Rebecca Alvidrez is beginning her fifth season as the UT Tyler women’s basketball head coach in 2025-26, having revived a program that had won just three games combined in the two seasons before her arrival before the 2021-22 season.
Alvidrez led the Patriots to a 24-5 overall record (20-2 and third in the Lone Star Conference) in 2024-25. The Patriots qualified for their third straight NCAA Division II South Central Region Tournament. In four seasons as the Patriots’ head coach, Alvidrez has led the Patriots to a 98-31 record. She was 9-19 as the head coach at Adams State College in 2013-14, giving her a career record of 107-50 in five seasons, an average record of 21-10 per season.
Alvidrez coached the Patriots to a tremendous season in 2023-24 as she led her team to its second straight NCAA Division II Tournament appearance and a spot in the Sweet Sixteen. The Patriots finished the year 24-7 in the regular season, earning their second consecutive second-place finish in the LSC. The Patriots took down West Texas A&M in the LSC Tournament before falling to UT Permian Basin in the LSC semifinals.
The Patriots earned an at-large berth in the NCAA South Central Region Tournament, and, as the No. 6 seed, took down No. 3 Regis in a dominating 74-54 win in the first round. They then beat No. 2 Colorado Mesa, 68-56, in the semifinals, before falling to No. 1 seed Texas Woman’s, 65-51, in the championship game.
Alvidrez orchestrated one of the best seasons in UT Tyler women's basketball history in 2022-2023, as the Patriots made their first NCAA Tournament appearance at the Division II level and their second Elite Eight appearance in program history. The Patriots went 23-6 in the regular season and 18-4 in LSC play to secure a second-place regular-season finish and the No. 3 seed in the LSC Tournament. After dispatching West Texas A&M in the first round, the Patriots made the LSC semifinals for the second consecutive year before falling to Angelo State.
The Patriots’ regular-season resume was good enough to book their spot in the NCAA Tournament for the first time as an NCAA Division II program, earning the #5 seed at the NCAA South Central Regional Tournament. They knocked off No. 4 seed Colorado School of Mines, 73-63, in the first round before meeting No. 1 seed Angelo State in the semifinals. In a back-and-forth battle, the Patriots prevailed again and moved into the regional championship game against Lubbock Christian. Two clutch free throws by Tina Machalova with 53 seconds remaining left in double overtime pushed the Patriots to a 67-64 win over the Chaparrals.
The first NCAA Division II regional championship in program history sent the Patriots to the NCAA Elite Eight in St. Joseph, Missouri. The No. 8 seed Patriots gave No. 1 Ashland all it could handle in the first round, but fell short, 81-72, to finish the year at 27-8 and ranked No. 14 in the final WBCA Top 25, the highest ranking in the NCAA Division II era.
During the 2021-2022 season, Alvidrez led the program to a huge bounce-back season, finishing with a record of 19-9 and earning a spot in the Lone Star Conference tournament semifinals. The team went 10-5 in the conference season and collected one of the biggest wins in program history on Jan. 18, 2022, against then-fourth-ranked Texas A&M-Commerce, the first win over a nationally ranked team by the Patriots in the Division II era.
Before taking the job at UT Tyler, Alvidrez spent four years as the associate head coach at Stephen F. Austin State University. In her final two seasons in Nacogdoches, the Ladyjacks were a combined 47-9 with a trip to the NCAA Division I Women’s Basketball Tournament in 2020-21.
Alvidrez was a key part of SFA’s rise to the top of the Southland Conference as she was directly involved with all program operations, including scouting, film analysis, and game/practice planning. Alvidrez and the Ladyjacks became just one of 15 NCAA Division I programs to post back-to-back seasons of 25 or more wins in 2018-19 and 2019-20, and one of 20 teams that posted four consecutive seasons of 23 or more wins during her time on the sidelines for the Ladyjacks.
Stephen F. Austin received bids into the 2018 and 2019 Women's National Invitation Tournament before the 2020-21 Division I National Tournament appearance after going a perfect 14-0 in Southland Conference play and winning the Southland Conference Tournament with a 56-45 win over Sam Houston State in the finals.
Alvidrez arrived at Stephen F. Austin in 2017 after serving for three seasons as the assistant women's basketball coach at Colorado State University in Fort Collins, Colorado. Alvidrez served on a staff that guided Colorado State to a record of 77-16 in those three seasons, claimed the 2015-16 Mountain West Tournament championship, and earned the automatic qualification into the 2016 National Tournament.
During her time at Colorado State, Alvidrez augmented the international recruiting ties that led to the acquisition of three straight Mountain West Player of the Year representatives from Colorado State in Gritt Ryder and Ellen Nystrom. She spearheaded and coordinated recruiting efforts throughout her time in Fort Collins, and also assisted in individual skill training and development of the current roster, as well as scouting for future opponents.
Before she was the head coach at Adams State in 2013-14, she spent the 2012-13 season as an assistant coach at Nebraska-Omaha. Before that one season at UNO, Alvidrez spent six seasons as the associate head coach at the University of Alaska-Anchorage, a perennial power in women’s basketball in the Great Northwest Athletic Conference. She was the associate head coach for current UT-Tyler men’s coach Tim Moser, who put together a record of 165-32 in those same six seasons he and Alvidrez coached together in Alaska. Moser was the associate head coach to Alvidrez in her first two seasons at UT-Tyler before he was named the men’s head coach before the 2023-24 season.
While at Anchorage, Alvidrez assisted in the recruitment and development of six All-Americans for the Seawolves during her tenure from 2006-2012, assisting the program to a pair of NCAA Division II Final Four appearances in 2008 and 2009 and a total of six NCAA Division II National Tournament appearances. The Seawolves claimed the regular-season GNAC Championship in 2009 and 2012, and GNAC Tournament Championships in 2011 and 2012. Alvidrez and company guided the program to a record of 9-3 against Division I competition during her six seasons as associate head coach of the program.
Alvidrez got her start in the coaching ranks as an assistant coach at Otero Junior College in La Junta, Colorado, from 2003-06 on both the men's and women's side (coaching again with Moser) following a standout playing career of her own in the professional ranks overseas. She was named the Player of the Year in the Sweden-Basketattan League in 2003, as well as an “All-Star" All-Sweden Selection the same year.
That standout professional career came after an illustrious playing career at Montana State University for Alvidrez. She was a two-time All-Big Sky Selection, the league's Newcomer of the Year in 2000-01, and the league's Defensive Player of the Year in 2002. She was inducted into the Montana State University Hall of Fame in 2018 for her standout career and was a member of the 2001-02 women's basketball team that was also inducted into the school's Hall of Fame.
