The North Carolina State women’s basketball team will take on top-ranked South Carolina in Friday’s Final Four in Cleveland. The Wolfpack have six freshmen on the roster – one being Flower Mound’s Maddie Cox.
Cox is a 6-2 guard and graduated from high school in 2023.
According to ESPN, Cox ranked #71 in the 2023 class and was a McDonald’s All-American nominee. As a senior, she averaged 17.2 points and 11.9 rebounds per game. She surpassed 1,000 career points and set the school record in assists during the 2022-23 season.
Cox was also a three-time all-state selection.
But Maddie isn’t the only one in her family to reach the Final Four. Her mom Brenda played at SMU while father Dennis played at Central Methodist. Cox has two older sisters that also reached the Final Four. Whitney played at Lubbock Christian and while she didn’t reach the D1 Final Four, she helped her team to the D2 national championship in 2021. LCU went 23-0 and beat Drury 69-59 in the title match.
Whitney, who was a student assistant at LCU this season, played in 86 career games and made her only 14 starts as a senior in 2023. Also a graduate from Flower Mound in 2019 – Cox averaged a team-high 12.2 points and 9.5 rebounds per game.
Their older sister Lauren graduated from Flower Mound in 2016.
Lauren is regarded as one of the best high school players all-time and one of the best while at Baylor. In college, Cox was the fourth player in program history to earn four All-America selections in the same season. As a senior in 2020 – Cox was Big 12 Player Of The Year, Big 12 All-Defensive Team and a National Naismith Defensive Player Of The Year semifinalist. As a junior, Cox was Big 12 Defensive POTY and a Naismith DPOTY finalist. She was also Big 12 DPOTY in 2018 and 2017 Big 12 Sixth Man Of The Year.
Cox was the top-ranked HS center by ESPN and #2 overall prospect while at FM. She was a 2x Gatorade Player Of The Year. Cox, who has multiple gold medals at the national level, was drafted by the Indiana Fever with the 3rd overall pick in the 2020 WNBA Draft.
With Baylor, Lauren went to the Sweet 16 three times, Elite 8 twice and won a championship in 2019.
The Cox family have one more daughter playing in college – Kaylee, who plays volleyball with Western Kentucky. Kaylee, a 6-foot-3 outside hitter, wrapped up her junior season in the fall. WKU won 30 games and made it to the second round of the NCAA tournament. Kaylee, who spent her first two seasons with Missouri, was a Top 50 recruit, Class 6A state champ and won multiple All-American and All-State awards.
