The New York Knicks made a major coaching change this offseason, moving on from Tom Thibodeau and replacing him with Mike Brown. While Brown ended up being the choice, the team cast a wide net in their coaching search. One name that came up was South Carolina women’s basketball coach Dawn Staley.
Staley might have been the most surprising name on the list. She was more than qualified to be on the list, but no team has ever hired a woman to be an NBA head coach.
Even though the Knicks had interest in Staley, they decided to go in a different direction.
With New York’s head coaching job being filled, Staley has now spoken out honestly about the team’s interest. She made it very clear that she would have taken the job if it had been offered to her.
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Those comments were made during a recent appearance on the “Post Moves” podcast with Candace Parker and Aliyah Boston.
“I interviewed for the Knicks. It was the same interview that everybody else that was in their candidate pool (got). Same thing. … I thought I did pretty well. I was well prepared,” Staley said.
“If the Knicks would’ve offered me the job, I would’ve had to do it. Not just for me, it’s for women. … To break open that. And it’s the New York Knicks, and I’m from Philly, but it’s the freakin’ New York Knicks.”
She also spoke out about where she might have shot herself in the foot during her interview with the Knicks. A question she asked seemed to change how the team viewed her throughout the process.
“(One of my questions was) if you hired me as the first female (head) coach in the NBA, how would it impact your daily job?” she said. “Because it would. It would. Because you’re going to be asked questions that you don’t have to be asked if you hire a male coach. There’s going to be the media, there’s going to be all this stuff that you’ll have to deal with that you didn’t have to deal with and don’t have to deal with when you hire a male. That got them to thinking. That really got them to thinking about ‘maybe she’s right.’ I felt the energy change after that. So I shot myself in the foot by being…inquisitive, asking all those darn questions.”
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Despite not getting the job in New York, Staley is in a great place. She has put the Gamecocks into dynasty territory since taking over as the team’s head coach.
Speaking of her tenure with South Carolina, Staley has been the program’s head coach since the 2008-09 season. She has compiled an impressive 475-110 record to go along with three NCAA championships.
It will be interesting to see if Staley gets more NBA interest down the road. While things didn’t work out with the Knicks, fans might not have heard the last of her name in the NBA rumor mill.
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