Basketball Hall of Famer Teresa Weatherspoon was named the Chicago Sky’s new head coach on Thursday.
“The things that we are about to do as a team, a business and in the community will be rooted in excitement, excellence and hard work,” Weatherspoon, 57, said in a statement.
For the past four seasons, Weatherspoon was an assistant coach with the NBA’s New Orleans Pelicans.
The Sky made the playoffs this season with an 18-22 record under two head coaches. James Wade left on July 1 to take an assistant coaching job with the Toronto Raptors. Emre Vatansever took over on an interim basis and guided Chicago to an 11-13 regular-season mark. The Sky were swept in two games during the opening round of the playoffs by the league-leading Las Vegas Aces.
After a stellar playing career, Weatherspoon began her coaching career by spending the 2007-08 season in charge of the Westchester Phantoms of the semi-pro men’s American Basketball Association. She then spent six seasons as head coach at her alma mater, Louisiana Tech, guiding the Lady Techsters to a 99-71 record and two NCAA Tournament appearances.
Weatherspoon propelled Louisiana Tech to the 1988 NCAA Tournament championship, the same year she was part of a U.S. squad that won a gold medal in the Seoul Olympics.
After playing professionally overseas for nearly a decade, Weatherspoon was an original WNBA player when the league tipped off in 1997, playing for the New York Liberty. She spent seven seasons with the Liberty, making five All-Star teams, before finishing her playing career with the Los Angeles Sparks in 2004.
She became a member of the Women’s Basketball Hall of Fame in 2010, and nine years later she was elected to the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame.
–Field Level Media