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Top Southern Arizona sports stories of 2025: April

By Javier Morales

Posted on December 29, 2025

Top Southern Arizona sports stories of 2025:

Arizona Athletics

Adieu to Adia: Adia Barnes, Arizona’s career leading scorer and most successful coach in program history, resigned her post to accept the head coaching position at SMU on April 5. The move was made after Arizona athletic director Desiree Reed-Francois did not offer to extend her contract. Barnes left her alma mater as the coach who took the Wildcats the farthest in the NCAA tournament — a spot in the 2021 NCAA championship game against Stanford behind All-American guard Aari McDonald. Arizona led the Pac-12 in attendance in its last two years in the conference and was second in the Big 12 in attendance in 2024-25, averaging 6.326 fans a game. In the season before her arrival in 2015-16, Arizona averaged only 1,303 a game and was an afterthought in women’s college hoops. Barnes, who was 169-114 at Arizona after her hire in 2016 by former athletic director Greg Byrne, struggled in recent years holding on to players, partly because of the difficulty of matching lucrative NIL offers by other programs and also because of reported personality conflicts.
Becky Burke Takes Over at Arizona: Becky Burke was named the new coach at Arizona, replacing Barnes, on April 9. Burke, 35, coached Buffalo to the WNIT championship a month earlier and led them to a program-record 30 wins. “Our model centers around identifying head coaches who prioritize success in coaching, recruiting and the development of high-character student-athletes,” said Reed-Francois in a press release. “Coach Burke is a proven program builder and rising star in collegiate women’s basketball with a track record of transformational success. She is familiar with the Wildcats and the tight-knit community we have in Tucson. Our search committee did a wonderful job of selecting the right leader.” A Louisville alum who played for the Cardinals in the 2009 Final Four, Burke took on her first coaching job at a Power 4 school. Burke is set to make $325,000 in base pay in the first two years of her contract, $350,000 in the third year, $375,000 in the fourth year and $400,000 in the fifth year. Listed as “other compensation” are “additional duties comp” of $350,000 annually. She is also permitted to have income from a camp, a retention bonus of $100,000 if still employed after March 31, 2028 and a signing bonus of $25,000.
Burke Makes Significant Hires: Lute Olson’s granddaughter Julie Brase-Hairgrove, a prolific scorer at Catalina Foothills and former standout at Arizona, was hired by Burke as an assistant coach on April 18. Brase-Hairgrove was an assistant with the Phoenix Mercury when the franchise won WNBA titles in 2007, 2009 and 2014. Michelle Marciniak, an NCAA champion at Tennessee under Pat Summitt, was hired by Burke to be Arizona’s first general manager on April 17.
Burries Good News for Arizona: Five-star guard Brayden Burries, a scoring threat from Riverside (Calif.) Roosevelt who is one of the top-rated Class of 2025 prospects in the country, became Arizona’s second five-star recruit to commit to coach Tommy Lloyd’s program within the last two weeks, following the pledge by Gilbert Perry forward Koa Peat. Burries made his commitment known April 9 on ESPN’s SportsCenter after Peat utilized another national ESPN show — the Pat McAfee Show — to announce his college plans.
Blueblood Baseball Program Produces: The program that boasts coaches Frank Sancet, Jerry Kindall, Andy Lopez, Jay Johnson and now Wildcat favorite Chip Hale reached at least 30 wins in each of the last 10 full seasons and in 61 full seasons since 1950 when it split a doubleheader with Texas Tech on April 26.
T-Mac Makes History: Tetairoa McMillan’s first-round selection the NFL draft April 24 as the eighth pick overall by the Carolina Panthers, was historic because he became the first Arizona receiver to be chosen in the round and is one of the top three picks in the Wildcats’ history. McMillan and linebacker Chris Singletion (eighth pick overall in 1990 by the New England Patriots) trail only legendary linebacker Ricky Hunley (seventh pick in 1984 by the Cincinnati Bengals) as the highest draft selection to come out of Arizona’s program.
Nelson Comes Home: Salpointe Class of 2020 graduate Evan Nelson, who led the Lancers to their first state championship that year, announced his transfer to Arizona from Harvard on April 10.

Pima Community College

Hometown Talent Leads Aztecs: Tucson High graduate Jiselle Nunez and Sunnyside alum Natalya Rivera were part of a potent lineup that led Pima softball into the NJCAA Region I, Division II tournament with a 47-7 record. Nunez was batting .548 with 20 home runs and a conference-leading 92 RBIs while Rivera had 16 homers and 60 RBIs as the leadoff batter.
Baseball again successful: CDO graduate Lucas Casey improved to 7-2 with a late-season win, enabling Pima to enter the regional tournament at 45-11.

Other Highlights

Sunnyside graduate Audrey Jimenez earned the U.S. Open freestyle championship at 50 kilograms April 25 at Las Vegas. Three weeks earlier, Jimenez earned a spot on the U.S. U20 Women’s Freestyle World Team, winning the 50 Kg competition of the 2025 U.S. Marine Corps Women’s National Championships at Spokane, Wash. She was selected the Most Outstanding Wrestler of the event. Her U.S. Open freestyle title punched her ticket to the Final X in June at the Prudential Center in Newark, N.J., where she competed in a best-of-three series with the winner qualifying for the U.S. Senior World Team.