Brenda Paul begins her second season as the head coach of the Young Harris College women's basketball program.

Paul was selected to become the architect of the program which was restarted last season after 80 years.

Paul, a Flowery Branch, Ga. native, led the Mountain Lions to a 11-13 mark last season and recorded her 450th victory - a 59-53 win over Reinhardt University - in the process.

Paul's career dates back to the 1978-79 season, her first of two seasons at Tennessee Wesleyan College. Her most previous coaching stint came at Elon University, where she was the head coach from 1994-2008, guiding the Phoenix from NCAA Division II to Division I.  Her 14 years at the helm of the Elon program makes her the longest-tenured coach in the school’s women’s basketball history.  

While there, Elon played in three different conferences, moving from the NCAA Division II South Atlantic Conference to the Division I Big South and on to another Division I league, the Southern Conference. While Paul’s Elon teams found success on the court, reaching tournament championship games in both the South Atlantic and Big South conferences, they were just as successful in the classroom.  

Under Paul’s guidance, every senior that completed her eligibility at Elon earned a degree. Paul came to Elon after coaching at Georgia State University from 1989-94 and, before that, at Mississippi State University from 1985-89.  While at MSU, she took a Lady Bulldogs team that went 8-20 her first year and turned it into one with a 19-13 mark in 1987-88, the best single-season record in the program’s history.  That season, MSU reached the postseason for the first time and Paul was the runner-up for the Southeastern Conference’s Coach of the Year award.

Prior to taking over the Mississippi State program, Paul coached one of the nation’s top small-college programs at Berry College.  From 1980-85, her Lady Vikings squads put together a combined 139-28 record and won the district championship every year.  While on the Rome, Ga., campus, Paul led her team to three top-eight NAIA National Tournament finishes, including semifinal appearances in both 1982 and 1984.  Eight of her Berry players earned All-American honors.

Paul began her college coaching career in 1978, leading Tennessee Wesleyan to a two-year record of 28-21.

In 2004, Paul was inducted into the inaugural class of the Northeast Georgia Sports Hall of Fame. She is a 1977 graduate of North Georgia College (now North Georgia College & State University).