Sytia Messer enters her eighth season as the assistant coach and recruiting coordinator for the Lady Bears in 2020-21. After three years as a head coach at Tennessee Tech and serving two stints at Georgia Tech, Messer was hired in the summer of 2013.
As recruiting coordinator, Messer has helped bring in the nation’s No. 1 signing class twice, for the first time in 2016 and most recently in 2018. She also orchestrated fourth-ranked signing classes in 2017 and 2015 and another Top 10 class with two signees in 2020 at No. 9.
Her work on the recruiting trail has laid a foundation which has produced 12 Big 12 Conference titles (seven regular season and five tournament crowns), six Sweet 16 appearances, five Elite 8 berths and a national championship in the last six years.
As the guards coach at Baylor, since her arrival in 2013, seven Lady Bears guards have been drafted in the WNBA: Odyssey Sims (Tulsa Shock, Rd 1, Pick 2, 2014), Niya Johnson (Atlanta Dream, Rd. 3, Pick 28, 2016), Alexis Jones (Minnesota Lynx, Rd. 1, Pick 12, 2017), Alexis Prince (Phoenix Mercury, Rd. 3, Pick, 29, 2017), Kristy Wallace (Atlanta Dream, Rd. 2, Pick 16, 2018), Chloe Jackson (Chicago Sky, Rd. 2, Pick 15), Te’a Cooper (Phoenix Mercury, Rd. 2, Pick 16) and Juicy Landrum (Connecticut Sun, Rd. 3, Pick 35).
In addition, Messer recruited Kalani Brown a first-round and No. 7 overall draft pick of the Los Angeles Sparks in 2019, and Lauren Cox, who was the nation's No 1 recruit out of Flower Mound High School and the No. 3 overall draft pick by the Indiana Fever in the 2020 WNBA Draft.
In her tenure, she saw the point guard, Sims, earn Big 12 Player of the Year in 2014, and in addition, six guards have been named First-Team All-Big 12, including Jones twice.
Messer joined an exclusive club as one of the few to have played in the Final Four (Arkansas, 1998) and coached a national title team (Baylor, 2019).
She was associate head coach at Georgia Tech in 2012-13 and served as an assistant coach for the Yellow Jackets from 2004-09. In between stints on the Atlanta campus, she compiled a 54-41 record as the Tennessee Tech Golden Eagles’ head coach. Messer was named the 2010-11 Ohio Valley Conference Coach of the Year after the Golden Eagles won the 2011 OVC regular season title. She also has coached at Memphis and Arkansas State.
The Waldo, Ark., native was a standout player for the Arkansas Razorbacks where she finished her career ranked in the top 10 in points scored (No. 7, 1,370) and rebounds (No. 10, 603). Messer was named the 1998 NCAA Tournament West Regional MVP when the Razorbacks made their run to the Women’s Final Four and led Arkansas to the 1999 WNIT championship.
Messer was selected to the Razorbacks 2018 Hall of Fame Class and was inducted Sept. 14, 2018.