DePaul University Athletics
Lisa Ryckbosch - WOMEN'S BASKETBALL
- Title:
- Director of Basketball Operations
- Email:
- lryckbos@depaul.edu
- Phone:
- (773) 325-7507
Lisa Ryckbosch enters her 27th season with the DePaul women’s basketball program in 2026-27, her fourth as director of basketball operations. Ryckbosch moved into the role in 2023-24 and was retained by head coach Jill M. Pizzotti in 2025. She oversees team travel, builds the Blue Demons’ competition schedule, coordinates the program’s community service efforts and serves as the program’s liaison to alumni.
Ryckbosch served as an assistant coach at DePaul from 2017-23. During that stretch, she helped the Blue Demons claim the 2020 BIG EAST Tournament title with an 88-74 win over Marquette and extend the program’s run of consecutive NCAA Tournament berths to 18, with the 2020 tournament canceled due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
Ryckbosch began her second stint at DePaul in 2011 as director of corporate, professional and community relations. She coordinated the program’s community outreach, including visits to Chicago-area grade schools, youth clinics and DePaul’s basketball camps. She also led the team’s annual Christmas Toy Drive benefiting the St. Vincent de Paul Center, organized volunteer work at events such as the Sheffield Garden Walk and Chicago Park District Fitness Fest, managed regular-season travel and helped coordinate the program’s Vincentian Heritage tour in 2014.
Ryckbosch spent nine seasons as head coach at UIC from 2002-11, leaving as the program’s all-time winningest coach with 128 victories and the only head coach in program history to reach 100 wins. Her 2006-07 team set a school record with 19 wins, including an 11-game winning streak, and made the program’s first postseason appearance in the WNIT. She coached 25 All-Horizon League selections and graduated 88 percent of her student-athletes who completed their eligibility. She also served as a UIC assistant coach in 1990-91.
During her first stint at DePaul, Ryckbosch served as an assistant coach from 1991-2001 and associate head coach in 2001-02. As recruiting coordinator, she helped the Blue Demons to eight postseason appearances, including five NCAA Tournaments, and three conference championships. She helped sign the nation’s No. 8 recruiting class in 1997 and the No. 19 class in 2001.
Before coaching at the college level, Ryckbosch taught mathematics and was the head girls varsity basketball coach at Hillcrest High School in Country Club Hills, Ill.
Ryckbosch played at Loyola Chicago from 1980-84, where she was a two-time co-captain and finished her career as the Ramblers’ all-time leading scorer and second in career rebounds. She then played professionally in Belgium for DBC Aalst from 1984-87.
Ryckbosch and her husband, Bart, a Belgium native and retired archivist at the Art Institute of Chicago, have two sons, Peter and Steven, and four grandchildren.
