SerpApi.Org
Dallas Wings guard Paige Bueckers has always advocated for racial equality in sports. When she won the Best Female College Athlete in the 2021 ESPY's, she used her acceptance speech to highlight the lack of media coverage for Black athletes. Bueckers reiterated that shortly before the 2025 WNBA Draft, when she said, 'it's still an issue years later.
After last Sunday's game against Chicago, Paige once again campaigned for equality, citing the lack of Black coaches in the WNBA and the absence of a Black female coach in the league this season.
"I'm for equal opportunity, no discrimination based on what you look like, who you like and anything of that nature," Bueckers said. Specifically, I grew up with a lot of prominent Black women in my life that were very important to me in how I was raised and how I grew up, being my stepmom, my AAU coach."
Black women with strong influence in Paige's life
Paige was born to software engineer Robert Bueckers and periodontist Amy Fuller on October 20, 2001. However, Robert and Amy divorced when Paige was only 3 years old. While Amy moved to Montana, the Bueckers remained in Minnesota. Soon, Robert fell in love again and married a Black woman, Moe Roberts, the mother of Paige's half-brother Drew, who is often photographed with the Dallas Wings star.
Although Bob followed his daughter's basketball career closely, another Black lady, Hopkins High School head coach Tara Starks, was responsible for molding Paige into the player she is today, coaching her from the time she was 5 years old until she left for UConn.
"I understand how amazing they are and how they should get the same equal opportunity as a white woman, as a white man to be an important piece of this league. And it was built on a lot of Black women, this league, so it's definitely right for them to get the same equal opportunity as everyone else," she added.
The WNBA coaching landscape has drastically changed since 2022
At the start of its 2022 season, the WNBA had seven Black head coaches, including three women. However, the league's coaching demographic has seen significant changes in recent years. Since 2023, 13 of the WNBA's 15 franchises have hired head coaches.
Only two were former WNBA players, and no Black female coaches were hired during that span. Currently, there are only two Black head coaches in the WNBA, but both are men: Tyler Marsh of the Chicago Sky and Sydney Johnson of the Washington Mystics.
Meanwhile, the last time there was a Black woman head coach in the "W" was last season when Noelle Quinn coached the Seattle Storm. She was fired after five years and was replaced by Sonia Raman. This also marks only the third time in three decades that there has been no Black female head coach in the women's association.
For a league that, since its inception, has been represented by a majority-Black workforce, it's surprising that there are fewer Black coaches and no Black women coaches in the WNBA. It's unclear if Paige's call will change that soon. But at least she pointed it out, so everyone is reminded, and maybe that's a good start.
