The Brooklyn Nets made an unconventional choice for their new head coach. How about the Philadelphia 76ers do the same? Why not look at a woman being in charge? There are plenty qualified out there.
Since Brett Brown got the ax as coach of the Philadelphia 76ers, there have been many names thrown around. It is the usual suspects: guys fired elsewhere (Ty Lue, Stan Van Gundy, Dave Joerger), guys who are promising young assistants (Ime Udoka, Dave Vanterpool, Sam Cassell) and guys fired putting their own names out there because no one else would (Mark Jackson, Jason Kidd).
So underwhelming were the coaching candidates out there, the Booklyn Nets decided to hire former NBA star Steve Nash even though he has never coached a game in his life.
Sixers General Manager Elton Brand has made it clear that HE will select Brown’s replacement. The days of collaborating with the Bryan Colangelo holdovers and the CEO who is suppose to take care of the business end but likes to put in his two cents on basketball matters, are over.
Since this is Brand’s call, maybe he should think a little (or maybe a lot) out of the box.
Maybe he should not exclude 50 percent of the population from consideration and look at hiring a female head coach.
There are several factors in favor of selecting a female head coach:
- For all of its (many, many) faults, the Sixers organization is a female-friendly organization. The Chief Operating Officer is long-time employee Lara Price (you might notice her at the press conferences) as well as having several female vice presidents, including Dr. Annelie Schmittel, the VP of Player Development who travels with the team.
- No NBA team has ever had a female head coach. On the other side, plenty of men have successfully coached women in basketball (Geno Auriemma at UConn, Bill Laimbeer in the WNBA), so why could it not work the other way as well?
Of course, a top-flight woman coach might simply prefer to coach other women. The late Pat Summitt was a legend at the University of Tennessee. Several times she was offered the men’s head coaching position but turned it down, because she wanted to stick to women’s college basketball.
If Brand wants to do some glass ceiling breaking, there are probably three major female candidates for the 76ers coaching spot.