Youngstown, Ohio -- Youngstown State head women's basketball coach Melissa Jackson has completed her initial staff with the addition of Shayna Gore.
Gore comes to Youngstown with an outstanding list of accomplishments as a Division I student-athlete and three years of coaching experience at the Division I level.
"I am so excited to complete our staff and welcome Shayna Gore to our Penguin Family," Jackson said. "I believe Shayna is a rising star in this profession, and her energy and enthusiasm to be at YSU was demonstrated throughout the process. Shayna comes highly recommended by some of the best basketball minds in our game at both the collegiate and grassroots levels. At Indiana, she worked tirelessly for a championship program with elite coaches and players. I am excited for her to bring those experiences to YSU, and I know our players will benefit tremendously from that."
Most recently, Gore spent the 2023-24 season at Western Carolina in her first position as a full-time assistant coach. In her year with the Catamounts, Gore's duties included on and off-campus recruiting, organizing official and unofficial visits, player development, social media, marketing and scouting.
In her two seasons as a graduate assistant at Indiana, Gore worked closely with Big Ten Conference Defensive Player of the Year Mackenzie Holmes and first-team All-Big Ten selection and WNBA draft pick Grace Berger. Holmes and Berger earned All-America honors, and the Hoosiers won 52 games in those two seasons. Indiana advanced to the Sweet 16 in 2021-22, and it collected 28 wins while earning the program's first-ever No. 1 seed in the NCAA Tournament in 2022-23.
Gore's coaching career began at the high school level as she was the youngest head coach in West Virginia at St. Albans High School in St. Albans, W. Va. She led the Red Dragons to impressive victories over the No. 5 and No. 9 teams in the state in her rookie head coaching season in 2019-20.
Gore had a notable playing career at Marshall from 2015-19 and earned All-Conference USA accolades three times. She finished her collegiate career with 2,081 points, ranking third-best in program history and sixth all-time in C-USA history. Gore made 303 career 3-pointers, the most ever by a Thundering Herd player, and helped Marshall to postseason berths in the Women's NIT and the Women's Basketball Invitational.
In high school, Gore was the West Virginia Gatorade State Player of the Year in 2015 and a four-time first-team All-State selection at Logan High School.
Gore joins Peyton Booth and Courtney Davidson as assistant coaches on Jackson's first staff at Youngstown State. Jason Pacanowski and Brice Margenthaler will remain on the staff and keep the same duties they held in 2023-24.
