The USF women's basketball hope of a return to the NCAA tournament ended Thursday afternoon in an upset 62-51 loss to UTSA
The Bulls finish their season under interim head coach Michele Woods-Baxter at with a 20-12 record. Was that good enough for CEO of Athletics Rob Higgins to remove the "interim" time?
We'll see.
Woods-Baxter was elevated to the top job after longtime head coach Jose Fernandez accepted an offer to lead the Dallas Wings of the WNBA shortly before the USF season started.
She held the team together to an overly demanding non-conference season -- the Bulls faced three of the top four ranked teams and defeated No. 8 Duke -- and guided the Bulls to a third-place finish in the American Conference.
Would Higgins seek to reboot the women's program, which has been successful but has not risen to the level of the top teams? Or does he believe Woods-Baxter, a longtime assistant to Fernandez, is the right person to lead the Bulls going forward?
Reaching 20 wins under trying circumstances is certainly a vote in Woods-Baxter's favor. Conference tournaments, especially in the initial rounds, can cause havoc with favored teams.
A decision on what is next is likely to come soon.