The Western Illinois women's basketball team has a winning formula in head coach J.D. Gravina and associate head coach Dan Chapla.
Chapla joined the Leathernecks in June of 2019 after 11 seasons at William Woods in Fulton, Mo., where he guided the program to unprecedented heights en route to the title of its all-time winningest coach.
At William Woods, Chapla recorded at least 20 wins in all but one season and became the school's all-time winningest coach in the 2018-19 campaign with an overall record of 257-103. He took the Owls to the NAIA Division I Women's Basketball National Championship in 2008-09 – their first appearance since the 1991-92 season – and the success steamrolled into eight consecutive postseason trips.
Chapla produced nine NAIA All-Americans (Rachel Baker (three times), Sharon Andrews, Priscila Santos, Katie Scherder, Blake French, Julia Wells, and Jasmine Brown) at WWU, and academically, the Owls were ranked Top 25 on the WBCA scholarly lists in four of his 11 seasons.
He came to William Woods from Culver-Stockton College in Canton, Mo., where he spent six years as the head women's basketball coach, and before that, he spent two seasons as the men's basketball assistant coach at his alma mater Ottawa University where he is also a 2014 Athletic Hall of Fame inductee.
A former First Team All-Conference and NAIA Honorable Mention NAIA All-American, Chapla was the team's starting point guard from 1989-1993, before graduating with a degree in political science. In May of 2002, he received a master's degree in physical education/sports administration from the University of Central Missouri.
Chapla is married to his wife Gara, and the two have a daughter, Ivy, and son, Luke.
