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After graduating from Duke as the Naismith College Player of the Year in 2007, Lindsey Harding was the No. 1 overall pick in that year’s WNBA draft. The point guard went on to play nine seasons in the W as well as in several countries overseas.
Harding is now viewed as a rising star in another league: the NBA, as a coach. After working as an assistant for the Toronto Raptors’ summer league team in 2017, she entered the NBA’s Basketball Operations Associate Program and then got a job as a full-time scout for the Philadelphia 76ers for the 2018-2019 season. She became the first Black woman in that position in league history.
The Sixers later promoted her to be the franchise’s first female coach when she took on a player development role. Following a year in Philadelphia, Harding accepted a job as an assistant coach on the Sacramento Kings’ staff. She will be one of the featured speakers at the second annual BreakThrough Summit, a digital leadership conference for women sponsored by Hudl and WeCoach on Dec. 14 and 15.
On her message to young women . . .
It's a lot easier for young women or people to do something when they see it being done. I've been inspired because I've had young girls, young women in college, say to me, ‘Hey, I want to coach in the NBA.' And when I was in college, or even playing professionally, I never even had that thought. I didn't even know it was even an option. Not just me, other women are breaking these little barriers, and it is opening up opportunities and opening the minds of young women and young girls minds and even boys to where this, hopefully, will be normal. Sports was and still is a huge part of my life, my childhood, and I want others to enjoy it and understand the importance of it.
When you’re going through any business, it's hard to get where you want to be without relationships. It really is. If you're in high school, try to meet all the coaches, men's and women's side. If you’re in college, try to get to know the coaches, men's and women's, because you never know where people are going to be and where they're going to go. Know the players. If you are a player, which I feel like I had that advantage—I had the opportunity to meet these coaches, these general managers, all of the organization, and try to continue those relationships. Whenever your time comes and you have opportunities, be able to speak what you want to do, and try to get your foot in there.
I started off coaching Summer League six years ago, and I was still playing in the WNBA. I just had an opportunity. I had like a week, so I flew down to Vegas, and coached the Toronto Raptors as an assistant coach. And in that week, I met a handful of my contacts I have now in the NBA. Because here’s the thing, how do they know to hire you if they don't know you exist?
On her coaching role with the Kings . . .
My job is like a two-piece job. One part of it is player development, and within player development, you get certain guys that you work with. Now, granted, any given day, anytime during the game, you're working with everybody, but you develop that relationship. You want to make sure they have that respect, and I feel like I have an advantage because, as a player, I've done everything that most of them want to do. And that respect comes instantly and that's the thing I want everyone to know: the guys are amazing. They know what I've done, and they respect it and they know I've been in the trenches like they have before.
I'm still young. My knees and legs still work. I think I retired at a good time. Today, I have a workout with Kyle Guy, and so I'm going to get out there and chase him on screens, body him up to finish his layups, do ball handling work with him, do defensive drills. And I'm not just standing there telling him what to do—I'm also out there showing it. We like to call that sweat equity. Let them know, we're out here with you, sweating and being tired as well.
Another part of my job is being an assistant coach. I have assistant coach responsibilities from game scouts of our opponents, running the shootarounds day of game, running video sessions, breaking down the film for my staff, for my players, and then part of the player development is you break down film on your individual players from practices or from games.
On the amount of video she watches . . .
It could be a lot. Whenever we fly, you're always watching film. I mean, there are times that I just want to close my eyes and go to sleep—and sometimes I do—but you're always watching film. I always have an opponent coming up, and we start looking at our opponents five, six games out. Now, that could be weeks in advance or that could be days in advance, you just don't know. There are times where we may have a back-to-back with two of my teams, and I'm watching two teams at the same time. That's never any fun.
You want to stay on top of everything the opponents are doing up until what they will probably run at the end of the game if you're defending them in this way. Sometimes that could be a guess, but what do they normally do? You want to know them like the back of your hand. And then after we play, I’m going to break down some of that film to show to the players individually that I'm working with for player development. So, definitely after every game, I'm already watching that game and then trying to cut and piece the video together on top of getting a scouting report ready.
On her favorite sayings . . .
A lot of people have certain philosophies and everything, so [I have] two. One is, ‘Good things come to those who wait.’ I've always loved that; that helps me with patience. And then the second one I always say, ‘Don't underestimate the power of positive thinking.'
As Lao Tzu said, ‘Watch your thoughts, they become your words, Watch your words, they become your actions. Watch your actions, they become your habits. Watch your habits, they become your character. Watch your character, it becomes your destiny.’
So every single thing that you do, you have the control to make it a positive or negative, to choose love over fear, to choose in any situation. So as a player, each new thought that you should have played more minutes and I might have played someone else more, you can come to practice upset, not focused, not being a good teammate, not even really wanting to practice—and imagine what that practice will be like. Or you can come in saying, 'I'm going to prove them wrong. Focus and watch film. I'm going to outplay this other player.’ And imagine what that practice is going to be like—same feelings of feeling that you should have played more, but different outcomes because you came with a positive attitude and mindset and thought versus the negatives. And you always can control that.
Athletes sometimes can’t stand their coach today, or sometimes can't stand their teammate, or sometimes they're upset about certain things, but they still can control themselves. I try to always bring positivity as much as I can. I'm honest about things, but I tried to do things in a positive way because I want them to take it that way.
On athletes taking stands for social justice . . .
Athletes as a whole, we’ve always spoken up and spoken out about these things. You have some people that just want us to play sports and not want to hear what we have to say. It’s been very telling, in 2020, on where people stand on these issues, because I think for so long, so many people wanted to stand in the middle. ‘I don't agree with this, but I'm not going to say anything.’ Or ‘I don't like this, but I'm not going to do anything.’
And we’ve drawn, as well as the rest of society, a clear line where there’s no middle ground anymore—you’re either on one side or on the other. And it's becoming very clear where people, businesses, countries, what side people are on this. And I love that it's very clear where sports are, where the athletes brought it there. Now, there were struggles at times in different sports, but the players brought it there.
And I'm just so proud that we are all on the right side of history, of equality. Being women, we need to still keep our foot down on the pedal because, as we look around on TV, as we look at what's going on in politics, we’re seeing that people are starting to really get into racism and saying that that's not OK. But, still, sexism is. There's still some things that people say, that people think, that people may write, that people [may post] on social media, they're real quick to say, ‘Black Lives Matter.’ But [they] want to make a comment when a woman is interviewing for a head-coaching NBA job.
So there's still a lot of room to go because equality is equality. I don't want to feel like I have to choose because I'm black and a woman. But it's understanding that now we're drawing this clear line, and we need to draw the same clear line, really, with sexism and what it really means. Because some people that I've talked to don't really think that what they've said or thought were possibly racist until you teach them, and it goes the same way with sexism. And I think that there's still some ways to go with that. But, again, I'm so proud and happy that athletes are on the right side of this on progress and wanting equality.
On her coaching mentor . . .
My coaching mentor now, and probably has been for the longest, is my college coach, Gail Goestenkors. She helped me be the player I am now. Granted, I had a lot of coaches along the way. My high school coach, Ann Roubique, was phenomenal. Moving on to that next level and having the opportunity to even play for her professionally as well—she was the one that told me, ‘You'd be a great coach one day.’ I thought she was kidding because at the time in college there was no way I was going to ever coach. I was like, ‘No, there's no way I'm doing it.’ But I'm still to this day, whether it's interviews that I might have had or questions about certain things, she's always just a phone call away.
On setting a good team culture . . .
Everyone has different ways of doing it. Setting the example is important. There definitely has to be rules to follow. And, when I say rules, I don't want it to sound like no fun, but there has to be accountability. Everyone has to follow the rules, so it's important to set the tone with that and to stay on it. You as the coach are setting the example and bringing the energy and having very clear expectations, so everyone knows what's going on. It's super important—if you're talking about college, it’s different—but in the NBA, if you can teach the young kids and, as they get older, they've now set the tone on how things are. The young people can come in and just follow their lead. It makes your life a lot easier.
A lot of these teams will trade for a couple of vets that follow what the head coaches want, and they can kind of come in and help set the tone. Sometimes players get tired of hearing coaches, and it's a lot easier when they hear or talk to other players. In college, in my experience, when I came in as a freshman, the juniors and seniors were setting the tone on how everything's done. That's because Gail Goestenkors—it takes time—but she started to build that culture when they were younger.
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