Brittany Mason is entering her third season with the Bearkat coaching staff after joining the Sam Houston State women's basketball staff prior to the 2018-19 season after two seasons with Ravon Justice on the Prairie View staff.
As part of Justice's staff the past two years, she has helped the Kats post a 35-23 record, going 25-13 in Southland Conference play. That includes going 19-10 in the 2019-20 season and 14-6 against Southland competition. The 14 SLC victories and the 19 wins overall in 2019-20 were both Division I records for the program.
In addition to the team success in 2019-20, the Kats also received some individual accolades as well with sophomore Amber Leggett finding her way onto both the all-SLC first team and the SLC All-Defensive team. Jaylonn Walker was named to the all-SLC second team for the second straight year, while Faith Cook became the second straight Bearkat to be named the SLC Newcomer of the Year.
In 2018-19, Mason helped the Kats to a 16-13 record in her first year, including going 11-7 in SLC play as Justice was named the SLC Coach of the Year. The 16 wins were nine more than the Kats had put together in the previous two seasons combined, and the 12-win improvement was the third best of any program in the nation in 2018-19, but the best of any that was under the direction of a first-year coaching staff.
In her first year at SHSU, three Bearkats – Jaylonn Walker, Lydia Baxter and Jenniffer Oramas – all pick up all-conference honors, the first postseason honors for any Bearkat since the 2015-16 season. Walker was named the league’s Newcomer of the Year, while Baxter was a third-team choice and Oramas getting an honorable mention nod. That season the Kats saw their scoring average jump up more than 18 points per game, eclipsing 100 points a pair of times. They also played an exciting brand of defense, ranking third in the league by forcing 22.7 turnovers per game.
The LaPorte, Texas native teams up with Justice for the third time in her coaching career at SHSU after also serving as an assistant coach at Texas A&M–Kingsville the two seasons prior to Prairie View. Before her time with the Javelinas, Mason was a four-year letterwinner and later an assistant coach at Houston during Justice's tenure on the Houston staff.
While at Prairie View A&M, Mason helped Justice resurrect and refocus the once prominent women’s basketball program. In 2016-17, the team had a school record five non-conference wins against teams from Conference USA, the Southland and the MEAC. The Panthers posted an 11-2 home record in her first season along with coaching a second team all-SWAC selection and second team Box-To-Row All American selection in Alexus Parker.
In 2017-18, the Panthers posted a 12-6 SWAC record, a five-game improvement from the season before, and missed earning a share of the league title by one gamebefore making it to the SWAC semifinals for the first time in three seasons.
As a senior, Mason played an integral role in helping lead the Cougars to a memorable and record-breaking season. Houston posted a 26-6 overall record and claimed a perfect 16-0 mark en route to making its first NCAA Tournament appearance since 2005.
Mason, known for her stingy defense, averaged a career-high 5.5 points and 5.0 rebounds per game as a senior for career averages of 4.0 points and 4.3 boards per contest.
She played in 119 career games, which ranks eighth in school history, with 70 starts. Mason also places ninth in the Houston record book in minutes played (2,578).
Mason graduated from Houston in August 2010 with a bachelor’s degree in health and followed up with a master’s of education with an emphasis in sports and fitness administration.
