BATON ROUGE, La. (BRPROUD) — Georgetown women’s basketball head coach and former LSU assistant coach Tasha Butts died Monday morning at the age of 41 after a two-year fight with cancer.
According to LSU Athletics, Butts was diagnosed with breast cancer in 2021. The Tasha Tough campaign was created to help raise awareness and money for women who can’t afford quality care through the Kay Yow Cancer Fund.
“Tasha was a great player and went on to have a successful career as a coach too,” LSU Head Coach Kim Mulkey said. “More importantly, she had an impact on so many lives throughout her lifetime. We are sad to lose her at such a young age.”
During Butts’ time at LSU, she was part of four 20-win seasons and six NCAA Tournament appearances highlighted by back-to-back Sweet 16 runs in 2012 and 2013, the university’s athletic department said.
“She helped ink three top-20 recruiting classes (2011, 2017, 2019), while signing seven top-100 prospects,” LSU Athletics said in a news release. “In eight seasons at LSU, Butts coached and mentored six all-SEC academic honor roll recipients and developed seven all-SEC selections.”
Butts was named Georgetown’s head coach in April before announcing in September she would be taking time to focus on her health.
