2 Finalists Left for Women's Basketball Head Coaching Position

Cody Burgess

A UAF alumnae, Burgess was a power forward for the Nanooks from 2002-2005. She brings nine years of combined playing and coaching experience at a diverse range of college levels.

This season she was an assistant coach at Moberly Area Community College (Moberly, MO) of the National Junior College Athletic Association (Division I). She helped guide the Lady Greyhounds to a 17-14 record that included a win over 10th ranked State Fair CC. While Burgess’ main role with MACC was as the recruiting coordinator, her other responsibilities included developing practices, coordinating the competition schedule, website maintenance and media relations, fundraising and monitoring the student-athletes’ academic progress.

Prior to MACC, Burgess spent two seasons as an assistant coach at William Woods University of the National Association of Intercollegiate Athletics (Division I) and the American Midwest Conference. In 2008-09 Burgess helped lead the Owls to a 21-10 record, a NAIA Tournament Bid and a conference championship title. The season was a huge turnaround success on the laurels of a dismal 4-23 campaign in 2007-08.

After closing out her collegiate career Burgess spent one season as the girl’s basketball assistant coach for North Pole High School, helping to guide the Patriots to a second place finish at the Alaska state championships in the 4A division.

During her time at Alaska, she was selected Daktronics First Team All-West Region in 2005 and Second Team All-Great Northwest Athletic Conference in 2003 and 2005. She led the GNAC in scoring during the 2003 and 2005 seasons and was a team captain for the Blue and Gold as a senior (2004-2005). She holds career records in the GNAC for her scoring average in all games (19.3) and in league games (20.0) as well as the all-time records for free throws made (188) and attempted (225), which were set during the 2004-05 campaign.

Before playing at the University of Alaska Fairbanks, Burgess played two seasons at Wenatchee Valley College, where she was named First Team All-Northwest Athletic Association of Community Colleges in 2002, as well as team MVP.

Burgess received her Bachelor of Science in Natural Resources Management, Forestry option from UAF and a Master's in Education in Athletic Administration at William Woods University.

Nichole Schutte

Nichole Schutte completed her second season as an assistant coach with the Western Oregon University women's basketball program in 2009-10. With the Wolves, she was responsible for post-player development, coordination of the strength and conditioning program, and implementation of individual defensive fundamentals and recruiting.

Schutte, who recently completed her master’s degree in Rehabilitation Counselor Education from WOU, earned her undergraduate degree in Applied Studies from Northwest Nazarene University (2008), where she was also a two-sport star for the Crusaders (women’s basketball and track).

She was named to the All-Great Northwest Athletic Conference second team in basketball as she averaged 11.5 points and 6.1 rebounds per contest and ran the sprints (100m and 200m) and the relays (4x100m and 4x400m) for the track team.