Indiana Fever hire former Sun coach Stephanie White to replace Christie Sides

The Indiana Fever have hired Stephanie White as their new head coach for the 2025 season, the team announced Friday.

White coached the Connecticut Sun for two seasons, leading the team to a combined 55-25 record and two straight playoff appearances. She won WNBA Coach of the Year in 2023, her first year in Connecticut.

White replaces Christie Sides, who was fired by the Fever on Oct. 27 after two seasons. Sides led Indiana to its first playoff appearance in eight years this past season, before getting swept by White’s Sun in the first round.

After weeks of speculation about White’s future, the Sun announced on Oct. 28 that the team and White had parted ways in what was seemingly a mutual decision. Reports had been circulating that White had been talking to other teams about her future.

After those discussions, White will now return to Indiana, where she coached for six seasons, starting as an assistant in 2011. She was eventually promoted to the team’s head coach in 2015, and spent two seasons in that position before leaving to coach Vanderbilt women’s basketball.

White is also an Indiana native, and was a standout women’s basketball player at Purdue; she spent most of her five-season WNBA career with the Fever before becoming a coach.

The Fever’s main young stars, Caitlin Clark and Aliyah Boston, both seem pleased about White joining the team, with the two of them reposting the coaching announcement on their Instagram stories.

White told ESPN earlier this week that the choice to leave Connecticut was made for both professional and personal reasons. “It’s not an easy decision to leave Connecticut, but I think the best one for my family and my career,” White told ESPN.

In addition to White joining the team, Indiana will start next season with a new front office, with Kelly Krauskopf being hired as president in September and Amber Cox hired as chief operating officer and general manager in October.