Louisville basketball star Hailey Van Lith has entered the NCAA transfer portal. The school confirmed the news on Saturday morning.

“We thank Hailey for her contributions to this program, this school and this community,” Louisville head coach Jeff Walz said in a statement. “She has done everything we have asked of her over the past three years, and we wish her the very best in her final collegiate season and beyond.”

While Van Lith just finished her junior season at Louisville, she will receive her undergraduate degree in finance from the university in May. She enters the transfer portal as a graduate student.

During her three years at Louisville, Van Lith led the Cardinals to three strong NCAA tournament showings. The Cardinals’ season ended in the Elite Eight twice (2021, 2023) and Final Four once (2022). Van Lith averaged 19.7 points as a junior and finishes her Louisville career with 1,553 career points (12th in school history).

Van Lith is just the latest big name to enter the NCAA transfer portal. Earlier this week, it was confirmed that DePaul’s Aneesah Morrow and Virginia Tech’s Ashley Owusu are also looking to make offseason moves.

Louisville coach Jeff Walz watched two very different basketball games Sunday: LSU’s low-scoring win against Miami, and then his own team’s high-scoring loss against Iowa.

Despite their disparate final scores, though, both Elite Eight contests featured high-quality basketball. Walz just wished that came across in the broadcasts.

He pointed to LSU’s 54-42 win against Miami as an example. As a keen observer, he found himself impressed by the defenses on display.

“But instead of complimenting that, we talk, ‘Oh, it’s a terrible offensive game.’ No, it’s not. It’s a great defensive game,” Walz said. “I’ve watched men’s games. They’re in the 20s. But every time I listen to an announcer on a men’s game in the 20s, they talk about what an unbelievable defensive game it is.

“We kill ourselves. We have to do better. It’s mind-boggling to me that we, as people who are trying to push and advocate for women’s basketball, we hurt ourselves. It’s got to stop. The stupidity has to end. It’s ignorance. I can’t figure it out.”

Walz’s words came as part of a seven-minute plea for more and better support for women’s basketball, made in the wake of his team’s 97-83 loss to Iowa. While he hopes fans “appreciate both sides” of the game, both the low-scoring and the high-scoring, the cue must come from those within the women’s game itself.

“We have to just continue to do a better job of being supportive of women’s athletics and women’s basketball,” he said. “I tell my players all the time, because this is something that’s important to me, when someone asks one of my players, ‘Who is your favorite professional player?’ I surely hope we say a WNBA player, because if we don’t, if you’re an advertiser and women’s basketball players are saying their favorite professional player is a men’s player, why would you advertise in women’s sports? You’re telling everyone, I prefer the men’s players.

“That, to me, I can’t figure out either. We have an unbelievable game, we have an unbelievable product, and we need to keep telling people and showing people that we do, but it starts with us.”