9443674-large.jpg
Texas Tech's Kristy Curry will take over at Alabama for Wendell Hudson, according to the Lubbock Avalanche-Journal. (AP photo)
-- Alabama has reached an agreement with Texas Tech women's basketball coach
Kristy Curry
to assume the same position with the Crimson Tide.
"I am very excited to announce that
Kristy Curry
will be the next women's basketball coach at the University of Alabama," UA athletics director
Bill Battle
said in a university statement. "When we began our search for a head coach, we sought a veteran head coach that had a proven record as a consistent winner. Coach Curry has produced an impressive record at Purdue and Texas Tech. We are thrilled that she has chosen to lead our program, and we are looking forward to welcoming Kristy, her husband Kelly, and their children, Kelsey and Kendall, to Tuscaloosa."
The
first reported the story. Texas Tech athletics director
Kirby Hocutt
later confirmed Curry's departure.
"Earlier this morning, I met with Coach Curry and she informed me that she would be resigning from Texas Tech in order to take the head coaching position at the University of Alabama," Hocutt wrote to the
. "A national search for her replacement is underway and the immediate interest in the job has been tremendous."
In seven years with the Red Raiders, Curry, 46, amassed a record of 130-98 and advanced to the NCAA tournament twice. Alabama, which went 68-87 (14-64 SEC) during former coach
Wendell Hudson's
tenure, has not made the NCAA tournament since 1999.
Hudson was recently
.
"I am honored and thrilled to be the next women's basketball coach at the University of Alabama," Curry said in a UA statement. "The Alabama program has tremendous potential and I am very excited to get the chance to lead the Crimson Tide back to national prominence. I want to thank the Alabama administration for the confidence they have shown in me, and for giving me this opportunity.
"We leave Texas Tech with heavy hearts. Kelly and I owe our deepest gratitude to so many people in the Red Raider family. We will always be grateful to the Texas Tech fans, the administration, the faculty and, most of all, our players."
Curry, a Northeast Louisiana alumna, was the head coach at Purdue for seven seasons before she was hired at Texas Tech in 2006. With the Boilermakers, Curry went 179-51, won two Big Ten regular season championships and three Big Ten tournament championships, advanced to seven NCAA Tournaments and went all the way to the national championship in 2001.
Curry's coaching career started at the prep level before she accepted an assistant coaching position at Tulane in 1991. She held assistant coaching positions at Stephen F. Austin, Texas A&M and Louisiana Tech before landing her first head coaching gig at Purdue.
Texas Tech was knocked out of the first round of this year's NCAA Tournament, ending Curry's final season in Lubbock with a 21-11 record.
According to the
, Curry was set to make a $750,000 salary for the 2013-14 season. Hudson made a salary of $245,000 with a $50,000 talent fee.