The Journey: Maria Marchesano returns home to Butler

On3’s Talia Goodman is showcasing women’s college basketball coaches taking over at new schools. This is the third edition of the series – in which we’ll take a deeper look at some of the 60-plus coaches who took over new programs during a turbulent offseason. This time we learn more about Maria Marchesano, the new head coach at Butler.

Maria Marchesano bio

HOMETOWN: Fort Wayne, IN 
EXPERIENCE: Purdue Fort Wayne (head coach 2021-26), Mount St. Mary’s (head coach 2017-21), Walsh (head coach 2013-16), Urbana (head coach 2011-13)
PLAYED: Butler (‘05)

Why Butler?

For Marchesano, returning to Butler was never strictly about a job. It was about coming home. 

“I’m either going to stay at home or I’m going to go back to my alma mater,” she told On3. “This time, when it came open, it just felt like the right time.”

The program’s move to the Big East, a supportive administration and familiar faces on campus – including athletic director Grant Leiendecker – all added to the pull. But so did the simple fact of what Butler means to her.

“The Butler war song – all the programs use it, especially men’s and women’s basketball over the years,” she said. “When you’re running out onto the court as a player and the band starts to play, it kind of just gives you chills. Watching games on TV over the last 20 years and hearing that in the background has always put me back in that moment. I’m excited to be back in that moment now as a coach.”

Her playing days there also give her a unique recruiting edge. 

“If they don’t already know that you played here, then they say, ‘Oh, you played here too,’” she said. “It makes it even more special and it makes everything you’re saying even more genuine. It’s a cool moment when you’re recruiting kids and they don’t know that, and they find out.”

Building the roster in a new era

Marchesano hit the ground running the moment she was announced, with the transfer portal already open and the clock ticking.

“It just feels like we’re treading water these first couple of weeks…,” she said. “It was very helpful that I knew I was going to bring a large majority of my staff with me, and I truly can’t imagine making a change in this landscape after the portal is open without having some of my staff already established.”

Butler wasn’t starting from zero, though. With two returners, two players Marchesano brought with her from Purdue Fort Wayne and four incoming freshmen already set to arrive, the Bulldogs had a foundation of eight before the real portal work began.

“It wasn’t like we were completely bare,” she said. 

The top priorities were clear: a dynamic point guard and a wing. 

“We feel pretty excited with the two kids that we landed in those spots.”

From there, it was about filling out the roster with the right people. 

“We’ve tried to put high character kids at the top of our list, even if that meant sacrificing talent at this point,” Marchesano said. “But I don’t feel like we have sacrificed talent either. We’ve been really lucky with the kids we’ve gotten so far.”

Marchesano’s coaching style and mindset

Offensively, Marchesano’s teams have a track record that speaks for itself. Her programs have consistently ranked near the top in offensive statistics, built on a Princeton/dribble-drive motion system that emphasizes spacing. She noted that two years ago, her player Lauren Ross led the entire country in both three-point and free throw percentage.

“We’re gonna push pace,” she said. “We’re not gonna play run and gun or anything crazy. We’re gonna put a high price tag on shot selection… We’re gonna have really good spacing and let our guards go to work.”

Defensively, Butler under Marchesano will be aggressive. 

“We’re about 85% man, we’re going to be up the line, disruptive,” she said. “In college basketball, you kind of have those two lines of thinking – you’re either going to pack it in or you’re going to be up the line a little bit. We’re definitely going to try and be disruptive and create some offense with our defense.”

The culture she’s building mirrors something she’s valued and something Butler has always stood for. 

“I kind of built our team’s core values very similar to the Butler Way,” she said. “Playing for the team first, putting the team above all, being really good people, being good humans, playing unselfishly.”

Central to that is creating joy in the process.

“One of our core values is ‘it takes what it takes,'” she said. “For every single kid and every single coach, including myself, it takes what it takes looks different… It’s just being willing to work on your weaknesses and strengthen your strengths for the good of the team.”

Something you may not know about Marchesano

Marchesano’s father was born and raised in Italy, came over through Ellis Island and eventually settled in Fort Wayne after meeting her Indiana-native mother. That dual citizenship allowed Marchesano to play professionally overseas, including on the island of Sardinia, which she calls a must-visit spot. 

“My dad’s a little Italian man and his English is terrible,” she said with a laugh. “His texts are hilarious. In the Italian language, everything is spelled and said phonetically. So his texts, even in English, are spelled very phonetically. And we all kind of screenshot them and share them and laugh about it all the time.”