Texas State’s women’s basketball program has hired Chris Kielsmeier as its next head coach, the university announced on Tuesday afternoon.
“I am thrilled to be joining the Texas State community and looking forward to an amazing opportunity to build something really special with the Bobcat Family,” Kielsmeier said in TXST’s release. “I would like to thank President Kelly Damphousse and Athletics Director Don Coryell for putting their faith in me to lead the women’s basketball program as they enter the prestigious Pac-12 era. I can’t wait to get started with building on the tradition and success the program has had in the past, while instilling a new standard of excellence that will see the Bobcat women’s basketball program become a perennial contender for championships and postseason bids.”
Kielsmeier departs Cleveland State with a 178-80 record at the school over eight seasons, a good chunk of his 594-196 career mark built with the Vikings, Division II Wayne State (NE), and Howard Payne of Division III.
Though the Iowa native’s victory total fell just shy of the CSU-record 206 compiled by his predecessor, Kate Peterson Abiad, there’s little doubt that he leaves as the most successful coach in program history. The Vikings had just two 20-win seasons, two conference championships, and four postseason appearances from the team’s inception in 1973 through 2018. During his time in Northeast Ohio, Kielsmeier added six 20-win campaigns – including a school-record 30 victories in 2022-23 – two conference titles, and six postseason tournament bids to those totals.
The pair of league championships arrived in 2023, when the Vikings beat Green Bay in the Horizon League final to advance to the NCAA Tournament, and the following season, when a wild last-day finish resulted in CSU’s first-ever HL regular season crown.
In 2021, Cleveland State defeated Portland in the title game of the Women’s Basketball Invitational, the first postseason championship in school history. The Vikings also made several other deep journeys in similar tournaments, including a near-repeat at the 2022 WBI, a trip to the WNIT’s Fab 4 in 2025, and a WNIT Great 8 run that ended on Monday at Arkansas State.
Destiny Leo, Colbi Maples, and Mickayla Perdue won consecutive Horizon League Player of the Year awards between 2022-23 and 2024-25, headlining a list of 18 all-conference selections that added Maples and Izabella Zingaro to the count in 2025-26. Kielsmeier won the HL’s Coach of the Year honor in 2023-24.
He’ll try to duplicate that success at Texas State, during an interesting time in the program’s life. The Bobcats have been a member of the Sun Belt Conference since 2013, and though they did manage an SBC regular season championship in 2022-23, TXST has just five winning seasons in those 13 years overall.
Furthermore, the school is set to join the re-configured Pac-12 next season. Though the league was all but obliterated by realignment two years ago, and is no longer considered a power conference, it has put together a healthy collection of ambitious and well-resourced schools for its reboot. Alongside holdovers Washington State and Oregon State, Fresno State, Colorado State, Utah State, and Gonzaga will be among Texas State’s Pac-12 rivals.
As for Cleveland State? The Vikings now have the unenviable task of finding a new leader to maintain its hard-earned reversal of past fortune, and face what’s sure to be an exhausting offseason of staff hirings and roster assembly.
CSU’s athletic director, Kelsie Gory Harkey, released a statement in response to Kielsmeier’s exit, thanking the coach for his impact on the school and its women’s basketball program, before providing a broad outline of how she will approach finding his replacement.
“Women’s basketball remains a cornerstone of Cleveland State Athletics, and our program is well-positioned to continue competing for Horizon League championships while also being a constant presence in postseason tournaments,” Gory Harkey’s statement read, in part. “We are proud of the tradition that has been built here and remain committed to providing a transformational student-athlete experience for every Viking that steps on campus. We have begun a national search for our next head women’s basketball coach and we will focus on identifying a dynamic leader who will build on the strong foundation of the program.”
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