Zenarae Antoine
Zenarae Tshui Chu Antoine is an American college basketball coach who is the current head coach of the women's basketball team at Texas State University in San Marcos, Texas. Zenarae Antoine is in her ninth season as the head coach at Texas State and is 13 wins shy of being the third-winningest coach in program history. In her first season, she led one of the best turnarounds in school history, taking a 9-20 team the year before, to 17-14 including the school’s first conference tournament win since 2003. She has also led the team appearances in the Women's Basketball Invitational in 2014, 2015 and 2017.
Antoine’s eighth season in 2018-19, Texas State finished with a 14-17 overall record and a 9-9 mark against the Sun Belt Conference. The Bobcats finished sixth in the league standings and dropped a tough game in the second round of the conference tournament. Guard Toshua Leavitt was named First Team All-Sun Belt Conference after a record-breaking season saw her top both the school and conference marks for career made 3-point field goals. Leavitt also collected CollegeSportsMadness.com National Mid-Major Player of the Week on Jan. 17 following a career-high 35-point effort at Georgia State.
The 2017-18 season, Antoine's seventh, was a historical season for the Bobcats. Antoine led Texas State to a record of 23-10, the most single-season victories in the Division I Era in program history. The season started with an upset at Texas Tech as Texas Tech knocked off the Big-12 foe 87-70. With an 81-45 victory over ULM on Jan. 18, Antoine became the fourth coach in Texas State women's basketball history to secure 100 career wins as a Bobcat. The Bobcats secured the No. 2 seed in the 2018 Sun Belt Conference Championship and made it to the title game. The Bobcats lost 54-53 in the championship game against Little Rock, but clinched an automatic bid to the 2018 Women's National Initiation Tournament for the second time in school history. Both Taeler Deer and Toshua Leavitt eclipsed the 1,000-point barrier, becoming the 17th and 18th players in program history to do so. Deer went on to win the Sun Belt Conference Player of the Year, was named to the All-Sun Belt first team and was honored as the 2018 Sun Belt Conference Championship Most Outstanding Player. Leavitt was named to the all-conference second team. Antoine help guide both guards to record-breaking seasons. Deer shattered the school's record for assists in a single-season and a single-game while Leavitt broke the school record for 3-point field goals made in a career, single-season and single-game.
Antoine has developed six 1,000 point scorers, one Sun Belt Conference player of the year, ten all-conference players, and three professional players. More importantly, during the 2017-2018 the bobcats claimed the highest women's basketball GPA in the Sun Belt Conference. Antoine has a 100% graduation rate with student-athletes who have completed their senior year.
Early life and education
Zenarae Antoine was born Zenarae Tshui Chu Pieters in Salina, Kansas and raised in Katy, Texas. Her father was an immigrant from British Guyana, and her mother is Chinese. After high school, Antoine attended Colorado State University and played basketball for the Colorado State Rams from 1994 to 1998 while completing her degree in physical science with minors in geology and statistics. In 2000, Antoine received her master's degree in athletic administration at Ohio University; she also was a graduate assistant for Ohio Bobcats women's basketball in the 1999–2000 season.Coaching career
In the 1998–99 season, Antoine was an AAU coach and semi-professional basketball player for the Southeast Ravens team in Houston.Antoine's first full-time assistant position was in the 2000–01 season with the College of Charleston as Zenarae Pieters. Returning to Ohio University, Antoine was an assistant coach there from 2001 to 2003 going by Zena Pieters.
Now going by her married name, Antoine joined the staff of new head coach Tom Collen at Louisville as recruiting coordinator on June 24, 2003. As the lead recruiter, Antoine put together two nationally ranked recruiting classes in her last two seasons, no. 26 in 2006 and no. 25 in 2007. Antoine then followed Collen to Arkansas in 2007 and served four years under Collen as assistant coach.
Texas State (2011–present)
On April 18, 2011, Texas State hired Antoine as women's basketball head coach. Inheriting a team that went 9–20 in 2010–11, Antoine led Texas State to a 17–14 record in its final year in the Southland Conference. Texas State moved to the Western Athletic Conference for the 2012–13 season, during which the team went 10–20 yet won its first game against a Big 12 Conference opponent since 2005, 91-80 against TCU at home.http://www.espn.com/womens-college-basketball/team/schedule/_/id/326/year/2013Beginning in the 2013–14 season, Texas State became a member of the Sun Belt Conference and made its first postseason appearance since 2008 in the WBI. Texas State made the WBI again in 2015 and 2017..
In the 2017-2018 season, the bobcats had the best record in the Division 1 era. This past season was record-breaking including receiving two players on the Sun Belt all-conference team. Taeler Deer was awarded first-team all-conference, Player of the Year, as well as Most Outstanding Player in the Sun Belt Conference Tournament. Toshua Leavitt was also named to an all-conference team earning a spot on second-team with an additional nod on the all-tournament team. Texas State earned the Sun Belt Conference's automatic bid into the Women's National Invitation Tournament for the second time in program history.
The Bobcats attacked the record book in the 2017-2018 season, breaking five program records, and placing athletes on numerous top 10 lists held at Texas State. In the 2017-2018 season, Coach Antoine also earned her win No.100 in a home victory over Louisiana-Monroe on January 18th, 2018. Antoine became just the fourth coach in Bobcat women's basketball history to amass 100 career wins with the program. One of Antoine's top guards, Toshua Leavitt, owns every school record Texas State has to offer. Leavitt broke the Sun Belt record for most 3-pointers made in a season and was one of five athletes to match or top the previous NCAA record for 3-pointers made in a season. Additionally, Taeler Deer finished her senior season landing on eight season and career top-10 leaderboards at Texas State and a two-time school record holder. Both Deer and Leavitt ended the season eclipsing 1,000 points.