Katrina Pardee: Future Coach

“Every one of our players wants to play professionally after they graduate. That’s their dream, right?”

In his first two years as head coach at WVU, Mark Kellogg is two-for-two in getting the women’s basketball team into the second round of the NCAA tournament. He understands the goal shared by everyone on his roster. 

“That’s why it’s important that we can point to someone like Katrina. We can tell our players, ‘Look at her. She worked hard while here and she’s been playing professionally ever since she graduated.’”

The Katrina he’s referring to is Katrina Pardee (BS, Exercise Physiology, ’19), the 1,000-point scorer who was a favorite of coaches and fans alike. And since earning her degree, she’s played for pro teams in Spain, Ireland, Bolivia, Brazil, Slovenia, Hungary, Russia, Turkey, and back to Russia.

All of this led to a very special invitation: last year, she participated in the training camp of the WNBA’s Dallas Wings.

Growing up in Cedar Park, Texas, playing for the Mountaineers never crossed Pardee’s mind. Following her junior season at Vista Ridge High School and a highly successful run on the AAU team TeamXpress, the recruiting service HoopGurlz rated her as the 22nd best guard in the country. She was squarely on the radar of many major programs.

She and her desired collegiate destination shared mutual interest, so she was confident that her path to big-time college basketball was assured.

But a freak injury forced a detour.

During a summer league game, she tore her ACL. When she called to inform the college coach, “they told me that my scholarship was no longer available.”

Fortunately, her AAU coach was close with WVU Assistant Chester Nichols. On a quickly arranged official visit to Morgantown while sporting a heavy knee brace, she committed on the spot. “It just felt like that’s where God was calling me to be,” she said.

Before she attended her first class at WVU, the women’s team made a trip to play exhibitions in Spain and Great Britain. Little did she know that one day she’d be back in Europe playing professionally.

“It's funny because when we took that trip, I thought that there was no way I’d ever play overseas.  That lifestyle was not for me. I was just ready to go home, honestly,” she laughed.

Her freshman season got off to a great start, as she scored 10 points in her first collegiate game. But then came the start of Big 12 play. The first opponent was the Texas Longhorns.

“I had been starting and playing well,” she recalled. “But I’ll never forget that Texas game. I only played six minutes because those (Longhorn) girls ate me up.”

Disheartened, she paid a visit to Head Coach Mike Carey’s office the following day to ask what she needed to do to play here. She told him she wanted to work hard and be the best; he told her she needed to get stronger and faster and be able to play defense.

“Every day after that, I was in the gym, even on our off days. I was working hard so he could trust me more,” Pardee said.

“I knew she would be a hard worker because she wanted to be a great basketball player,” Carey said. “I never had any concerns about her work ethic. She worked extremely hard and improved all her skills. And you never had to tell Katrina twice. Whatever you told her, she would pick it up very quickly and work on it and become better at it. She took coaching very well. She wanted to be coached.”

During her sophomore year, the Mountaineers entered the Big 12 tournament as the #6 seed. In consecutive days, WVU pulled off upsets of nationally ranked Oklahoma, Texas, and Baylor. Pardee said that was the highlight of her WVU playing career. Her teammate on that championship team was senior Lanay Montgomery, who was drafted into the WNBA a few weeks after that historic run in the tournament.

In her senior year, Pardee tallied her 1,000th point during a nonconference game against Missouri. “When I hit that milestone, it was just a surreal moment for me. I understood that God really did place me where I was supposed to be. I'll be able to cherish that moment forever.”

Not long after that accomplishment, she encountered another major injury, this time a dislocated ankle. The pain was so severe that she couldn’t walk off the court, even with help.

“To keep the injury from getting worse, I carried Katrina off the court that day,” Strength and Conditioning Coach Zack Allen recalled. After surgery to correct the damage, Allen helped monitor her recovery. “KP was such a tireless worker, as well as a great human being. She was lifting weights way above what you’d think possible for someone her size.”

When the opportunity to play professionally abroad presented itself, she was ready. She credited Coach Carey for that. 

“He's not the easiest coach to play for, but after my four years there, he made me extremely mentally tough. And I know that after playing for him, I can play for any coach in the country or in the world.”

That mental toughness was crucial to Pardee last fall in the Russian Premier League. The general manager of Dynamo Kursk liked Pardee’s skills and signed her to a guaranteed contract. The team’s coach hadn’t been consulted, though. His reaction to the lack of communication was to bench Pardee and, she said, try to get her to leave. But Pardee stood up for herself and negotiated a settlement to terminate the contract. “And two weeks after that, the coach got fired.”

Another hardship of playing overseas is that the support personnel isn’t always trained as well as in the U.S. After Pardee suffered a thigh contusion during a game in Hungary, the team trainer performed a rigorous message on the area – turning a minor injury into a serious condition requiring surgery.

But no matter where she played overseas, there was always a West Virginia connection. Pardee said she was constantly approached by fans who had watched her play at WVU or who had relatives in the state.

“Honestly, I love telling people that I played at West Virginia, and I love sharing the pride that I have for my school and being an alum,” Pardee said. “I think the way that WVU prepared me in the classroom and also on the court is something that I can share with everybody that I interact with.”

All of her international challenges and triumphs opened the eyes of the WNBA’s Dallas Wings, and she was invited to their training camp last year. Pardee played well and was one of the last players cut prior to the regular season.

“I told the Wings from the beginning, all I wanted to do is just come in there and prove that I belong and leave a good name for myself. They told me I did exactly that and that my time is coming.

“They said that everybody needs a ‘KP’ on their team.”

Carey observed that her tryout with a WNBA team shows that “she’s continuing to work on her game. That tells you what kind of person she is.”

Montgomery agrees. “Beyond her game, what really stands out to me is Katrina’s heart. I’m so proud of the woman she has become. She’s a genuinely good person with a great family.”

Pardee’s proud mother Christy admits she was a little nervous about her daughter leaving Texas to play at WVU, “but I knew this would be a big growth opportunity for her along with an amazing experience. Going to school at WVU prepared Katrina to play professionally overseas.”

She added her daughter has made lifelong friends as a result. “Mountaineer Nation is nothing short of amazing.”

Pardee is currently waiting for her agent to line up her next adventure abroad. Has she thought about her post-playing career? “I’ll be coaching,” she said with no hesitation.

“I've fallen in love with the mentorship side of things. I want to be the coach I wish I’d had growing up. Especially for girls, I want them to know they can achieve their dreams and hear it from a player who’s been where they want to go and done the things they want to achieve.”

No wonder Kellogg views her as a role model for his current players.

When Pardee turns her attention to coaching young girls, will she let them know that WVU is a great place to go to school?

“Absolutely. I'll be trying to get them there for sure.”

This story is part of a series of profiles of former WVU student-athletes written for WVU Magazine by Joe Mock, who graduated from WVU’s Perley Isaac Reed School of Journalism (now part of the College of Creative Arts and Media) in 1980. He writes regularly for USA TODAY publications. Follow him on X at @baseballparks.