PENSACOLA, Fla. –UWF head Women's basketball coach Stephanie Yelton has announced the addition of John Motherwell to the Argonauts' staff as an assistant coach for the 2026-2027 season.
As the Argos join Division I, Motherwell brings 16 seasons of Division I experience with him in his return to Pensacola.
"I'm grateful Coach Yelton called, her basketball resume is elite and she's an even better person," said Coach Motherwell. "The talent and support in this department is top-notch. I had some options where to continue my career but it was a quick and easy decision to return to West Florida."
Motherwell spent last season at Seattle University in the Redhawks first season in the West Coast Conference (WCC). Prior to that, he served as the Recruiting Coordinator and Associate Head Coach at the University of North Dakota as part of his second stint with UND having been with the program in the 2010-11 season.
Motherwell was an essential part of North Dakota's 2022-23 post season run to the Women's Basketball Invitational having finished third in the Summit League that year. While at UND, he landed the school's first and second ever ESPN four-star recruits. He also served a brief stint at Central Michigan where he garnered the commitment of the Mid-American Conference Freshman of the Year and Player of the Year.
Motherwell has coached at the University of Detroit Mercy, where he signed the top-ranked recruiting class in the Horizon League. He also spent time on the coaching staffs at the University of Minnesota and Valparaiso before serving as Finlandia University's head coach during the 2017-18 season. He began his coaching career at the high school level in Michigan before one-year stops at Concordia University-St. Paul and the College of St. Scholastica.
Motherwell spent five seasons at Minnesota State Moorhead from 2000-05, helping engineer one of the program's biggest turnarounds. The Dragons posted five consecutive winning seasons after seven straight losing campaigns. In his final season, Minnesota State Moorhead won a program-record 24 games, captured its first conference championship in 20 years and earned an NCAA Tournament berth.
He later spent five seasons at Milwaukee from 2005-10, where the Panthers won the Horizon League regular-season and tournament championships and advanced to the NCAA Tournament in his first season. Motherwell also mentored two Horizon League Players of the Year. During a two-year stint at Minnesota from 2014-16, he helped the Golden Gophers win 43 games, reach the NCAA Tournament, coach two first-team All-Americans and secure the commitment of the Big Ten Freshman of the Year.
During his first stint at UWF, Motherwell recruited several of the program's standout players, including Tessah Holt, Kelly Preston, Jenny Menz, Raquel Miller, Brianna Williams, Courtney Meyer and Gulf South Conference Freshman of the Year Katie Bobos. Over the course of his career, he has recruited conference Freshman of the Year honorees in six different leagues and mentored more than 30 players who went on to play professionally.
A Michigan native, Motherwell lettered as a wide receiver at Eastern Michigan University exhausting his eligibility before earning a bachelor's degree in general studies from the University of Michigan. He and his wife, Sherri, have two children, Annie and Joe.
