Longwood University Athletics

Erika Lang-Montgomery came to Farmville in the spring of 2022 and is entering her fourth season at the helm of Longwood women's basketball. She has been successful at every stop in her career: as a player in the Southeastern Conference, in a decade as a Division II head coach, and as a Division I assistant at multiple Power 5 programs – most recently Florida, where she helped lead a program that surged to a top-15 ranking in 2021-22 and the NCAA tournament.  

She's also won high praise at every step along the way as a leader and mentor to student-athletes, and a dedicated community member.
 
Now, Lang-Montgomery's new home is Farmville as the next head coach for a Longwood women's program which moved into a new, on-campus arena -- the Joan Perry Brock Center -- for the 2023-24 season.
 
As a head coach, Lang-Montgomery has 151 wins across an 13-year head coaching career. In her first three seasons with the Lancers, Lang-Montgomery led Longwood to first-round byes in the Big South Conference tournament.

Lang-Montgomery and staff had their most successful season at Longwood in 2024-25, finishing 22-12 overall after advancing to the Big South Conference championship game and earning a berth in the Triple Crown Sports Postseason WNIT. Longwood earned 20 wins for just the second time at the Division I level and orchestrated a 13-win turnaround from 2023-24, thanks, in part, to an eight-game winning streak from Dec. 18 to Jan. 22. Longwood posted a 9-5 record in regular-season non-conference play, the school's best since the 1987-88 season. Lang-Montgomery guided her team to victories in its initial six Big South games of the season, a program first. It was also the first time LU won its first six games in conference since 1999-00 when the Lancers where part of the NCAA Division II Carolinas-Virginia Athletic Conference.

Longwood did it by playing smothering defense, forcing 24.47 turnovers per game while swiping 13.5 steals per game, figures that were second and third, respectively, in all of Division I women's basketball. Senior guard Kiki McIntyre earned Big South Defensive Player of the Year honors and became the program's all-time steals leader for a single season, collecting 130.

At season's end Lang-Montgomery was named Big South Coach of the Year, another first in Longwood women's basketball history. 

Lang-Montgomery helped the 2023-24 Lancers to six league wins for the fifth time in the school's Big South Conference era. The season opened with a difficult non-conference slate and included the second-longest road trip in Division I women's basketball from Nov. 15 at James Madison to Dec. 17 at William & Mary, traveling approximately 4,534 miles in a seven-game span.

Longwood was 21st nationally in steals per game, averaging 10.7. Individually, McIntyre finished 20th and 29th in steals per game (2.77) and total steals (83), respectively. Additionally, forward Otaifo Esenabhalu was twice named Big South Freshman of the Week while also earning a spot on the league's all-freshman team.

Further, in her second year under Lang-Montgomery, graduate student Anne-Hamilton LeRoy became the Lancers' all-time leader in career free throw made with 386. LeRoy also finished eighth in points scored at Longwood at 1,465.

Following a non-conference schedule that saw Longwood face three 2023 NCAA tournament participants (including two teams in the elite eight), the 2022-23 team picked things up down the stretch.
 
Under the tutelage of Lang-Montgomery, returners LeRoy and Adriana Shipp-Davis had breakout seasons. The pair were both named to the Big South second team while averaging career highs in points, rebounds, assists and field-goal percentage. LeRoy increased her scoring average from 6.2 to 13.4 while Shipp-Davis jumped from 4.5 to 13.9.
 
The Lancers enjoyed many season highlights, including LeRoy surpassing 1,000 career points with Longwood, a 21-point comeback victory against Presbyterian on alumnae weekend, and a gutsy road win over UNC Asheville in the final regular season game of the season to ensure the first-round bye.
 
During her nearly three-decade coaching career, Lang-Montgomery has been to the NCAA tournament with three different teams. In 2019 she was Peach Belt Conference Coach of the Year at Flagler, where she led the program 10 seasons before returning to her alma mater, Florida, as an assistant for three seasons. 
 
While in Gainesville, she was a key leader who helped engineer a major turnaround for the Gators. Florida qualified for the  postseason in consecutive seasons, including a berth in the 2022 NCAA tournament. In addition, the team was ranked as high as 15th in national polls last year and finished 21-11 overall and 10-6 in the SEC. The Gators beat five top-25 teams during the season.
 
That trip to the NCAA tournament came on the heels of a trip to the WNIT, the team's first postseason berth since 2016.
 
Lang-Montgomery has coached four WNBA draft picks, helped sign a pair of top-15 recruiting classes and mentored multiple all-conference and all-region players in addition to her postseason experience.
 
She went to her alma mater following 10 years as the head coach at Flagler at the Division II level. She is the program's all-time winningest coach and delivered its first 20-win season in the team's Division II history and best record since 1977. She went 39-17 in her final two seasons at Flagler.
 
Lang-Montgomery also led the school to the Peach Belt Conference playoffs five times while helping the school transition from NAIA to NCAA Division II. She had nine players earn all-conference honors and 16 garner academic all-conference awards.
 
Lang-Montgomery was named the Peach Belt Conference Coach of the Year in 2019 after her team went 21-8, and the names of her players dot the Flagler record books, as she coached both the program's single-season scoring leader and rebounding leader. 
 
Lang-Montgomery's coaching career began at Purdue University following a four-year playing career at Florida that saw her named to the All-SEC Freshman Team. In her first season, she helped the Boilermakers qualify for the 1996 NCAA tournament.
 
That jumpstarted her career that has seen her coach across the nation, with stops at Florida State, Southern California, Wisconsin, Wichita State and North Texas.
 
Among the highlights in those stops, she helped Wisconsin reach the highest ranking in school history, as the Badgers were ranked No. 5 in the Associated Press poll and No. 7 in the USA Today/WBCA Coaches' Poll in the 2001-02 season.
 
Lang-Montgomery -- who signed a six-year contract extension following 2024-25 that will keep in Farmville through 2030-31 -- and her husband Larry have two sons, Jaden and Justin, a Longwood student and women's basketball team manager.