Erin Crane enters her first season on the Northwestern State women’s basketball staff after spending this past season at Saint Mary’s (Minnesota).
Crane, a former point guard at the University of Dubuque, makes her third stop in as many seasons after spending 2015-16 at Saint Mary’s and ending a three-year run at Northern State in South Dakota in the 2014-15 season.
In her lone season at Saint Mary’s, Crane helped lead the Cardinals to a 21-6 record and a second-place finish in the Minnesota Intercollegiate Athletic Conference.
Crane, a Baraboo, Wisconsin, native, spent three seasons at Northern State, a Division II program in South Dakota, before heading to Saint Mary’s. While at Northern State, Crane coached under Curt Fredrickson, the active victories leader among Division II women’s basketball coaches.
Crane helped guide the Wolves to a pair of Division II national tournament appearances and the 2015 Northern Sun Intercollegiate Conference Tournament championship. After spending the 2012-13 and 2013-14 seasons as a graduate assistant, Crane was Northern State’s volunteer assistant in 2014-15.
She comes from a family of coaches, having played for her father in high school. Her brother Andy, currently an assistant coach at Youngstown State, was an assistant at Dubuque during Crane’s playing career.
“Erin comes from a coaching family and knows how it works,” Dupuy said. “Having been an assistant at both the D2 and D3 level, you have to wear many hats, and she has done a great job of assisting in all areas of the program. Here, her main focus will be the organization of recruiting and heading up our community service program. Having a more concentrated set of duties will allow her to be even more successful as a coach.”
Crane played two seasons at Dubuque after playing two seasons at Madison College. She is a 2012 Dubuque graduate in speech communication and earned her master’s degree in sport performance and leadership from Northern State in 2014.
Crane began her coaching career at the AAU level, coaching the U-14 Team Wisconsin in 2012.
