For Green Bay head coach Kayla Karius, every championship is different, yet equally special.
Karius knows plenty about that dynamic. The former Kayla Tetschlag won two Horizon League tournament titles as a Phoenix player between 2007 and 2011, and has now matched that pair since returning to coach her alma mater prior to the 2024-25 season.
Her latest crown, earned with a 57-49 victory over Youngstown State in Indianapolis’ Corteva Coliseum on Tuesday, followed something quite rare in Northeast Wisconsin: a rebuilding job.
“Reload is what we like to say,” Karius corrected.
Noted.
Whatever one calls it, Green Bay’s third straight HL tournament title involved turning over most of Karius’ first Phoenix roster, a championship-ready group that featured program legends like Bailey Butler, Maddy Schreiber, Cassie Schiltz, and Jasmine Kondrakiewicz, veterans that the second-year boss says taught her a lot at her then-new job.
To replace that group, GB needed to tread the unfamiliar waters of the transfer portal last spring. They did so quite successfully, landing (among others) all-conference and all-tournament selection Maddy Skorupski, starting point guard Kamy Peppler, and Carley Duffney, a former Karius player at South Dakota.
“We had to go and find so many extra players to fill our roster, and then pour into them constantly day in and day out, highs and lows, good wins, bad losses, we just had to stick together through with all,” the coach said.
Much about the Phoenix is predictable, to the point where it can almost make the program’s incredible levels of success seem boring at times. Some 30 minutes after the nets were cut down, the final on-court photo was snapped, and the last celebratory shaving cream pie was thrown – a creative brand activation with event sponsor Barbasol – the Horizon League championship trophy sat virtually ignored in the middle of a press room table, its ostensible guardians busy typing into their phones.
And why not? Green Bay now has 19 of those glass slabs in 32 seasons as a Horizon League member. What’s one more?
Actually, the one more is worth plenty, according to tournament MVP Jenna Guyer, who scored a game-high 21 points, 14 in the first half – vital tallies that helped the Phoenix stay afloat while trying to find its footing in the early stages of the contest.
“To go in and find the players that we have now, and just how we’ve meshed, how we’ve played together,” she began, “I think it just makes this year, this year is so special. This win, I don’t know, I will cherish it forever.”
Her coach agreed.
“It’s hard to even put this into words, but when we put this team together, really last April and May, it was just how are we going to do this?” Karius added. “We had so many newcomers, and we graduated seven, and I just really had to rebuild this thing it felt like in a lot of ways.”
“It’s just a beautiful thing to see it all come together, and I’m really happy for these players more than anything.”
Green Bay took full control of the defense-heavy championship tilt in the fourth quarter, a surge spearheaded by Guyer, a fifth-year Phoenix. The forward scored five straight points midway through the frame, including a pair of free throws that gave GB the lead for good. Those shots were followed shortly after by an and-one play through the Penguins’ Hayden Barrier, an event that exploded the top seed’s bench, and a packed section of traveling fans behind it, in celebration.
Karius, however, kept returning to her newcomers, including Peppler, who set up Guyer’s traditional three-pointer with one of her four steals, then hit a dagger three to put Green Bay up by eight with two minutes remaining. Skorupski fired home 13 points, second only to Guyer in the game, and added a staggering five thefts. Duffney, meanwhile, was an unsung hero of the clash with 34:17 of playing time that produced a plus-12 rating, much of it while matched up against Youngstown State’s formidable frontcourt of Sophia Gregory, Paulina Hernandez, and Sarah Baker.
“It was a stage that so many of them had not been on before,” Karius said. “And at the same time, I just think that so many gamers on our team, [including Skorupski], you just put the ball in her hands, and turn the lights on, and she goes to work. It just didn’t even phase her.”
That surprising level of mental toughness from a group that, largely, had yet to experience those bright lights stood in contrast to YSU, which was making its first-ever appearance in the Horizon League final, but nevertheless stood toe-to-toe with the Phoenix for more than three quarters.
“I thought our kids really fought today,” Penguins coach Melissa Jackson said. “Obviously, first time being in the championship game, first time being in Indy, we really wanted this one today, but Green Bay obviously made a few more plays down the stretch.”
With the HL’s automatic bid to the NCAA Tournament in hand, the Phoenix will make its 21st March Madness appearance. As a player, Karius was a part of the most successful of those journeys, a 2011 trip to the Sweet Sixteen, and will try to recapture some of that magic for a program that previously fell to SEC foes Tennessee and Alabama during its present run of appearances.
GB will learn its opening opponent for the 2026 edition of the tournament on Sunday.
“It’s always the goal to get to March Madness, and then to obviously show that we are a really good team and that we compete against anybody,” Guyer said. “That’s one thing that I’ve kind of held onto these last two years, with the losses against Tennessee two years ago, and then Alabama last year. I think just that experience, knowing what it takes to get there and then to do something there, I think is kind of on my mind going forward.”
“I believe we have an opportunity, we have a chance, because of the people that we have, to be the best team in Green Bay history and to go further than anybody’s gone,” Karius added. “I really believe that.”
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