Mike Merrill enters his 10th season with the program in the 2025-26 campaign. After spending two years as an assistant coach with the Terriers, Merrill was promoted to associate head coach on October 17, 2018. He has previously worked with coach Garrity at both Anderson University and UNC Wilmington.
Overcoming several key injuries in 2024-25, the Terriers posted another impressive campaign at 17-12 with an 8-6 SoCon clip. Wofford reached the semifinals of the SoCon Tournament for the fifth-straight season. For the third-straight season, a Terrier earned SoCon Player of the Year as Evangelia Paulk won the award, adding SoCon Defensive Player of the Year honors as well. Helen Matthews joined her on the All-SoCon First Team to mark the first time in program history that two Terriers were honored on the first team together. Libby Privett was honored as the Ann Lashley Inspiration Award winner, and Molly Masingale was tabbed to the SoCon All-Freshman Team. The season saw Paulk record the program’s second-ever triple-double, becoming the first SoCon player to ever record one with steals as one of the three markers. Wofford was 12-2 at home and secured its best-ever start to league play at 6-0. The fifth-year senior Matthews closed her career in incredible fashion by playing through an elbow injury and still leading the team to the SoCon semifinals while claiming SoCon All-Tournament Team recognition.
The 2023-24 season was another stout season for the Terriers, as Wofford was 17-13 with an 8-6 SoCon clip. Wofford returned to the semifinals of the SoCon Tournament for the fourth-straight season. During the regular season, Wofford defeated Virginia 71-70 for just the second Power Five win in program history and the first over an ACC foe. Rachael Rose hit the game-winning bucket in that game, and she tallied the program's first-ever triple-double later in the season against Furman. Rose repeated as SoCon Player of the Year upon the conclusion of the season. Annabelle Schultz earned SoCon All-Defensive Team honors alongside a Third-Team All-SoCon selection. Evangelia Paulk was named SoCon Freshman of the Year, just the third player in program history to claim the recognition. Maddie Heiss joined her on the all-freshman team.
The 2022-23 season saw unprecedented heights for the Terriers with a 22-10 overall record and 10-4 SoCon clip. Wofford claimed the Southern Conference Regular Season Championship, the first in program history and for any Wofford women's team sport. The 22 wins mark the program's first 20-win season at the Division I level. Rachael Rose was named SoCon Player of the Year and was joined on the All-SoCon Teams by Jackie Carman and Lilly Hatton with Helen Matthews garnering All-Defensive Team honors. As the No. 1 seed, Wofford reached the SoCon Championship for just the second time ever and the second time in three seasons while returning the WNIT for a second consecutive season of postseason play. The Terriers set a new single-season program record for three-pointers made with 268 and won a D-I era record seven-straight games early in the season.
Merrill helped guide the Terriers to new heights in the 2021-22 campaign, which saw Wofford finish 17-14 overall and 11-3 in Southern Conference action. The 17 wins are the fourth most in program history overall and the most at the Division I level, and the 11 league wins are also a program record. All five members of the starting lineup earned some kind of All-Southern Conference honor at the conclusion of the regular season, including Jackie Carman (First Team) and Lilly Hatton (Second Team). Niyah Lutz and Alexis Tomlin garnered Third Team nods, and Reagan Rapert was selected to the All-Defensive and All-Freshman squads. The Terriers earned the No. 2 seed for the SoCon Tournament, their highest ever, and they concluded the season with their first-ever WNIT appearance.
During the 2020-21 season, the team was 13-11 overall and 7-7 in Southern Conference play. Following the regular season, Lilly Hatton was named to the All-SoCon Second Team by both the coaches and media, while Jamari McDavid was named to the All-SoCon Third Team by the media and was the recipient of the Ann Lashley Inspiration Award. The Terriers reached the Southern Conference Tournament championship game for the first time in school history.
The 2019-2020 season saw the team finish with its best conference record in program history (8-6). By the end of the year, Lilly Hatton was honored as Freshman of the Year, along with Chloe Wanink, Da’Ja Green, and Cairo Booker receiving All-Conference accolades as well.
Merrill was instrumental in helping lead the 2018-19 team to the program’s fifth best finish in program history, while also helping land a program-best five Terriers on all-conference teams: Chloe Wanink (First Team), Da’Ja Green (Second/Third Team), Cairo Booker (Third/All-Defensive Team), Niyah Lutz and Jackie Carman (All-Freshman Team).
Da’Ja Green earned All-SoCon second team honors and All-Freshman Team honors for the 2017-18 season in addition to Jamari McDavid being named to the All-Freshman team. In his first season at Wofford, guard Chloe Wanink was named All-Southern Conference second team.
Prior to Wofford, Merrill was on Garrity’s staff at Anderson University for three seasons. Merrill helped lead the Trojans to an overall record of 66-26 and was promoted to Associate Head Coach in February of 2016. During his time at Anderson, Merrill helped produce nine All-SAC selections, two SAC Players of the Year (Sierra Simpson, 2015 and Jennifer Monroe, 2016) and two All-Southeast region selections (2015- Sierra Simpson 2nd team and 2016- Jennifer Monroe 1st team). The 2015-16 Trojans finished with a 23-7 record, SAC regular season champions (18-4), SAC Tournament Runner-up, NCAA Division II 2nd round and a top-25 national ranking.
The year prior, Merrill assisted in one of the most successful seasons in Anderson University history. The 2014-15 Trojans finished 27-5 overall, 20-2 in the SAC and were SAC regular season champions, SAC Tournament runner-up and advanced to the NCAA Division II Sweet 16. The 20 conference wins still stands as a SAC regular season record.
Prior to Anderson, Merrill spent five seasons on staff at UNC Wilmington under head coaches Ann Hancock and Cynthia Cooper-Dyke first as a student assistant and later as Director of Women’s Basketball Operations.
Merrill received his Bachelor of Arts in Physical Education from UNC Wilmington in 2007 and a Masters of Arts in Sports Management from North Carolina State in 2015. Merrill is married to the former Molly Pyles, who played volleyball at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Both are natives of Hendersonville, N.C. and have two sons, Nolan and Jack, and reside in Spartanburg.
