Hokie ClubBLACKSBURG - Virginia Tech women's basketball head coach Megan Duffy tabbed Lee Taylor as the program's assistant athletics director, strength & conditioning Monday.
Taylor, who has spent a dozen years training elite women’s basketball athletes at the Power Four level, comes to Blacksburg after serving as the director of athletic performance for Penn State women’s basketball for one season.
With over 15 years of experience in collegiate athletics, 12 of those years have been spent in women’s basketball throughout the SEC and Big Ten.
Before his time at Penn State, Taylor served in the same capacity at the University of Kentucky, where he assisted in guiding the program to new heights. Throughout his three years in the bluegrass state, he helped Kentucky reach historic heights with the first SEC tournament championship in 40 years in 2021. The success continued with the programs first ever overall no. 1 WNBA draft pick in Rhyne Howard.
Prior to Lexington, coach Taylor served for two seasons with the Auburn Tigers. While at AU, Taylor helped prepare one of the game’s best centers for the next level as Unique Thompson had back-to-back All-SEC seasons before being selected 19th overall by the Indiana Fever in the 2021 WNBA Draft.
Before his stint in Auburn, Taylor spent six seasons as the director of strength and conditioning for the Tennessee women’s basketball program. While overseeing all aspects of the strength and conditioning program with the Lady Vols, Taylor was a part of two SEC Championship seasons, one tournament and one regular season. Tennessee also succeeded in the NCAA Tournament under Taylor’s coaching with two Elite Eights, three Sweet Sixteens and six top-25 finishes in the Associated Press rankings. While at UT, he was also an integral part of the 98,000 square foot basketball facility renovation of Pratt Pavilion weight room.
Taylor has an impressive track record of producing players that compete at the highest level. Throughout his career, 14 athletes he has trained have been WNBA draftees or gone on to professional basketball careers overseas. In that same time span, he has seen two former players win Olympic medals.
Before working with women’s basketball, Taylor served as a football assistant strength coach at UT. He worked primarily with the offensive and defensive lineman as well as the specialists, assisting with designing and implementing in-season and off-season strength and conditioning programs and developing several future NFL players.
Prior to Tennessee, Taylor served as the director of strength and conditioning at Eastern Illinois University, University of Incarnate Word, and Missouri Valley College where he oversaw the design and implementation of strength and conditioning programs for all sports, purchasing, budgeting, and overall oversight of the departments.
Taylor, who graduated from Missouri Valley College in 2008 with a bachelor’s of science in athletic training and exercise science, is a certified strength and conditioning specialist through the National Strength and Conditioning Association (NSCA) and Level 1 Sports Performance Coach through the USAW.