Colgate head coach Bill Cleary named Lauren Ellis to his women's basketball coaching staff in August 2016. She served one season as Director of Basketball Operations before earning promotion to Assistant Women's Basketball Coach in May 2017.
Ellis also serves as recruting coordinator and concentrates her coaching efforts on the post position and defensive game plan.
Ellis and the Raiders are coming off one of the best seasons in program history. Colgate finished 19-11 in 2019-20 for the second-most wins and just the second winning season in 33 years of Division I play.
Colgate fashioned a 6½-game improvement over the previous season's 12-17 record and finished above .500 in the Patriot League for just the third time at 11-7. The Raiders were picked to finish sixth in the preseason but exceeded those expectation with a third-place result.
Ellis helped Abby Schubiger earn All-Patriot League Third Team honors as arguably the most improved player in the conference in 2019-20. Schubiger in her remarkable season shot 51.4 percent from the field to rank among the Patriot League leaders all year. She scored at a 10.5 clip and totaled more points as a senior (315) than in her first three years combined (302). Schubiger also set personal season highs in rebounds, assists, blocked shots and steals, while finishing as the team leader with 119 career games played.
Rachel Thompson under Ellis' tutelage earned All-Patriot League First Team and All-Defensive Team honors in 2019-20. Thompson wound up second in the conference in steals with 74, eclipsing her season total from the year before by one. For her career, Thompson fashioned 211 steals to land sixth on the Colgate chart. Her 74 and 73 season steals rank seventh and eighth, respectively.
In 2018-19, Colgate seniors Mylah Chandler and Summer King wrapped up solid careers and improved each season under Ellis. Chandler ranks fifth in career rebounds with 631, and 10th in career field goal percentage at 44.3. King is right behind on the shooting chart at 44.1. Both players are listed on the career blocked shots chart, with Chandler fourth at 89 and King seventh at 87.
Ellis played her collegiate basketball at Bloomsburg under Cleary from 2009-13. She arrived at Colgate after three quality seasons as an assistant coach on the Division III level.
Ellis’ first coaching position was in 2013-14 at Widener, where she helped Jen Egee to Middle Atlantic Conference Player of the Year honors.
She spent the next two seasons as an assistant coach at Salisbury. The Sea Gulls won the 2015 Capital Athletic Conference title and advanced all the way to the NCAA sectional championship game (final eight) on the strength of a 28-3 record.
Salisbury with Ellis on the staff produced back-to-back CAC players of the year in Anna Hackett in 2015 and Julie McLaughlin in 2016.
Defensive Force at Bloomsburg
Ellis was a three-year starter on teams that won 20 or more games every season and captured three PSAC Eastern Division titles. The Huskies won the overall PSAC crown in 2013 and Ellis helped them to a pair of NCAA tournament appearances.
"Playing for Coach at Bloomsburg was the best choice I made for my collegiate basketball career,” Ellis said. “He is passionate about the game and determined to pull every ounce of potential out of you to make you the best player you can be.
“He has been one of the most influential people in my life since I was in high school and a main reason why I pursued a career in coaching. Colgate made the right decision in putting Coach at the head of this program."
The Bangor, Pennsylvania, native graduated fifth on the Bloomsburg career chart in blocked shots and 10th in rebounds. Before her Bloomsburg days, she was a star at Bangor High School. Ellis was inducted into the Bangor High Athletics Hall of Fame in January 2020.
Ellis earned her bachelor’s degree in Exercise Science at Bloomsburg in 2013. She added a master’s in Applied Health Physiology at Salisbury while producing a 3.6 grade-point average.
