by The Mid-American Conference (MAC) regular season champions for the second time in the last 25 years.
MAC Tournament champions for the first time since 2009.
First NCAA Tournament appearance in 16 years.
That is the bar Ball State women’s basketball set last season. Now, the Cardinals will look to follow up on that success going into the 2025-26 campaign.
But Brady Sallee believes that season was something else on its own.
“To think that Ally Becky’s gonna be reincarnated on the floor, or you’re going to see Marie Kiefer, Alex Richard, Madelyn Bischoff or Elise Stuck, okay, they’re not,” he said.
As he prepared to go into his 14th season as the head coach of the program, Sallee knew he needed to bring in new Cardinals as they lost the ‘Core Four’ to graduation and others to the transfer portal.
He said his search for the next Ball State representatives started just days after the team won the MAC Tournament and punched its ticket to the NCAA Tournament.
“The job is still the job. The process is still the process,” Sallee said. “The whole art of building the new roster started immediately after the MAC tournament. We had five or six scholarships. We had specific needs, and we had profiles of kids we were looking for.”
Sallee and his staff did just that, bringing in nine new players. While they drew commitments from some who have already played college basketball, others are brand new, as the program will see seven international players wear a Ball State jersey.
When looking at the ideal roster, Sallee said he wanted players who fit into his program. While he noted that Ball State has a strong brand throughout the Midwest, he said it’s also known outside of the United States.
Freshman forward Alba Caballero (Spain) said the success piqued her interest in Ball State, and since her first day in Muncie, she said she understood why success has followed the team over the last few seasons.
“We are such a family. People care about us as people, too,” she said. “They want to know us and they don’t see us as just players … [The coaches] make this place special and so unique. This program is just different.”
Players admitted that the mix of United States-based players and international athletes has been interesting. From a language barrier to cultural differences, some said it was like the ‘first day’ of high school all over again.
But after a few practices, the Cardinals started to click.
“With everybody coming in at different times, too, we honestly kind of just connected in an unreal way,” junior guard Karsyn Norman said. “I was kind of worried about coming in … Are we going to get along well? Are we going to have any type of chemistry? But it’s just a group of good girls.”
Though Sallee said there have been multiple days of ‘inconsistency,’ the winningest coach in program history wanted to go through this process. He said the 2024-25 achievement earning team wasn’t built in a day or a season.
It took time, and because of that, he wanted to build a roster that he could mold into a solid unit.
“There’s a real joy in bringing a group together and seeing them click and seeing new relationships form … You think about what we as college coaches do. We get handed kids that are 17, 18 years old,” Brady said. “And at the end of their time with you, we produce adults. There may not be a bigger four years in a human’s life than from 18 to 22.
“And we get to have a front row seat to see it happen. It’s really cool when it clicks, and believe me, it’s not all cream and roses either. You see these kids through their toughest adversities sometimes. So loving them and seeing them come out of that a better person is also part of this, too.”
When it comes to on-court action, one thing the Cardinals will see is more size, as they have six players over six feet tall. Sallee said that because of this, the team can rely on paint play. But even with the size, he also said they have better shooters throughout the roster.
One of those is redshirt senior forward Bree Salenbien. The Gonzaga transfer began her career as a top shooter for the Bulldogs and was a weapon at the foul line, as she shot 89 percent from the free-throw line.
But following an injury, she said she felt her production plummet. It was Ball State’s coaching staff who, according to her, saw that pre-injury player inside of her. In her short time in Muncie, she said Sallee has tapped into the potential.
“I’m playing a different way that I’ve never played before, and I see it in myself,” she said. “I hope everyone around me sees it as well. I would run through a wall for him, and I want to win for him.”
Another transfer from a Bulldog mascot is Norman. Last season at Butler, she averaged 3.2 points and 2.6 assists. She said the coaching staff sometimes misused her game and didn’t allow her to own her full skillset, which was one of the main reasons she transferred. But she said that hasn’t been the case at Ball State.
She was originally interested in playing in Muncie after watching the success last year’s team had, and she didn’t want to be a part of a typical rebuilding season.
“[Success] is so attractive. You go on all these visits, and they’re like, ‘Oh, yeah. We’re in a rebuilding year right now. And, like, that’s cool. But when the program’s already established, and I know [Ball State] lost parts from last year, the program’s still the same program. [A history of success] is very, very attractive when you’re in the portal.”
Leading the international group is Caballero with multiple achievements throughout her career. Moments like winning a Gold national championship medal and taking home a Silver Medal playing for Spain in the European Young Olympics are just some of her accolades.
With Caballero and other Cardinals like freshman guard Giorgia Gorini (Italy) and freshman forward Zhen Vernburgt (Belgium), some of last season’s returners said the playstyle this group brings has mixed well with Ball State’s brand of basketball.
“They obviously play a different way and play by different rules [in other countries],” sophomore guard Grace Kingery said. “They’re still learning our way, but with mixing that, I think it definitely gives us a little bit of an edge for sure.”
Besides Kingery, the program returns four players from last season. Those include senior forward Tessa Towers, sophomore guard Zuri Ransom and junior guard Ashlynn Brooke. With those Cardinals not seeing much action last season, Sallee said they even have things to learn as their minutes will increase this season.
But that’s the point.
Sallee said Ball State fans will be ‘proud’ of how this team represents the community by the way they play, whether the result is in their favor or not.
“Brady always talks about how he doesn’t believe in losses. He believes in getting better each game,” Brooke said. “We’ve been talking about buying into each other, buying into dying at practice or buying into each other even outside of practice. We just need to buy into the culture of what we have.”
Just like Sallee said on the previous Cardinal roster, it takes time to build a winning program. And he’s willing to be patient with this group, though he believes the level of talent will win games alone.
“That’s the molding process that is going to be ongoing for as long as it takes, right? And if it takes until three days in March for us to be at our best, that’s fine,” Sallee said. “If it takes three games into the season, and we’re clicking, that’s fine, too.”
Ball State will begin the new season on the road Monday, Nov. 3, against Arkansas State in the MAC-SBC Challenge at 8 p.m. The MAC schedule will kickoff Saturday, Dec. 20, at Worthen Arena as the Cardinals will host Eastern Michigan.
Contact Zach Carter via email at zachary.carter@bsu.edu, zachcarter039@gmail.com or via X @ZachCarter85.
