Nancy Lieberman announced as first woman head coach in NBA D-League
ABC News,
Thursday, November 05, 2009 -
Nancy Lieberman is making history once again.
After years of breaking boundaries for women in professional sports, today Lieberman made her fiercest challenge to the sports world: that a woman can coach men’s professional basketball.
In a press conference this afternoon in Dallas, Lieberman announced her new position as the head coach of the new NBA Development League (D-League) franchise in suburban Dallas. The team, which is yet to be named, is an affiliate of the Dallas Mavericks. This appointment makes her the first woman head coach of a NBA Development League team.
"In 1986, my goal was not to be a girl playing in a men's league, it was to be a player in a men's league,'' Lieberman told reporters Thursday in Dallas. "In 2010, I don't want to be a woman who is coaching men, I want to be a coach who is coaching.''
Stephanie Ready, sideliner reporter for the Charlotte Bobcats, was an assistant coach for the now-defunct Greenville Groove in South Carolina from 2001 to 2003, becoming the first female coach in the D-League. Today, Lieberman takes Ready’s achievements a step further with her acceptance of the head coach position.
As head coach, she is expected to work with current and future NBA players. The NBA D-League is touted as the most scouted professional men’s basketball league outside of the NBA, and players who are in their first and second seasons playing in the NBA are eligible to train with the affiliate D-League team.
Lieberman has valuable experience in men’s professional basketball, playing alongside men throughout her playing career. In the mid-1980s she became the first woman to play in a men’s professional basketball league, with the United States Basketball League. She also played in summer leagues for Pat Riley with the Los Angeles Lakers and Frank Layden with the Utah Jazz.
"I feel like I'm the right person for the job,'' Lieberman said. "I know how these guys feel. I played in the minor leagues. I'm ultimately connected to that part of development in a player's life.''
Her three years as head coach for the Detroit Shock from 1998-2000 also adds to her readiness to take on the challenges ahead.
As a testament to her endurance and talent, she made WNBA history in 1997 as the oldest woman to play in the league at 39 years old, and again in 2008 at 50. Lieberman was elected to the Basketball Hall of Fame as a player in 1996 and to the Women's Basketball Hall of Fame in 1999.
"She's got the skins, the experience - she knows what she's doing - so I certainly hope that we're well beyond those issues,'' Donnie Nelson, partial owner of the D-League team and head of basketball operations for the Dallas Mavericks, said. "Besides, if you can't respect authority, no matter what form or color it comes in, I don't want you on my team.''