Becky Burke turns to Louisville ties for Arizona assistant coach Devan Newman

TUCSON, AZ - FEBRUARY 17: Arizona Wildcats head coach Becky Burke during the third quarter of a women's basketball game between the Colorado Buffaloes and the Arizona Wildcats on February 17, 2026, at McKale Center at ALKEME Arena in Tucson, AZ. (Photo by Christopher Hook/Icon Sportswire via Getty Images) | Icon Sportswire via Getty Images

Devan Newman has been in the coaching business since Arizona head coach Becky Burke was in college. That’s how Burke met her newest assistant.

“I am thrilled to welcome Devan to our staff,” Burke said in the program’s press release. “She has a wealth of knowledge and experience at every level of college basketball. She comes from a basketball family, and I have a long-standing relationship with her. She is going to be an excellent addition to our program and somebody that I am very excited that our players get to be around every single day. She’s of great character and about all the right things. Arizona women’s basketball just got better!”

Newman started her college coaching career as a graduate assistant at Louisville in 2008. Burke was on the team from 2008-2012. Burke’s newest hire climbed the ladder to special assistant to the head coach and assistant director of operations before leaving in 2011.

“I am overjoyed and grateful to be joining Becky and her staff at the University of Arizona,” Newman said in the program’s press release. “I have known Becky from her playing days at Louisville and her passion for the game, fierce competitiveness, and relentless work ethic is infectious. She is a winner and I can’t wait to get in the trenches with her and grind every day to help the Wildcats program achieve success.”

Newman has been part of a great deal of success at Louisville and her next two stops. At Louisville, she was part of a staff that took the team to the national title game and the Sweet 16.

She followed former Louisville assistant coach Bethann Shapiro Ord to Weber State. She was an assistant coach on Shapiro Ord’s Wildcats staff from 2011-18 during a program rebuild. Newman helped a program that hadn’t won more than 10 games the three years before Shapiro Ord took over to a program-record 23 wins in 2015-16.

The pair then moved on to Binghamton in 2018 where Newman was first an assistant coach then associate head coach on Shapiro Ord’s Bearcats staff. That staff led the Bearcats to a program record 22 wins in 2019-20.

Newman has ties to the Western U.S. going back before her time with Weber State. She earned her bachelor’s degree in sport administration from Oregon in 2007. She got a master’s in the same field from Louisville in 2009.

Newman has been at Pitt for the past two years. She became available when Panthers head coach Tory Verdi was fired following lack of competitiveness and legal issues during his three years at the helm. The allegations quoted in the press appear to arise from the 2023-24 season, the year before Newman arrived and she is not a defendant in the case. Pitt denies the veracity of the claims in the lawsuit.