Locked On Women’s Basketball: WNBA head coaches ghosted, GM haunted houses

“I can’t say that I’ve ever seen anything like this happen in my life,” Mustafa said. “And this started with the surprise firing of Curt Miller with the LA Sparks. Tanisha Wright with the Atlanta Dream was one that maybe people saw coming, but ever since then, it’s felt like surprise after surprise, whether that was [Teresa Weatherspoon] with Chicago, Stephanie White and Christie Sides being parted ways with the Sun and the Fever … I’ve never seen anything like this before. I’m very interested to see what happens. Because I think my biggest takeaway with all these coaches being fired or parting ways, or whatever language the teams have been wanting to use, it’s like, okay, sure, but now who do you bring in that is going to fit in with each of the respective situations for these teams?”

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“Because a lot of these are very talented coaches who, when you look at it at first glance, you’re like, ‘well, why did they get fired?’ Because some of these teams are in positions that were kind of out of their control in a way, and maybe ownership has been looking for change, but you almost might turn into a little carousel thing where the other teams will hire the coaches that have been fired, and it’s just like, you’re not really hiring anybody new, because who else are your options?”

Then, they talked about the different factors that lead to a coach’s firing, and what makes each of these coaching vacancies different:

“I think it depends on what the owners of these teams are looking for in terms of what they expected these teams to do,” Mustafa said. “Like, when you look at the LA Sparks, they’ve kind of been in rebuild mode, and they brought in Curt Miller to kind of lead the way, and they’ve had a lot of bad luck with injuries and things like that. You know, Cameron Brink getting injured at the start of what was appeared to be going to be a very stellar rookie season. Lexie Brown, kind of being more inconsistent, with her health issues that she’s been dealing with.”

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Here at The Next, in addition to the 24/7/365 written content our staff provides, we also host the daily Locked On Women’s Basketball podcast. Join us Monday through Saturday each week as we discuss all things WNBA, collegiate basketball, basketball history and much more. Listen wherever you find podcasts or watch on YouTube.

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“And I think it just comes down to if it wasn’t mutual, then that means there’s some disagreement between the ownership, between the general managers of these teams and the coaches, between what is deemed success for each of these teams positions, and how long are they willing to kind of keep the same coaching staff, or whoever it is, to kind of work through the kinks of that. Or is it a no, we want to win now kind of situation, which, if you look at some of these teams, I think is a little bit unrealistic,” she continued.

Tune in to hear more from Mustafa and Speer about the WNBA’s many front office vacancies. Make sure to subscribe to the Locked On Women’s Basketball podcast to keep learning about the WNBA, women’s college basketball, basketball history and much more!