After two seasons as women’s basketball head coach at Xavier University of Louisiana, Bo Browder had 38 victories, a disappointing 15-16 record in his second season and an opening on his staff for an assistant coach.
Browder hired Darrilyn Broussard to fill the opening, then the Gold Nuggets quickly regained their status as the top program in the Gulf Coast Athletic Conference and one of the perennial powers in NAIA Division I. The first event, Browder says, led to the other.
“I give Coach Broussard as much credit as anyone for our sustained success,” Browder said. “She provided a strong but settling influence on our program. Coach Broussard is a terrific role-model for the young women in our program to look up to.”
The Gold Nuggets qualified for the NAIA Division I National Championship 12 times during Broussard’s first 14 seasons on the staff. They’ve gone 352-116 (.752) during her tenure and averaged 25.1 victories per season. They’ve won or shared seven GCAC regular-season championships and won the GCAC Tournament seven times, including 2010, 2011, 2012 and 2014. Ten student-athletes have been Arthur Ashe Jr. Sports Scholars. Three times the Nuggets led NAIA Division I in scoring defense.
It hardly was a surprise when Xavier promoted Broussard to associate head coach in September 2006.
“Coach Broussard and I are a good team, like Batman and Robin,” Browder said. “It’s been easy to work with her because we believe in the same things, such as how to treat people and how to live. That makes a difference.”
The 2015-16 season will be Broussard's 16th at Xavier and her 15th on the women’s basketball staff. Her duties include recruiting, scouting, game and practice preparation, team management and coordinator of the Gold Nuggets’ summer basketball camp.
Broussard was an assistant coach on the women’s volleyball team in 2003, 2004 and 2011. She helped the Gold Nuggets and first-year head coach Christabell Hamilton set a slew of school records in 2011 and win that program’s first GCAC regular-season and tournament championships.
Broussard is a New Orleans native who graduated from Mercy Academy and was all-district and all-metro in both basketball and volleyball. She was a member of Domino’s AAU Junior Olympic team that won a national AAU championship in the early ’80s. Broussard played guard for four seasons at Xavier — she had 11 assists in a game her sophomore season — before graduating in 1986 with a degree in communications. As an XU senior she was chosen the team’s defensive player of the year and made the dean’s list. She earned her master of arts in education from the University of Phoenix in 2001.
Broussard coached six seasons at Xavier Preparatory High School in New Orleans before joining Browder’s staff. At “The Prep” she coached the basketball team to its first state-playoff victory. She also served as head volleyball and track coach and as athletics director.
She and husband, Kevin, have been married for 21 years and have two children, Chad and Katherine. Katherine Broussard is a standout volleyball player at Howard University.
