolina.  However, UK lost to Princeton in the first round of the NCAA Tournament in All-American Rhyne Howard’s final game at  UK.

Since then, four players — including three starters — have put their names into the transfer portal. However, Barnhart liked what he saw when UK beat the top three seeds in the SEC Tournament, something no other No. 7 seed had ever done in a power five conference tournament.

“We’re excited to extend Kyra and continue our investment in women’s basketball and in her as a coach and positive role model in our community. After the adversity the team faced throughout the season, the turnaround at the end of the year was impressive – defeating the eventual national champion and winning our first SEC Tournament Championship in 40 years, a strong step in building the championship vision we all have for this program,” Barnhart said in a statement released by UK.

Elzy is 37-21 in two seasons as head coach after taking over before the 2020-21 season when then head coach Matthew Mitchell unexpectedly resigned. Elzy had been an assistant under Mitchell and helped guide UK to the 2012 SEC regular-season title, UK’s first since 1982. She was also part of two Elite Eight trips. She has now been part of 224 wins, including 33 victories over ranked teams, at UK.

Elzy was thrilled to stay in what she said is “no better place in the world for a young woman to live out her academic and athletics careers” and thanked UK officials for the confidence they had in her.

“I am 100 percent confident in what we offer our student-athletes here at Kentucky. Our coaches and staff commit ourselves daily to our players. Their individual successes, on and off the court, is our collective success as a program. As seasons come and go, our focus and commitment haven’t and won’t waver from the expectations set for this program,” Elzy said.

“We have a core group of talented and driven players returning along with an exciting group of signees that cannot wait to wear those eight letters across the front of their jersey. We are counting down the days until we can all be together again inside Memorial Coliseum. Until then, we will continue to work to bring home more championships.”