For Cynthia Cooper to return to basketball, more must be done. The wounds are too fresh

CLEVELAND — There weren’t screams of outrage across the basketball landscape when the coaching staffs for Saturday’s inaugural Women’s College All-Star Game were announced several weeks ago, but there were whispers and raised eyebrows.

Did you hear? Can you believe it? What were they thinking?

The questions revolved around the inclusion of Cynthia Cooper as a volunteer assistant. While definitely a basketball legend, which is how she and the three other coaches were described in the announcement, Cooper also was the focal point of a damning and disturbing 2022 investigative report by The Athletic that outlined allegations of inappropriate, vulgar and verbally abusive behavior toward players on multiple teams over multiple decades.

She resigned from Texas Southern two years ago and had stayed out of the coaching spotlight until her photo appeared alongside those of Nancy Lieberman, Janice Braxton and Cheryl Miller in the press release. The reaction may have been muted nationally, but the pain was very real among the former players who spoke out in the article.

“She needs to apologize to every player she hurt publicly and make a statement,” one of them told The Athletic this week. “She has not once publicly apologized to all the players. We want a loud apology, and we want it loud just like the abuse was.”

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The answer to whether Cooper should have been invited to coach is an easy one. She should not have. The wounds remain too fresh, the emotional pain too deep for those affected. But to the question about the proper timeframe of atonement, I don’t have that answer. It varies from situation to situation and typically comes down to, you know it when you see it or feel it.

Final Four weekend is meant to celebrate what is right about the game, not things that have sullied it, and Cooper’s track record includes either NCAA rules violations at Prairie View A&M or sexual harassment and verbal abuse allegations at UNC Wilmington, USC and Texas Southern. I firmly believe Cooper should have a pathway back to coaching, but my conversation with her this week leads me to believe there remains work to be done.

For instance, when I asked what she would say to victims who spoke out against her, she said: “I apologize for making their experience a very negative experience. I know everybody’s perception is their reality, and so I have mine and they have theirs. But I never meant for them to have a negative experience.”

The words did not come off as someone accepting responsibility for specific actions. They sounded like someone saying she was sorry for the hurt she caused while not acknowledging the actual actions that caused the pain. It’s a subtle yet significant distinction because it comes off as an apology/non-apology.

Cynthia Cooper was a volunteer assistant at Saturday’s inaugural Women’s College All-Star Game despite her resignation in 2022 amid allegations of abusive behavior toward players on multiple teams over multiple decades. (Chris Pietsch / Associated Press)

When former players describe being suicidal because of the abuse they experienced, as some did in The Athletic’s story, it’s not to be taken lightly. It stretches the bounds of credulity that she could not have known she was crossing the line from metaphorical pushing to actual abuse when, for instance, she looked on as one player punched a bleacher until her hand bled, upset because she believed she had been wrongly punished by Cooper.

What makes this all the more damning is that Cooper has a special place in women’s basketball as someone who won two championships at USC, an Olympic gold medal, and four WNBA titles, all of which ended with her as the Finals MVP.  When people talk about the all-time greats, her name is regularly mentioned. The WNBA included her among the 25 greatest players in league history.

But that iconic status can be a blessing and a curse in that it brings not only greater visibility but also greater responsibility as a steward of the game. Her misbehavior was hurtful to not only those involved but also a women’s game that leans so heavily into the precepts of integrity and consciousness.

Her conduct resulted in a Title IX investigation and no-contact order with players beyond practice and games. She resigned from Texas Southern weeks before a scheduled Title IX hearing and said she entered therapy a little over a week later. The ongoing sessions have been painful at times, she said, but maybe that’s a positive sign because pain typically is a shotgun rider on the road to progress.

“I realized I was in trouble,” she said. “I sent my therapist the article before ever going just so she would know what she was dealing with. Then I just went to work — work on myself, work on looking in the mirror to see what I could have done better or could have done differently. I had to look at what people were saying their experiences were and what role I had in that. I had to play back everything.”

The invitation to coach at the all-star game came from the National Basketball Retired Players Association, where president and CEO Scott Rochelle said he has seen Cooper work beyond the spotlight to improve herself, her self-awareness and her coaching. She has coached and tutored amateur basketball groups, primarily fourth- and fifth-graders, and has participated in the NBA’s coaching development program.

“This isn’t a reward,” Rochelle said of the all-star appointment. “This is another step in her development to try to improve on herself personally and professionally. The article wasn’t something that was foreign to us, but … we believe that those who do the work are those we want to continue to work with. From that standpoint, we’re standing with her and standing with any former player who really wants to better themselves. People are right to have opinions on this situation, but to treat it as if it’s some momentous occasion where she’s being celebrated — she’s volunteering her time to give back. I guess the question becomes, what else are you looking for?”

Cooper’s participation comes in the same week that Ole Miss hired Quentin Hillsman as an assistant coach. Hillsman resigned three years ago as the head coach at Syracuse amid a third-party investigation into alleged verbal abuse and threatening behavior toward players, all of which was outlined in another investigation by The Athletic. And though some may try to draw a direct correlation between his situation and that of Cooper’s, they are different in that Hillsman has a full-time position and will be working with players on a year-round basis; Cooper was a volunteer assistant for one weekend. The argument can be made that participating in the game, which was broadcast on ESPN2, could be used as a stepping stone to full-time coaching, but there’s no way to know. Cooper said she’s unsure if she wants to return to coaching at the college or pro levels.

“That’s still a question in my mind, that’s still a question in my heart,” she said. “I will say that the article hit hard. … I think right now I just want to be the best version of myself every day. I do want to be able to contribute in a positive way to women’s basketball. I’ve done that my entire career and I would like to continue to help grow the sport if they’ll let me.”

For me, the road back has to start with the offer of face-to-face apologies to those whom Cooper hurt. That’s not a first step, it’s a mandatory step because that’s where true accountability begins. But even that might not be enough, and understandably so.

“It makes my stomach turn to see that she’s still having access to people’s children and young ladies,” one staffer said. “With some people, there are isolated incidents where they make mistakes, and with other people, it’s in their core of who they are as a person. I don’t see a 180-degree change in a two-year span.”

(Top photo: Adam Pantozzi / NBAE via Getty Images)