Dawn Staley made a big admission about the possibility of leaving the South Carolina Gamecocks to coach an NBA franchise a couple of months ago. The three-time NCAA national champion flirted with the New York Knicks job once they fired Tom Thibodeau and were denied the chance to interview several candidates who were already employed by other NBA franchises, such as Jason Kidd and Ime Udoka.
Staley was one of the candidates to take over from Thibodeau shortly after she lost the 2025 national championship game against Geno Auriemma’s UConn Huskies.
After a 25-year career that started in Temple in 2000, Staley has become one of the best coaches in women’s college basketball. She is committed to her program, but taking on a challenge as big as coaching an NBA team, as a woman, was enticing for the former WNBA All-Star.
Dawn Staley details how she inadvertently convinced Knicks not to hire her
During an appearance on “Post Moves,” a show with former WNBA star Candace Parker and Staley’s former player Aliyah Boston, the veteran coach admitted she interviewed for the Knicks job.
“I interviewed for the Knicks,” Staley said in the episode published Wednesday. “… I thought I did pretty well. I was well-prepared for the interview. If the Knicks would have offered me the job, I would have had to do it. Not just for me, it’s for women, just to break open that.”
While she was very interested in the opportunity, Staley added that her questions about how a potential appointment would change the dynamics with the fans and the media. She said that the front office “changed the energy” after she asked those questions, saying she shot herself in the foot and lost what would have been a historic opportunity.
