MINNPOST: Why Cheryl Reeve has Vowed to Assemble an All Female Staff

[Ignatius L Hoops]

Why Lynx coach Cheryl Reeve has vowed to assemble an all-female coaching staff for 2020 — and beyond | MinnPost

Reeve always considered herself an advocate for women, using her standing as one of the most successful coaches in WNBA history to push for various causes. But Reeve realized she was falling short in promoting and preparing women to be head coaches.

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Pat Borzi:

Nine months ago, when Notre Dame Coach Muffet McGraw told the web site ThinkProgress.org she would never hire another male assistant coach to her staff — a story that blew up when she repeated it a week later at the Final Four — her words stung Lynx Coach Cheryl Reeve.


As a young coach, Reeve admired McGraw as mentor and a role model. She still does. Reeve always considered herself an advocate for women, using her standing as one of the most successful coaches in WNBA history to push for various causes. But suddenly Reeve realized she was falling short in an important area — promoting and preparing women to be head coaches

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That reality slapped Reeve hard again earlier this month when the New York Liberty hired young Lynx assistant Walt Hopkins as head coach. Hopkins, 34, is the second Lynx male assistant to land a head coaching job in two years, following James Wade, the WNBA Coach of the Year in his rookie season in Chicago. It might have been three in five years had former assistant Jim Petersen accepted the Connecticut Sun job offered in 2016.

Hopkins’ hiring gives the league eight male and four female head coaches, a breakdown Reeve calls “disgraceful,” even though Reeve inadvertently contributed to it. And all four of the women are white, in a league where, like the NBA, most of the players are not. (Wade and Derek Fisher in Los Angeles are the league’s only black head coaches.)

Two minutes of brainstorming with Reeve elicited a half-dozen names of qualified women she believes can coach in the WNBA. Dawn Staley of South Carolina. Kim Mulkey at Baylor. Felisha Leggette-Jack of Buffalo. George Washington’s Jen Rizzotti. Notre Dame assistant Carol Owens. And, of course, Whalen, who was on track to join the Lynx staff until the University of Minnesota hired her straight off the court as head coach. (Whalen spent the week embroiled in her first crisis, suspending leading scorer Destiny Pitts, who plans to transfer, while benching top rebounder Taiye Bello and her sister Kehinde. Not good.)