Kara Lawson from top tier athlete to prominent coach in basketball, formidable leadership and life lessons, Pat Summit stories, Boston Celtics, restoring Duke Women's program as a powerhouse & Gold Medal run with Team USA in 2026 FIBA World Cup

"Who puts us in the best situation to win each night... I'm here for all the smoke!" Kara Lawson Kara Lawson joins Ryan Clark, Channing Crowder and Fred Taylor for a powerful conversation about the journey from elite athlete to one of basketball’s most respected leaders and coaches. Fresh off a Gold Medal win at the 2026 FIBA World Cup, Coach takes us inside her experience with USA Basketball and the challenge of coaching a roster loaded with some of the greatest talent in the world—including Angel Reese, Caitlin Clark and Paige Bueckers—and finding the balance between individual greatness, different personalities and one shared mission on the international stage. Not afraid to ruffle feathers or cave to criticisms, Coach explains her approach to leading and winning at the highest levels. She opens up about the leadership lessons that have guided her, the impact of legendary coach Pat Summitt, and the stories and wisdom she carried forward from her time around one of the most influential figures in women’s basketball. Lawson also reflects on her experience with the Boston Celtics and how working inside the NBA sharpened her understanding of leadership, culture and team-building. Lawson takes us from her childhood, where her father introduced her to football and helped shape the toughness, discipline and competitive mindset that would define her life, to becoming a top-tier basketball player and eventually a prominent coach. Now at Duke, Lawson discusses the challenge of restoring a historic women’s basketball program to powerhouse status, building a culture that demands excellence, and developing players beyond what happens between the lines. From playing football with her dad to learning from Pat Summitt, from the Celtics to Duke, and from elite player to elite coach, Kara Lawson shares the leadership, sacrifice, resilience and life lessons behind her remarkable basketball journey—and what it takes to lead the best talent in the world. Full video episode streaming on Netflix now. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:00Speaker 00

  Before this,

• 0:05Speaker 00

  there's this.

• 0:08Speaker 00

  As you celebrate the game, take a deeper look at its roots. The people grow in the grass, paving the lots, welding the goalposts, inspecting every football. The hardworking people that make every Sunday possible. Carhartt is proud to outfit the crews behind the game. Visit carhartt.com/jointhetrades to learn more.

• 0:31Speaker 01

  It was my mindset that was built, you know, not necessarily my body. It was just a mindset of just great belief. Everything comes down to belief and confidence in yourself. I'm for me and nobody can change or alter my opinion of myself. You can have your opinion, that's fine, but you're not changing mine. Not mine about me, for what? Because I know what I bring to the table, I know what I could do. Like, winning doesn't disrupt me, losing doesn't disrupt me. I stay the same. I mean, I'm just removed from a World Cup and I appreciate it and I love it, but I'm ready for what's next. When I went into that game every night, whatever game it was, trying to figure out what combination of players gives us the best chance to win. I didn't think about fanbases, I didn't think about how old they were. I thought about what can they bring to this game and how that can help us. If someone's playing really well, you're going to stretch those minutes out a little bit more.

• 1:15Speaker 01

  And if someone's playing poorly, you're going to shorten those a little bit. That's part of it. I'm here for all the smoke, man.

• 1:40Speaker 01

  I had 13 years in the league and zero knee surgeries. So that's pretty good for basketball.

• 1:45Channing Crowder?

  That's amazing.

• 1:45Ryan Clark?

  Yeah, that hard work.

• 1:46Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah, that's pretty good.

• 1:48Ryan Clark?

  That's great, yeah. Hey, every basketball, like, old hooper walk like their legs on the wrong side.

• 1:53Speaker 01

  I know.

• 1:54Channing Crowder?

  I got the, I got the little.

• 1:56Speaker 01

  You got a little.

• 1:56Channing Crowder?

  Yeah. Them stairs are hell, Coach.

• 1:59Fred Taylor?

  They were a lot more physical, man.

• 2:00Channing Crowder?

  I looked for an elevator for 30 minutes before I walked up the stairs.

• 2:03Ryan Clark?

  Hey, Chan, I love Dawn, but when Dawn walk out to the court, she walk bad, boy.

• 2:08Speaker 01

  Yeah, it hurts watching her walk.

• 2:10Ryan Clark?

  Yeah, it hurt for sure.

• 2:12Speaker 01

  And then like the old NBA guys, like when you see them.

• 2:15Channing Crowder?

  That's what they call me, Kenny Smith knees.

• 2:17Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 2:18Ryan Clark?

  No question.

• 2:18Channing Crowder?

  I don't think it's funny.

• 2:23Ryan Clark?

  Coach Carol Lawson, welcome to the Pivot. This is Channing Crowder, this is Fred Taylor, I'm Ryan Clark. Pivot fam, thank you for pivoting with us. You know, there's an interesting fact about the four people sitting here, Coach. We were all excellent Little League football players.

• 2:38Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 2:38Ryan Clark?

  But not all of us got to go to the Today Show, though. So how good do you actually have to be in Little League football to get to the Today Show, to be interviewed?

• 2:49Speaker 01

  I mean, I was pretty good.

• 2:52Speaker 01

  It was, football is my first love. I loved watching it, I loved playing it. I can remember when I was three years old, my parents asked me who I wanted for Christmas and I asked them for a football stadium. And my mom was like, I don't think Fisher Price or Mattel makes football stadiums. I was like, no, I want a real one, like in the backyard. That way on Sunday, I can just go in my backyard to watch instead of watching on television. Just grew up loving the game, man. And my favorite player was Mike Singletary for the Bears defense. So linebacker, man, was awesome. And so I started playing, begged my parents to let me play. I played when I was seven and eight years old. I played running back and linebacker and I loved it. So, yeah, averaged three touchdowns a game and was just enjoying, enjoying playing.

• 3:36Fred Taylor?

  I was going to ask you if it was true if you led the team in rushing, touchdowns and interceptions?

• 3:41Speaker 01

  Yeah, that was true. Yeah, that was true. That was true, but.

• 3:46Ryan Clark?

  First off, who were you playing with, Coach, that you led everybody in every important statistic?

• 3:52Speaker 01

  Well, I mean, I just loved the game and I loved to compete. And let me tell you this story, when I was seven and I remember my dad driving me to my first practice, you know, football practice. And, you know, you guys have kids, I think you can tell when your kid is nervous. And I was nervous going to practice because I knew I was going to be the only girl. And you know when you feel, and you're going somewhere and you know that you're going to be the different one and you're going there for the first time. And so I was, I was pretty nervous. I'm sitting in the car and we pull up to the middle school and it's, it's seven-year-old football. So it's tryouts essentially, but everybody's going to kind of make it. And I can see the other, all the boys down there, like, getting ready.

• 4:36Speaker 01

  And I go to open the door to get out of the car and my dad stops me and he says, "Hold on a second." And I said, "Okay." And he looks at me and he says, "Do not get out of this car if you don't believe you're the best player on that field." Like, like, don't get out. And it was such a formative lesson for me. It's something that I still take with me every day, you know, before I get out of the car to go to work, before I get out of the car to coach a game. You got to believe you're the best. And I went down to that field and seven-year-old football tryouts aren't very complicated. They're, they're just trying to see like, who can throw, who can run, who can tackle, like, basic skills.

• 5:19Speaker 01

  We get five minutes in and they put me with the lineman. Like, that's where they put me. And I was so mad, you know, it's like, I ain't no lineman.

• 5:28Ryan Clark?

  Right, you telling me I can't play.

• 5:29Speaker 01

  Yeah, like, I'm not a lineman, like, no disrespect to any lineman because they're important to the game, but like, that ain't me, I'm born for the end zone. You know what I mean? And so I'm sitting there and I'm frustrated and I'm mad, I'm seven, you know, and I'm like, this is not my position, this is not where I'm supposed to be. And I just think about like, how many times in our lives, like, we're put somewhere where we don't think it's our position, where it's not where we're supposed to be. And we're put there by somebody else, but we know that's not where we're supposed to be. And I was so frustrated, I did the whole practice as a lineman. I get in the car after the practice and my dad's like, "Well, what did you think?" And I was like, "Dad, I'm not a lineman." Like, that's not my position. And he says, "It's not your job to decide where you are, it's your job to do the best that you can in wherever you're put."

• 6:11Speaker 01

  So in one day, that's one day, you know, these two huge formative lessons that I still carry with me now, you know what I mean? Because even through life as it's gone on for me, I've been put in positions that I didn't think I was supposed to be in, that I thought I was better than, you know? But I always go back to that. So football taught me a lot, just like it taught you guys a lot. I only played for two years, but it was a lot of fun.

• 6:34Channing Crowder?

  Coach, there's a question I ask a lot of you to be, honestly, one of the most, have the most accolades of any athlete ever on this show. High school, everything, state champion, college, everything, All-SEC, All-American, Naismith Player of the Year, WNBA champ, everything you've done. But at seven, you were the baddest thing on the football field. Some people say they're prodigies. We had prodigies on this show that are called, and then my good friend, John St. Brown, Amon Ra St. Brown's dad, he said he built his sons. Well, you built or born to have greatness in athletics because you, you're a great athlete.

• 7:08Speaker 01

  Yeah, I think, I think it's a little bit of both, but there's no doubt I was built to last by my parents. It doesn't matter what's in front of me or what I'm facing, I know that I can last through anything. So I think for me, it's a little bit of both. I mean, I'm certainly born with some God-given gifts, but I'm not that tall. I'm not that, I mean, if you look at me, if you walk, I walk down the street, I'm 5'8". It's not like you pass by me and think, oh, that's a professional basketball player. So, yeah, I think just built, understanding with the right mindset. When I say I was built, it was my mindset that was built, you know, not necessarily my body, it was just a mindset of just great belief, man. Everything comes down to belief and confidence in yourself. And I had that at an early age, it was cultivated by my dad and now it's unstoppable, yeah.

• 7:52Fred Taylor?

  Channing, I think Channing forgot one accolade, maybe the most important one. You were on a fourth grade reading level in kindergarten. That's the most important piece of development as an athlete. Can you just talk about how your parents made sure your academics were always priority?

• 8:10Speaker 01

  Yeah, my parents had this, this huge bookcase downstairs and it had, you know, this is back obviously before the internet. So it just had dictionaries and encyclopedias and just big books. I mean, I remember being young, it's hard for me to pull off the shelf. And I would open them and I would look at them. And my sister was two years older than me, she went to school at five, to kindergarten. I started to try to do her lessons when I was three because I wanted to do what she was doing, I wanted to emulate her. And, yeah, reading was encouraged, being smart was, was a cool thing. It was something that you should aspire to be and getting As. I mean, my dad was in the Marine Corps, he served three tours in Vietnam, Semper Fi. And I like to tell people, like, I was in the Marines for 18 years, like, for real.

• 8:54Speaker 01

  Like, from when I was born to, and he was out of the Marines from when I was born, but that was like our household, you know what I mean? It was strict, it was disciplined, it was nothing less than your best. And I'm really thankful for that because I think it just, it molded me into expecting that for myself.

• 9:09Ryan Clark?

  Say, bro, do y'all remember when Klay Matthews got his looks maxed? I mean, talking about like ridiculous jawline, balloon biceps, them huge calf implants? Which, by the way, I wouldn't be mad if I could get some of those.

• 9:25Fred Taylor?

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• 9:30Channing Crowder?

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• 9:39Fred Taylor?

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• 9:49Channing Crowder?

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• 10:28Ryan Clark?

  You know, Coach, you talk about that discipline, but along with that discipline, the things that parents have to do is love on you as well. It can't always be sort of this strict, we're trying to regulate you constantly without letting you know how much they care. That also parallels the life of a coach. In college, for sure, you had one of the greatest coaches in any sport at Tennessee in Pat Summitt. You said that that was the coach you needed. What did Coach Summitt teach you about being the coach that a player needs?

• 11:01Speaker 01

  Well, she challenged you every day, and I knew that I needed that as an athlete. That's why I chose to go there. And I also knew I wanted to be a coach, so that's why I chose to go there as well. I think the thing about Coach Summitt that made her special was she really was honest with you about where you needed to grow as a person, even more so than a basketball player. When I got to Tennessee, I'm really introverted. I wasn't very confident speaking in front of people. And some people are confident in public speaking from day one. That was not me. And she realized that that was an area I needed to grow, and then she challenged me to grow in that. She actually made me take a public speaking course my sophomore year.

• 11:44Speaker 01

  She put it on my schedule without me knowing, and I was very angry about that. And I used to physically sweat when I would have to go to that class, and my voice would shake when I'd have to give a presentation. And she used to make me go to the press conferences. Even if I played a bad game, I'd be one of the players that had to go to the press conference. Coaching and leading and parenting, it's very easy to complain about the weaknesses of others. It's very easy to look at your child or look at your player and say, "They're not good at this." And then it's also really easy to tell them that they're not good at that. That's actually not leading or parenting.

• 12:27Speaker 01

  That's just complaining, and anyone can do that. What makes you a parent, what makes you a coach, what makes you a leader, is you see the weaknesses in other people, and then you get in the dirt with them to help develop them, to help make them better. And so you create the plan, and then you, step by step, walk with them in the development of that plan. So she didn't just say, "Hey, you're an introvert. Hey, you're not good at speaking. Figure it out." She put public speaking on my class list. She made me go to press conferences. She made me get reps in something that I wouldn't have done on my own because it was a weakness. And then, lo and behold, I ended up working in media for 16 years, and now I think communication's one of my greatest strengths as a coach. None of that happens without Coach Summitt doing that.

• 13:12Ryan Clark?

  I remember I was getting praise for being a player and an analyst when I was at ESPN, and somebody reminded me that I wasn't the first person to do it. They were like, "Nah." I want to say it was her. Like, she actually told me.

• 13:27Speaker 01

  Well, I think I've told you this story.

• 13:29Ryan Clark?

  Which one?

• 13:30Speaker 01

  So it was...

• 13:31Ryan Clark?

  Was it Kevin?

• 13:32Speaker 01

  Yeah, Kevin. So I used to work the women's tournament in the studio, and Kevin Nagandi, for many years, was the host. And he's one of my friends, a great guy. And one day, we're sitting on set, and when you do raps halftime and things like that, you're not on TV. You're watching the game in the studio, and then you come on at halftime. There's a lot of small talk that goes on amongst friends and colleagues. You're talking about this, you're talking about that. We're sitting there on the desk, and we're watching the game, and he's like, "Man, you know what's really impressive?" He's like, "Ryan Clark, he's an active NFL player, but he comes here in the offseason, and he does television.

• 14:17Speaker 01

  It's fantastic." And I'm sitting there, and I'm thinking, "He's trolling me right now." Like, he's trying to get a rise up. I'm like, "He cannot be serious." Because I've been doing this for 10 years while I was playing in WNBA. Like, this dude's in his first year, his second year. That's impressive? What are we doing here? So I'm waiting, and he keeps going, and I'm like, "This dude is serious right now." So I was like, "Hey, hold up." And then it hit him. I had just become part of the fabric. It had kind of been forgotten that I was a WNBA player at the same time I was doing TV. And here he comes in for like a year, and then everyone's swooning. It's like, "Come on."

• 14:57Channing Crowder?

  Coach, why? Why did you do that? That's old-school coaching. That's a distraction. You're a baller, go ball. You going into the studio for what?

• 15:07Speaker 01

  Honestly, man, I was doing it for money. Back in the day in the WNBA, we didn't get paid a lot. It cost me more to get my body prepared to play and to fuel my body during the season than the salary I made. So I had to have a second job. And this is what we all did. It wasn't we all did. A lot of players went overseas and played at the time, or a lot of people had other jobs. They might coach in college, or they might coach in high school. I ended up doing television, but we had to do that to make ends meet, to be able to put the good fuel in your body, be able to have strength coaches, massage therapists, all the things that probably you guys had at your facility. We didn't have that. We didn't have facilities in the offseason, ability to use facilities.

• 15:51Speaker 01

  Sometimes you'd have to pay for those. It cost me more to be a pro athlete than I was making, so I needed to have another job. And that's how I started at ESPN.

• 16:00Fred Taylor?

  And that doesn't happen if you don't trust Coach Summitt. I think that's how I ended up with these guys right here. He's been doing TV, I mean, radio for forever. As you just mentioned, he studied journalism. And people don't understand why he's so passionate, why he was so passionate on the show when his block, your box, went missing.

• 16:22Ryan Clark?

  My box did disappear from ESPN one day.

• 16:25Fred Taylor?

  But people, they question his passion for it, but I get it, being challenged. And that's how I ended up on the pivot. I hate talking, but they kind of also forced me to be better at it. I do want to ask you, what are the similarities in Coach Summitt and your father? Because it seems like they have a lot of similarities.

• 16:45Speaker 01

  Very similar. Very similar. And I think that was... I think part of being able to reach your potential is knowing yourself really well and knowing what you need. And I knew I needed a really strong leader. I knew I needed someone that would challenge me. When I went to college, I needed someone that was going to be hard on me. That's the way I was raised. That's what gave me the best performance. So there were a lot of similarities in terms of the standard, being really high, and not allowing anything to fall below that. If it does fall below that, it's going to be called out. It's going to be called out immediately.

• 17:26Fred Taylor?

  Can you be that way on kids nowadays? Or you got to tweak it a bit?

• 17:31Speaker 01

  Yeah, I think you have to tweak it a little bit, but as far as the standard, you can. You can be. How you get them to that level, I think, is what's changed. I think you have to adapt to kind of what motivates them, and that's to each player. It's more of an individual thing now. Some players, the way you motivate them is different than other players. So I think it's about building that connection with your players. But yeah, we have a standard that you have to play and practice at, and if you don't do that, I'm going to let you know. And I'm going to let you know right away, because we don't have time to waste. You know what I mean? And that's not like a mean thing. That's not like a... That's just like, you can't sit there when I'm in your living room and tell me you want

• 18:15Speaker 01

  to be a pro, and you want to be an Olympian, and you want all these things, and then practice that way. Like, that's completely contradictory to what you're saying. So we either got to change what you say your goals are, or we got to change our habits. And so it's my job to say that to them, and then it's their job to raise their level. And we're teaching that, how to do that, and hoping that by the time that they're done, they have the ability to get themselves there as much as possible.

• 18:44Channing Crowder?

  But Coach, that is extremely old-school thinking. These young kids, Twitter and Instagram and Tic-Tac and all that stuff. Now they want money. Now they got transfer portal. It has to be way different than you have to talk to these kids than Pat Summitt talked to you. It has to be different.

• 19:02Speaker 01

  It's different. Yeah, it's different, but the standard's still the same. How I get them there is a little bit different. And I'm a different personality than Coach Summitt. Like, I'm not trying to be Coach Summitt Part Two. That's not me. I'm not as fiery, I don't think, as she was. I don't play either, and I think I'm honest and transparent about that. When you talk to me, like, what you hear is what you get, and I'm not trying to be somebody I'm not. Like, I'm really confident in who I am. I don't need to try and fool you or trick you or pretend that I'm this or that. This is how I do it, and that approach works for some players. It might not work for others. That's okay. Not everybody's your people, man. Not everybody's for you.

• 19:46Speaker 01

  And when you understand that, it doesn't make them a bad person. It doesn't make you a bad person. You have to find the people that fit your style and how you coach. So you're right, it is a little bit different, but you still got to hold people to it. You know, I've been around some of the best players in the last 30 years in the sport, men and women. And you watch them practice, and you watch them perform, like, there's a standard. And when they fall below it, they want to know. The great ones do. They want to know. I was just with the U.S. Women's National Team. Obviously, we won the gold, and I don't know if we're jumping ahead, but...

• 20:25Ryan Clark?

  You are. It's okay. You're the coach.

• 20:28Speaker 01

  Yeah, thank you.

• 20:29Channing Crowder?

  I'm a little scared of that.

• 20:30Fred Taylor?

  We can always pivot.

• 20:31Ryan Clark?

  You're the coach. We got it. Yeah, we're good.

• 20:34Speaker 01

  But I was talking, you have one-on-one meetings with all your players, and I did throughout the tournament. And I had a couple of them tell me in the middle of a one-on-one meeting, like, to get on them more. These are pros. These are some of the top players in the world, top players in our country, and they were asking for me to get on them more. And so I think there's more players that want to be great and that are willing to be challenged than maybe people think.

• 21:07Speaker 00

  There's this.

• 21:10Speaker 00

  As you celebrate the game, take a deeper look at its roots. The people grow in the grass, paving the lots, welding the goalposts, inspecting every football. The hardworking people that make every Sunday possible. Carhartt is proud to outfit the crews behind the game. Visit carhartt.com/jointhetrades to learn more.

• 21:32Ryan Clark?

  Yeah, I think that's the, what you made, with the point you made though, so imperative though. What are your goals? Right, if we have that conversation about what your goals are, and you trust me to help you get there, then you're going to want to be held accountable. My son plays football, and he told me in eighth grade, he was driving down the street and he was like, "Pop, I want to, I want to play in college, like I want a college scholarship." I said, "I know a little bit about that, I can help you with that." And we had some like knockdown, dragout, training sessions, he's crying, I'm hot. And he would look at me sometimes, and I could tell he was over me. And I would tell him, "As soon as you tell me that your goals have changed, I will change." I was like, "Your college is paid for."

• 22:13Ryan Clark?

  I played a long time in the league, I was like, "I'll go to this game, and I'll buy popcorn, and drink Diet Coke, and clap when you get burnt, just because I love you." I said, "But if you tell me this is what you want, there's a way to get there, there's a standard to uphold." And I think that's so fair, what you're saying, like either your goals have to change, or your habits. And if more people looked at it that way, I do think those conversations would be easy. Listening to you say though, you had some of the best in the world come to you, and say, "Hey, I want to be coached harder, I want to be held accountable." What are some of the differences and difficulties in coaching the best women in the world in an atmosphere where you have, everybody's a number one, but everybody can't be number one here?

• 22:58Speaker 01

  Well, it's the best problem to have, let me say that. I would much rather have way too much talent than not enough. I think we all agree on that, right?

• 23:07Ryan Clark?

  Yeah, for sure.

• 23:07Speaker 01

  So sometimes it gets framed as, as being the USA coach is like, "Oh man, that's, that's hard, that's terrible." You go, "Please, it's fantastic, they're so good."

• 23:17Ryan Clark?

  Right.

• 23:17Speaker 01

  And so, so, so I embrace that part of it. And then it's just having honest, transparent conversations with each of them, and talking about what you need from them. And there's an element of, there's 12 of them, I'm not going to play all 12 of them consistently. And for us, even more challenging than all the talent was, we only had two days of practice before the World Cup. You know, think about that, that's not a lot of days.

• 23:44Ryan Clark?

  That's ridiculous.

• 23:45Speaker 01

  So for us to build chemistry in two days of practice is really hard. On top of that, we had two of our best players pull out a week before the competition. Asia Wilson and Kelsey Plum, who are fantastic players, they are injured, and so they pulled out. So our roster changed as well. We knew that it would take time, and one of the things that I impressed upon them is, our growth through the tournament was important, how we improved, and continuing to play, and just being really clear about what you need from them. I think players are like this, for sure, but people in general. If you're clear with your communication about what your expectation is, then it's a lot easier for people to understand what they're supposed to do. If you're not clear, or you're giving mixed signals, or mixed, mixed messages,

• 24:30Speaker 01

  that was a huge frustration for me when I was a player. Like when I had a coach that I felt like it was mixed signals, or I didn't know where I stood, it was really hard. When I had a coach that was clear, even if I didn't agree with their decisions, it was clear, and I knew why they were making them, then like I could respect that. So I try to be that type of coach. Then as the tournament goes along, our job's to win. And that's always the, the number one goal, and they, they did a great job. You know, it, it, you have to change how you play a little bit, to play on the USA team. And they all were willing to do that.

• 25:04Channing Crowder?

  But Coach, you got criticized about that. They said you didn't want to play the puppies. You had Chelsea, you had Stewie out there, Stewie was the MVP.

• 25:11Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 25:12Channing Crowder?

  But they said, "Angel, and Katelyn, and Paige." "Coach, I'm here, Coach." There was a lot of criticism, I read a lot of stories about people, and, and fans especially, they were almost saying like, "You won, you wanted to win, but there was some level that you were supposed to showcase the young, the young players as well."

• 25:31Speaker 01

  You know, listen, I, I was off social media during the tournament, so I didn't see or hear any of that. But what I will share with you is, women's basketball has exploded, and there's so many players that have incredible, passionate fanbases. I think that's a great thing. It's okay to have an opinion, and it's okay to want the player that you like to play more. I get that. My whole family, when I was playing, wanted me to play more. You know, like, that, that's fine. For, for us, and, and, and not just me, but my entire coaching staff, I had incredible coaching staff. I have four WNBA head coaches on my staff, and I had Tia Jackson, who's one of my, who's my associate head coach at Duke. We, we went into that coaches meeting every day, with putting our team in the best position to win.

• 26:15Speaker 01

  And then when I went into that game, every night, whatever game it was, whether it was China, whether it was Italy, whether it was Czech or Hungary, whether it was Spain, or whether it was France, trying to figure out what combination of players gives us the best chance to win. I, I didn't think about fanbases, I didn't think about how old they were. I thought about, what can they bring to this game, and how that can help us. And then obviously, in the course of the game, if someone's playing really well, you're going to stretch those minutes out a little bit more, and if someone's playing poorly, you're going to shorten those a little bit, that's part of it. I'm here for all the smoke, man. It's okay. All of it. Yeah, I'm here for all of it. You can have it, yeah.

• 26:51Ryan Clark?

  What does having somebody like Tia come back to Duke when you get the job, do for you? What's sort of, I guess, her importance in your maturation as a head coach, having never held that position?

• 27:02Speaker 01

  One of the things that I was really intentional about, and I'm so glad that I did this, when I was hired, I was a first-time head coach. I was also a first-time coach in college, because I came from the NBA. So I played 13 years in the WNBA, and then when I finished, I started working with USA Basketball, working with high school players, I started working with some college players, started working with some G League guys. Then I started getting calls from NBA teams to be on their staff. I ended up working with the Boston Celtics, with Brad Stevens. So I came from that pro mindset. Everything about me was pro, from when I left Tennessee, until I got to Duke. I knew a lot about the game, I knew a lot about ball, I knew a lot about the pro style. I didn't know how to run a college program.

• 27:44Speaker 01

  So I was very intentional about hiring experienced assistant coaches, that had been in college for over two decades. So when I hired my staff, that's what, that's what I did. And Tia was the most important hire, because she had been a head coach in Power Four before. She had been at Stanford, at Duke, at Rutgers, under Vivian Stringer, at Miami. She'd been at all these different places, and she kind of taught me how to be a head coach. I, I knew basketball, I knew what I was doing in that way, but she taught me recruiting, she taught me in the calendar, what we should be doing. And so it's very formative for me, in having her. And then, more important than all of that, more important than all of that,

• 28:27Speaker 01

  is the loyalty and trust that you have with the people that you work with. You know, and I trust her as much as my own blood. And I know she has my back, and I know that she really cares about our program, our players, and me. And so when you have someone like that, it, it makes you a lot more confident in what you can do. And the other thing about her that I, it's hard for me to say I like, it's hard for me to say I like, is she'll tell me about myself. And when you get to certain positions in life, it's harder and harder to find people that'll do that. Because a lot of people, as you ascend, will just tell you what you want to hear, man.

• 29:07Ryan Clark?

  They can say they're wrong.

• 29:08Speaker 01

  They're going to, yeah, they're going to tell you what you want to hear, they're going to tell you how great you are, and it's very few people that, at the levels you reach, that will say, "Hey, you were wrong for that."

• 29:19Speaker 01

  You know, it's hard to find that. Man, she'll, sometimes I'm like, "Damn, every day."

• 29:23Ryan Clark?

  I can't always be wrong.

• 29:25Speaker 01

  Yeah, like what? I'm like, every day, like, every day? You know, stays on me, you know, in a respectful way. You know, I mean, she'll come in my office, shut the door, and say, "Hey, you were, you were wrong for that." I need that, we all do, we all do, yeah.

• 29:42Fred Taylor?

  Yeah, Channing, Channing's question made me think, the young people, they got to wait their turn, they got to earn it, it'll, it'll come. But I, I do want to ask you something, but before that, we have this thing where we kind of cut the room, and like, for example...

• 29:56Ryan Clark?

  Are we talking championships? Because it'll just be this way?

• 29:58Fred Taylor?

  Just be quiet, man, just be quiet for a moment, brother.

• 30:00Ryan Clark?

  I'm sorry.

• 30:01Fred Taylor?

  Let me, let me do this. You be sneaky, man. You know, like, the linebacker connection, the running back connection, the light-skinned connection.

• 30:10Speaker 01

  Yeah, that's right, come on, man.

• 30:11Fred Taylor?

  The active media broadcasting connection, 13-year careers right here.

• 30:16Speaker 01

  Are you guys 13 too?

• 30:17Ryan Clark?

  I'm 15. All three of us.

• 30:18Fred Taylor?

  Yeah, yeah. The people that got drafted connection.

• 30:24Ryan Clark?

  Okay, that's dirty.

• 30:27Fred Taylor?

  Which brings me to my question. Fifth overall pick, 2003, young person, you got to go earn it. What was your welcome to the WNBA moment? Like, what showed you that this is a grown woman's league, and who gave you that business?

• 30:41Speaker 01

  Oh, my rookie year, gosh, almost everybody. I mean, I, I came into the league, and there were so many veterans that, you know, weren't, weren't even like considered superstar players in the public's eye, but they would just outsmart you. They would, they would understand the angles, they would understand the scheme, and before you know it, they're scoring on you, and you're like, "What happened?" I was going to say, like, you were saying cutting the room, like in basketball, we play like offense and defense, but like nobody else sitting here played both sides of the ball.

• 31:15Ryan Clark?

  None of us did, Coach.

• 31:16Speaker 01

  No, so.

• 31:17Fred Taylor?

  That is a very good point.

• 31:18Speaker 01

  It's over here.

• 31:21Ryan Clark?

  They just got your space.

• 31:25Speaker 01

  But it's hard, it's hard, it's hard defensively, that was probably the biggest thing, man, was on defense, more so than offense for me. Because in college, and, and maybe it's like this in football, in college, you can make a mistake, and then make up for it, you can get it back. In the pros, you make the wrong step, and...

• 31:48Speaker 01

  You can't get that bad.

• 31:49Channing Crowder?

  Right.

• 31:50Speaker 01

  So when I would make defensive mistakes, dang, it's a three. Yeah. Backdoor cut, layup.

• 31:57Channing Crowder?

  Right.

• 31:58Speaker 01

  That part was what was like, wow, I would have to be very precise, very precise when I'm out there. My angles, my positioning, my spacing, everything matters. And I never thought of the game in that much detail when I was in high school and college because I didn't have to think about the details of much. I was a superior athlete.

• 32:17Channing Crowder?

  Yeah.

• 32:18Speaker 01

  You know, and now I'm like, okay, my spacing's gotta be perfect if I'm gonna keep her in front of me.

• 32:22Channing Crowder?

  Right.

• 32:23Speaker 01

  Because if it's off, I'm done. If I'm too far off, she's shooting. If I'm too close, she's by me. I gotta be right there.

• 32:29Channing Crowder?

  Right.

• 32:30Ryan Clark?

  Sounds stressful.

• 32:31Channing Crowder?

  And Coach, like, we were all, we were all wanting to be the best. We all wanted to make it professional. We all wanted to be pros. When we became pros, we became rich. The second we got drafted. You didn't get drafted. He wasn't rich, but us three were rich.

• 32:47Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah.

• 32:48Channing Crowder?

  But when you were...

• 32:49Speaker 01

  Well, I wasn't rich either.

• 32:50Channing Crowder?

  You were broke.

• 32:51Speaker 01

  I had a second job.

• 32:52Channing Crowder?

  Oh, yeah, you're okay, so yeah.

• 32:53Speaker 01

  We were homeworking all season. This is the rich people right here.

• 32:55Channing Crowder?

  It's actually my question. Like, first, I'm gonna ask you how much you made because it's just ridiculous that you had to have an offseason job.

• 33:02Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 33:03Channing Crowder?

  But was it...

• 33:04Speaker 01

  Well, you can ask me how much I made.

• 33:05Channing Crowder?

  Did you, like, what was your best, your best season? What was the highest money you made in WNBA?

• 33:10Speaker 01

  My best salary? Oh, gosh. Probably, I don't even think it was six figures. Maybe 95,000? Maybe, actually, maybe by the end I was in six figures.

• 33:18Channing Crowder?

  But it didn't, did it cha, like, I don't wanna say it did it change your life. 95 grand's a lot of money. But were you playing for money? I, I knew I wanted to go and get out of inner-city Atlanta. Like, let me, this football can do something for me.

• 33:31Speaker 01

  Right.

• 33:32Channing Crowder?

  The financial side of it was not a push for you while you were playing?

• 33:38Speaker 01

  No, I mean, it was, I mean, growing up, it was more of having stability than becoming rich. You know, being able to, to own a home is a big deal. Being able to own your car, you know, is a big deal. Being able to, you know, go on a vacation, and not even an elaborate one, being able to have the money to do that. It was more of those things for me, being able to take care of my mom. It, it was more of those things than it was anything flashy. So I was just a saver. You know, I majored in finance at University of Tennessee for that reason, just to be able to have stability and, and to be able to, you know, motivation provided for my mom, which I think, you know, our parents, there's motivation to do that.

• 34:23Speaker 01

  And so that was really what I was saving for and why I took on the second job to be able to do that.

• 34:29Channing Crowder?

  And, and one more thing, because as, they call us old heads, the young ballplayers. My first base salary was 237. Now, everybody in the league make $800,000 a year, league minimum.

• 34:41Speaker 01

  I know.

• 34:42Channing Crowder?

  In the WNBA, do you tell Stewie and Fia and them, hey, if I didn't play for 95, y'all couldn't make a million? Are you, are you a curmudgeonist?

• 34:49Speaker 01

  I'm not.

• 34:50Channing Crowder?

  You don't never let them know that you paved the way for them to do what they did with their new CBA?

• 34:54Speaker 01

  No, I'm not. I, I, I love it for them. I love it for my players in college.

• 34:58Channing Crowder?

  Yeah.

• 34:59Speaker 01

  You know, like, the NIL and the rev share, I think is fantastic. I, I've never been one to worry about what other people have and what I didn't. I think it's great for, for them to be able to have the new CBA. I think they deserve it. I think we deserved it.

• 35:11Channing Crowder?

  Yeah.

• 35:12Speaker 01

  You know, it just didn't come in time for us. So our players understand, you know, I think have great respect for, for the players that paved the way.

• 35:19Speaker 00

  Before this... There's this. As you celebrate the game, take a deeper look at its roots. The people growing the grass, paving the lots, welding the goalposts, inspecting every football. The hard-working people that make every Sunday possible. Carhartt is proud to outfit the crews behind the game. Visit carhartt.com/jointhetrades to learn more.

• 35:49Ryan Clark?

  Yeah, when, when our thing was, I was a vice president of NFLPA, I was on the executive board, the old dudes would come and they'd be so mad at us. Right? Because they, they would see that you were making this money, but they also didn't feel like they were being taken care of in the right way. And so it's good to hear that you understand that you were in your era, and even if you deserved something else, it's good to see that things have changed and come around. I wanna ask you about your speeches.

• 36:15Speaker 01

  Uh-huh.

• 36:16Ryan Clark?

  Right? You know, shout-out, Coach Summit, all-time great. She put you in speech classes and look at you now. When you, uh, when you hit the handle hard better speech, when you was done, you was like, damn it, I got it. Like, did you walk off, you go, that's gonna be one right there?

• 36:31Speaker 01

  No.

• 36:32Ryan Clark?

  I saw the cameras. No, like, just something like that, when you do express something to your team that is a life lesson. Like, that wasn't just a, a basketball lesson. That was a life lesson. And so many times, you mentioned that, you know, in, in real life, like, that things don't get easy. And you talked about them being able just to handle the hard part better. And even in ball, when you felt like you were handling it better, we were gonna make it harder. When you were thinking about those things, what are you drawing from, from your experiences to be able to communicate that to your players?

• 37:06Speaker 01

  Well, I talk to my players every day, so that, I don't, like, come up with speeches and then give it to, to them. I just talk about it. And, you know, the genesis of that comment with my players, I was talking with one of my freshmen a couple days before that. And we were talking about her adjustment. It was in the summertime, the freshmen had just gotten there. And she made a comment to the effect of, well, I just gotta get through the summer. And then, when I get to the fall, I'll be okay. And I remember thinking, like, that's not how this works. You know, you get to the fall, you have class, you have 20 hours of practice, you start playing games, and you're a freshman, and they, you know, hit you upside the head, and you're like, whoa, this level. And then you get into conference play.

• 37:49Speaker 01

  It just continues to get more difficult. So I talked to her about that in a one-on-one setting, and it seemed like she understood it, what I was trying to say. And then, I thought, man, this is probably a good thing for me to say to the whole team. Because I'm sure she's not the only one thinking that. And that's what happened. But I, I didn't know when I said that, that it would be as viral as it was. In fact, I forgot what I said. When I, when I, the next day, my creative team came to me and they were like, hey, this was really good. And I'm like, well, what did I say? I didn't even remember what I had said the day before. You know, because you talk a lot with your team, you don't have it. So, no, I didn't know when, when I finished.

• 38:31Speaker 01

  And then, even then, when I watched it, I was like, eh, it's, it's fine. Uh, and then, we put it online, and then, I was like, oh, I guess it's better than fine. People, you know, really took to it. And still, to this day, that's, I mean, I get recognized more for speeches than I do for basketball now. Um, when I'm traveling, people come up and it's a really, it's a really, it's been a great blessing. Here's why. You know, you guys have had decorated careers and, and people know who you are. And, and so, when they see you, it, it feels good as a human to be recognized for, for what you've done. And, you know, they'll tell you they're a fan of this or a fan of that. And that's great. But a lot of those interactions can be surface. Because it's just, I loved watching you play at Florida, I loved watching you play LSU, I loved watching you play at Florida.

• 39:14Speaker 01

  Take a picture, sign an autograph, and then it ends. With handle hard better specifically, people come up and tell me about how the speech has impacted them. They tell me about an instance in their life where they had to handle hard better. They tell me their personal stories. They'll say, my mom recently passed away. My, my best friend sent me that speech. And I just wanna tell you, Coach, it helped me get through one of the hardest times in my life. My son was just diagnosed with cancer. You know, we watched that every morning as a family. And you get these connections with strangers that you would never have if it was just a, hey, I loved watching you play, or hey, I love Duke.

• 39:57Speaker 01

  And that's an incredible gift that that speech has given me, is a chance to connect on a human level with, with strangers, you know, wherever I travel.

• 40:07Ryan Clark?

  Coach, you talked about handling hard. You know, you would think, right, you look at the women's basketball game, that there would just be a majority of women coaches. Right? Because so many of you have played in the WNBA, excelled at the sport, understand how to communicate, understand how to relate. And the number of women's coaches is growing, but it's still a majority male-led career. For you, also being a minority woman, right? There, there are two things there that are working against you. How do you see those things impacting the pressure on you to do well, to make sure that

• 40:47Ryan Clark?

  more people, more women, more black women, get the opportunities that you have earned?

• 40:53Speaker 01

  Well, I think I'm mindful of it, I'm aware. I mean, I wake up every day, I, I know those two facts about myself, right? But, um...

• 41:02Speaker 01

  I don't allow that pressure to change how I approach it and my belief in my confidence in what I can do. And I think what I bring to the table, those are strengths. I use the fact that I'm a female. I use the fact that I'm a minority woman. That's a strength because I coach a majority-minority team. And so the players that I teach and that I coach every day have those qualities about them as well. So the relatability, I think that I provide is something unique. That doesn't mean that someone that's not a minority or someone that's not a woman can't provide relatability, but I think the fact that I played at a high level and that I've

• 41:45Speaker 01

  done a lot of the things these players want to do, I think that's a strength of mine as a coach. So I don't really, it doesn't really add my, yes, I want to do well, but you know, this might come across as arrogant, but it's just like real, like I know I'm going to do well. Like it's not a, that's not, like I know I'm doing well. So it was, I'm not like hoping to do well to help people. I know I'm going to do well. And I've always felt that and believed that. And you have to. I think especially just in life and in this environment, I'm for me. You know? And nobody can change, can change or alter my opinion of myself.

• 42:29Speaker 01

  You can have your opinion, that's fine, but you're not changing mine. Not mine about me. For what? Because I know what I bring to the table, I know what I can do. And so I think you have to be really, really sturdy in your belief in yourself.

• 42:46Fred Taylor?

  Coach, you want to hoop right now?

• 42:47Speaker 01

  I'm ready.

• 42:48Ryan Clark?

  She had me fired up too. Damn.

• 42:51Fred Taylor?

  I'm like, no, I ain't got no game. I'm just saying. Plus, I got on these.

• 42:55Ryan Clark?

  Hey Coach, we saw Freddie T, a high school basketball pitcher. And so he was like, he was 6'1" at that time, like 215 in high school. And you got to realize, he on this basketball picture with all skinny kids. His traps was huge, his arms was big. He was, I was like, I know all you did was foul. There was no other way they was putting you on the court.

• 43:18Speaker 01

  Power forwards.

• 43:19Ryan Clark?

  Power forwards.

• 43:20Speaker 01

  Under-sized, under-sized power forward.

• 43:23Fred Taylor?

  I was 6'1" power forward. Charles Barkley. Barkley. No, I hear that seven-year-old. Your dad gave you that message and say, don't get out the car unless you know that you're, why you're out here. But also, I want to give you your flowers, being the first female coach in Celtics history. But I don't want to ask the cliche question about a woman coaching men. I do want to ask you, what'd you learn about earning credibility coaching elite players regardless of sex?

• 43:55Speaker 01

  Well, I loved my time in Boston. I'm so thankful for it. It was such a formative time. I was an assistant coach for Brad Stevens, who's now the president of the team. And Danny Ainge was a team president. Those two, those two men have been incredible mentors for me as I've grown in my coaching career. And then I got a chance to coach just some phenomenal young men. Jason Tatum, Jalen Brown, Gordon Hayward, Kemba Walker, Marcus Smart. Just incredible group of young men. And I can't say that I learned this in Boston, okay? I can't say that I learned this, but I had never, you know, coached men in five-on-five before. I'd coached some G League guys in three-on-three.

• 44:39Speaker 01

  But I knew this to be true as a player in the women's game is your job as a coach is to be prepared. Be as prepared as you can be. And a player will buy into your coaching if you can help them get better.

• 44:54Fred Taylor?

  Yep.

• 44:55Speaker 01

  That's all they're concerned about is can you help me improve as a player? Do you have insights that I can take and put that into my game and help me become a better player? I just focused on that. That's what I focused on is providing value to the players that I coached. Be prepared. And I found that they responded very, very well to that. I wanted to be as prepared as I could. I wanted to be able to give, you know, insight that could help them. And, you know, I, I thought I was going to stay in Boston a long time. I never expected to leave after one year, but the opportunity came, obviously, to be a head coach. But I loved those young men. I loved coaching them. I still, still talk to many of them.

• 45:40Speaker 01

  I got some nice messages online from some of them after we won the World Cup. It's just great to watch as they moved on in their careers. They're all on different teams now except for JT, but, and JT's a Duke guy, you know? So I see him quite often and he's a fantastic person. But yeah, that was never an issue for me with the players at all.

• 45:59Ryan Clark?

  Coach, are you a workaholic or are you just driven? Right? Because in all of the quotes from your time in Boston, it's, we'd be in here shooting and Coach would still be watching film. We'd be in here shooting and Coach would still be working to learn. Right? I am, I don't think I'm, I wouldn't use the word workaholic. My family members would call me that. Right? Because the job, in my opinion, the job has to get done, but I have to be as prepared as I could possibly be because to me, then the outcome is not what I'm focused on. Right? Because I know I prepared myself for this. What is, I guess, the origin or the foundation of your work ethic?

• 46:39Speaker 01

  Well, it starts from when I was young. I was taught, taught by my parents to work and to not settle for less than what you're capable of. So that was in school. We weren't allowed to bring home anything less than an A. On the sports team, my dad was my coach in most of my sports. And if I wasn't practicing as hard as I could, then I would have to run laps, you know, or I'd get yelled at on the way home. So that was just instilled. And then as I got older and I started to play in high school and I started to play in college, I started to see that, you know, the way I was raised and the way that I worked, that not everybody did that. Not that I was the only one.

• 47:20Speaker 01

  There was other people that worked hard, but, and I started to see it as like an advantage. You know, as I started to like go up, man, they're not willing to do what I'm willing to do. And if I'm willing to do this, then I got a chance to be better. And once I realized that, it was like I found out a secret and I just started using it all the time. I'm passionate about what I do. It is work maybe to some people, it's not work to me. I love the game. I love the sport. I love trying to win. I'm competitive. And, but I'm quieter about it, you know? Like I don't talk about, oh, like I don't like when people are like, oh, I work harder than everybody or I'm here, I'm not.

• 48:05Speaker 01

  I just work. If people see me in the gym, they see me in the gym. Like I was never like going out there and being like, hey, guys, it's 2:00 a.m., I'm here. You know? It's just, I'm working. And that's how I approach everything is I'm going to do the job and I'm going to be prepared and I want people to be able to count on me. You know, if you work with me, I want you to be able to count on me that I'm, I'm going to be ready.

• 48:26Channing Crowder?

  And Coach, a very unique person to ask this question to, maybe one of the only people in the world. Other than more dunks, is there really a difference in women and men's basketball? Like coaching, X and O, game plan?

• 48:39Ryan Clark?

  Oh, he about to say coaching? Oh. Because I was about to say how, I was going to tell her how disrespectful you are to the game of women's basketball. I thought, I thought you was going to be honest with Coach.

• 48:50Speaker 01

  No, no, no, no, no.

• 48:51Ryan Clark?

  And talk, oh, but you know what? You probably changing because your daughter plays now.

• 48:54Channing Crowder?

  I know, I said other than dunking because that's the excitement. I'm an elementary basketball watcher. I want to see the high flying, the dunks, the get down off the backboard type stuff. But the coaching style of it, they don't, they don't run as fast, obviously.

• 49:08Speaker 01

  So some of the, some of the differences, I would say you can run some of the same actions. The rules are different in the, in the NBA and college. For example, there's a 24-second shot clock in the NBA, it's 30 seconds in college. So some of the prolonged actions you may be able to run in college, you can't get through them in time in the NBA. The NBA has defensive three seconds, which opens up the floor for them to be able to fly in and dunk, for them to be able to score 50 points individually. Whereas in college, you see zones, people can pack the lane. So just, there's some, there's a lot of rule differences that make it that way.

• 49:47Speaker 01

  There are some actions that are similar from pro to college, but by and large, we run, I won't say we run different things because it's all kind of in the same family. But like I don't run lob plays in, you know, in women's college basketball. We don't run too many lob plays, whereas you would in, would in the NBA. So those things are, are a little bit different. But yeah, I mean, there are differences between coaching men and women, for sure. Yeah, yeah, there's differences. Like, you guys smell terrible. So bad. So much worse.

• 50:24Channing Crowder?

  There's some stinking girls out there, Coach. There got to be, Coach.

• 50:26Speaker 01

  Yeah, no, no.

• 50:30Speaker 01

  No, I mean, I mean, it was like, it's so much worse when I was coaching, coaching guys. How bad you guys smell?

• 50:37Ryan Clark?

  Bathing is not like-

• 50:38Speaker 01

  And how much you sweat?

• 50:39Ryan Clark?

  Bathing is not like a high priority for a lot of men, though. It's not really-

• 50:42Speaker 01

  No, it was a high priority. It's just you guys like stink like the locker room stinks.

• 50:47Ryan Clark?

  Yeah, for sure.

• 50:47Speaker 01

  It smells. That's not how a women's locker room smells. It's just different, right? I found, and this is not like a scientific thing. I didn't, I can't, I can't say I did this long study, anything like that. This is my own experience. I found young men to be more sensitive than young women to criticism.

• 51:10Channing Crowder?

  Oh, getting their feelings.

• 51:12Ryan Clark?

  I would agree with that.

• 51:14Speaker 01

  Yeah, I found, as a coach, and I'm not saying that as a knock, that that's a bad thing, but I found that in the difference between, you know, between men and women.

• 51:23Ryan Clark?

  Yeah, I would agree. I think also at the levels, you had opportunities to coach at too. A lot of those men have definitely been told how great they are for a majority of their lives too. And sometimes, like you talked about, as you ascend, it's harder to find people who would be truthful and honest with you. I think it starts to happen earlier in life for men in athletics. If you have that player that is the star, that player that, you know, is going to be the next one, if you want to be attached to them, you got to make them feel good. And I think now having someone hold them accountable is probably more difficult. Well, I don't think women get that in athletics because the North Star isn't the $100 million contract.

• 52:05Ryan Clark?

  Whereas for men, you know, you might be attached to someone who gets to attain this thing that changes generations of lives. So I do believe that that's a different. Coach, you got to the, you won the ACC Championship in 2025. That was a huge, I'm a huge Elena Beard fan, by the way. She's from Louisiana. Yeah, she's from Louisiana, from Louisiana. So always, you know, I followed Duke when she was playing there. You know, you're, you're at a, a school that was trying to restore some of the luster that was lost from the women's program before you were there. What did that moment mean to you in your coaching journey there at Duke? That you had grown that program or your, your team had gotten to the point where you could cut down those nets?

• 52:48Speaker 01

  It was just confirmation, more than anything, that we were doing it the right way and that our way works. And when you, when you start, like when I started at Duke, the first year, we're last in the ACC. There's 15 teams in the ACC, we finished 15th. Now we have 18 teams because of conference realignment and we've, you know, won three ACC titles in the last two years. So in '25, when we won, that was our first time in 12 years. This year, we won the regular season, that was our first time in 13 years. So it just confirms how you've built the program, what you're doing is working. And when I say confirms, it confirms it to me, but like I told you, I knew.

• 53:27Ryan Clark?

  Right.

• 53:27Speaker 01

  I knew we were going to do well. But it confirms it to your players, you know, to your players. When, when you're on them, when you're pushing, when you're doing the conditioning, when you're doing the weights, like they know it works now too. It's not just you saying it. They're, they're cutting down nets. Doesn't have anything to do with me cutting down a net. I've cut down nets, right? It's more about them. And so I think the power in what it says about our program, the state of our program, where we are right now and how it reflects in the minds of our players is probably the most powerful thing.

• 54:02Fred Taylor?

  You don't always win 17 in a row, but I know, right?

• 54:05Speaker 01

  Well, we started 3-6.

• 54:06Fred Taylor?

  I know, 17 in a row. Coach, we always ask our guests, what's their biggest pivot in life or pivots? That's that, those one moment or moments you can look at and say, because of this, I am who I am today.

• 54:18Speaker 01

  Because I was raised by the parents I was raised is why I am who I am. And because I was coached by the people I was coached with, coached by. I've been really fortunate to have great mentors in my life and they taught me how to do it the right way. And they taught me to have expectation and a pride in, in my performances and to have a great belief in myself. And that set up everything else. That set up everything else in my life. And, you know, those moments now, I look back and I'm so thankful to have learned that at an early age because I'll meet people that are trying to learn that now. They're trying to learn that as adults and I had it really early. I've had obviously successes and failures after learning that, but they don't disrupt

• 55:01Speaker 01

  me as much as they do other people. Like winning doesn't disrupt me, losing doesn't disrupt me. I stay the same. I mean, I'm, I'm just removed from, from a World Cup and I appreciate it and I love it, but I'm ready for what's next, you know?

• 55:18Channing Crowder?

  Coach, is there a finish line at, any goal that you're set to? You want to hit this, do this as a coach, as an analyst, as anything where you're chasing? Or are you just running without, just running as fast as you can?

• 55:31Speaker 01

  I don't think I have a, I mean, my, my first coaching goal, when I became a coach, I started coaching in 2017. And my first job was coaching high school players, three on three. It pays $0. I worked for USA Basketball and I coached top high school players. And when I started coaching, my first goal that I set was to be the national team coach, the Olympic coach. It's a number one coaching job in our country, in our sport, in my opinion. And I, I set that goal and nine years later, here I am. And so I'm, I'm really focused on doing my job well for our country.

• 56:14Speaker 01

  And I'm really focused on continuing to build Duke into a power. So I don't know that I have a singular goal, but I want Duke to become a power year after year, be a contender. And I, I want to lead our team to a gold medal in Los Angeles in 2028.

• 56:31Ryan Clark?

  Yeah, I don't think that there's a thing better, Coach, than being able to wear that medal around your neck for representing our country as this head coach. I do want to say like, what I thought was really dope, I read you said that you had your time and now it's your players' time and you don't want to take from that. I think so many times, coaches and parents and people are trying to relive some other glory than the glory that they can attain in being of service to people. And just when I listen to you talk, when I watch you coach, I can tell that it's extremely important that you are of service to your players. And I think there is no higher calling in the world than that.

• 57:12Ryan Clark?

  I agree, I followed in your footsteps in being an analyst, but you were born to do what you're doing now. So thank you for your time. Best of luck. Congratulations on all the success already. And we know, Coach, we going to see a lot of great things for you, as you know it already too.

• 57:29Speaker 01

  Thank you.

• 57:29Ryan Clark?

  Appreciate it.

• 57:30Speaker 01

  Thank you.

• 57:31Channing Crowder?

  Let me run through a wall. I know I'm going to succeed.

• 57:36Ryan Clark?

  Some people, some people meant to do certain things, brother. She was, she was meant to coach basketball.

• 57:41Channing Crowder?

  Yeah, that's awesome.

• 57:42Ryan Clark?

  Nah, she was meant to coach, nah, thank you. She was meant to do that. Coach, what is it like when, you know, you're a legend at, at one school, but you are the head coach of another? Like, do you ever, is it ever anything, you're like, man, let me see what's going on at Tennessee, make sure?

• 57:56Speaker 01

  Oh, I definitely follow those, you know, like, you know, Kyrie Elzy's on my staff as well, one of my assistants. We played together at Tennessee. So my college teammate is on my staff at Duke. And yeah, we follow the balls. We root hard for them, you know? We want to do well. It's your alma mater, you know? You want to do well. So we root hard for them.