Navy women’s basketball senior Kate Samson recently chatted with PressBox about a typical day at the Naval Academy, bouncing back from injury and more. The 6-foot-4 center averaged 9.0 points and 7.0 rebounds per game for the Midshipmen in 2024-25. Samson is a native of Richmond, Va., and graduate of Saint Gertrude High School.
PressBox: How did you first become interested in basketball?
Kate Samson: I started playing a little bit of club leagues when I was a little bit younger, in fourth grade. I kind of stuck with that until middle school. I actually got cut in sixth grade, so that was kind of my [motivation]. I joined an AAU program between seventh and eighth grade, and I started to get better from there. That’s kind of where it kicked off, the competitive nature of it. Clearly being invested in it was probably around eighth grade. I just kind of kept growing from there.
PB: Who was the biggest influence on your game growing up?
KS: Right now, I’d have to say my parents. My dad, [Dave], played tennis at Longwood. My mom, [Amy], didn’t do sports in college, but I saw her growing up doing triathlons and she ran a marathon before I was born, so both [are] very into sports. They kept me around the sports world a lot. I played soccer, volleyball. I did a little bit of high jump in high school, so just keeping me around the sports world. They never really pressured me into doing things. They just said, “We want you to be happy and we want you to be successful in whatever you do.” I think that helped me and motivated me to become the player who I am today.
PB: Why did you choose to go to the Naval Academy?
KS: This is actually a really funny story. My AAU coach reached out and he was like, “Hey, the Naval Academy — the coach has been reaching out and they want to talk to you and they’re interested.” At first I was like, “I want nothing to do with the Navy, absolutely nothing to do with it.” And then my parents were like, “You have to at least talk to them. This is an incredible school.” I ended up talking to the coaches and visiting the campus and ended up loving it. It’s been the best decision for me that I could’ve ever made. I absolutely love it here and have absolutely zero regrets of coming here.
PB: What’s a typical day like at the Naval Academy?
KS: I wake up around 6:30 every day, go to breakfast. We have formation in the morning, then we have our first four classes before lunch. We go to lunch. We have a little bit of a break for meetings or we’ll have team lift during lunch or conditioning. From there, we have usually one or two more classes in the afternoon. Then we’ll head on over for practice. We’ll do prehab before practice. We sometimes will get a lift in depending on how the schedule looks — practice and go to dinner, study and then rinse, repeat. Busy day.
PB: What’s your favorite thing about the Naval Academy?
KS: It’d have to be the people, 100 percent. Obviously my teammates are some of my best friends, but we also have company mates here. Those are the people you go through plebe summer with and you spend a lot of your time with as well. Everybody here has a shared common goal, and that’s to commission and eventually be in the Navy or Marine Corps. I think everyone having that shared goal and mindset really brings people together. They’re my closest friends. I absolutely love the people here.
PB: What injury did you suffer in 2024-25?
KS: I suffered a stress fracture in my right femoral neck, so right around the hip area. I was out for about three months last year. I was cleared I think it was two weeks after our very last game, so I definitely had a lot of setbacks, but I’m very thankful that my trainers and coaches and teammates were able to work with me through that.
PB: What was rehab like?
KS: It was usually 30 minutes to an hour Monday through Friday, sometimes Saturdays just depending on when we were in the gym. It was a lot of making sure that the rest of my body was keeping up with the strength of my hip and making sure that it was able to support it for when I did get back and getting back in condition, too, so that when I do come back I’m not falling behind my other teammates.
PB: How did the injury happen?
KS: We think that it was just over a long period of playing. It did start to kind of bug me around October and then it just kind of progressively got worse for the first couple of games. We think it was just from overuse a little bit.
PB: How do you take the strides you made on the court last year into hopefully a full season in 2025-26?
KS: I think it just comes from getting in the gym. I think our team as a whole has a very good culture around getting in extra time, extra shots up. … I think that kind of shows the grit that we have here at the Naval Academy that every girl is getting in the gym all the time. Extra lifting, as much lifting as we can do. We do a lot of preventative workouts now, a lot more focused around the basketball athlete this year and keeping our bodies all healthy so we can prevent as many injuries this year as possible.
PB: Who’s your best friend on the team and what’s a story that underscores your friendship?
KS: I probably would say Kelli Giuliani. She’s one of the shorter people on the team. I’m obviously one of the taller people on this team. People joke about that a lot. We lived right next to each other last year, so every day from practice we would just walk back with each other, talk about the day, go to dinner, that kind of stuff. It does help that her grandpa has a boat, so the team will always be over there. If you asked the team, I feel like a lot of people would say Kelli as their best friend. She’s truly the best. She supports every person out on the court. She’s kind of my [way] of keeping myself together, keeping my composure. If she can tell I’m having a hard day, she’ll always have my back. I also love myself some Morgan Demos. We battle it out every single day, so I’d have to also pick her just because we’re constantly battling it out on the court. I’ve enjoyed playing with her the last three and a half years, whatever we’re at now.
PB: Who did you look up to early in your college career?
KS: I’d have to say Ciera Hertelendy. I never personally got to play with her, but I remember watching her when I was getting recruited. I think we do have similar games. We both are 100 percent effort all the time. She had an injury at one point, too, and she just played through it. I’d have to say her. I truly admired her game and her leadership on the court.
PB: What advice would you give to younger players looking to play in college?
KS: I would say be coachable and go all out. I think that being coachable has truly gotten me to the point that I’m at today. If you’re not willing to learn anything, then you’re probably not going to develop any new skills. I think being coachable, listening to feedback from your coaches and your teammates is really important for getting to the college level. Give 100 percent every day. Even if you can only give 80 percent that day, give all 80 percent that day. I think that’s truly gotten me and the majority of my teammates to where we are now.
PB: What did you service select?
KS: We put in our preferences, but I’m hoping to get Surface Warfare. We’ll find out officially in November. … I love the automatic leadership aspect of it. A couple of the other services, you have to go through a lot of training beforehand to actually get that leadership opportunity. But in Surface Warfare, you come in and you’re immediately thrown in with a group of 10 to 50 people that you have to lead, all from different backgrounds. I’m very much a people person, so getting the opportunity to lead people was something that really drew me to it. It’s a super cool opportunity to get to travel the world. I tell my parents this all the time, but over my summer cruise we have a training opportunity to go live on a ship for a month. I got to see the night sky. I got to see the sun set in the middle of the ocean. Stuff like that I truly don’t think will ever get old. The experiences that come out of that are incredible.
Photo Credit: Phil Hoffmann/Navy Athletics