Q-and-A: Matt Wilber reflects on ‘crazy’ first season with Phoenix Mercury coaching staff

Oct. 18—MITCHELL — Though the countdown is on for the upcoming college and high school basketball season, Matt Wilber is ready for a brief break.

The former Dakota Wesleyan men’s basketball coach of 11 seasons, Wilber is coming off approximately 14 consecutive months of coaching, going from his final season with the Tigers last winter directly into his first as an assistant with the WNBA’s Phoenix Mercury this spring and summer.

At the Mitchell Quarterback Club on Wednesday night, Wilber made an appearance as a guest speaker, sharing stories on topics ranging from trying to be a parent from halfway across the country to what it was like working with and learning from Diana Taurasi, the WNBA’s all-time leading scorer and a 20-year veteran of the sport.

Wilber spoke to the Mitchell Republic about his new professional coaching experiences, with those answers below, edited for clarity:

Q: What did you learn during your first season on staff with the Mercury?

MW: “To jump into this staff, with the experience that they have, it was just keeping your eyes and ears open in order to digest as much as you can because we have some high-level people in our coaching staff from the top on down with (Mercury head coach Nate Tibbetts). We’re talking about, offensively and defensively, seeing whole new systems and talking about that. … I was kind of like, I could have used this in the middle of my career (at Dakota Wesleyan). I could have used a month of training and doing things like that. It was everything from offense to defense to working with players and individual stuff. It was crazy we were able to take so much away from it in just a short period of time.”

Q: How did you feel to be a part of a growing South Dakota contingent making a mark in the WBNA?

MW: “It’s really cool being an assistant with Nate Tibbetts (Sioux Falls Roosevelt and University of South Dakota product), and even when you talk about Becky Hammon (Rapid City Stevens product and current Las Vegas Aces head coach) having won a couple of championships — I mean, she’s a mural on the Corn Palace now. It’s crazy how it has worked out in this way, and it just goes to show the kind of talent we have in our state. There are great coaches all over the place, and basketball is one of those sports that we all grew up with. It means a lot to be a part of it, and I’m really grateful the organization signed off on bringing me on the staff.”

Q: Since the WNBA offseason coincides with the high school and college basketball seasons, what does that balance look like between home and the Mercury this winter?

MW: “I’m hoping to be around a little bit more during my boys’ high school basketball season. Over the course of their basketball careers, I obviously haven’t got to see much in person. As a coach, you miss a lot, so I’m fortunate with this to see a bit more of them. I don’t have any plans, and I don’t fully know what I’m going to do while I’m back up here. But I’m on call for whatever we need to be doing with the Mercury, and I’ll be back (in Phoenix) during some of the offseason as well.”

Q: As the season gets close, have you thought about how different it will be not roaming the sidelines at the Corn Palace this winter, instead taking in DWU games as a fan?

MW: “I’ll still be cheering (the Tigers) on and rooting for them, absolutely. But I’ve been in season for 14 months straight — from doing my job at DWU and then moving to Phoenix right after. That was challenging, on top of going into a whole new role. … I went from knowing everything about our league (in the GPAC) to knowing very little (about the WNBA), so there wasn’t a lot of time to think about it. So I guess I can’t anticipate what all the feelings will be emotionally not being out there, but there’s a definite sadness to saying, ‘Hey, that that part’s over.'”

Q: What are you focused on doing differently or improving on in year two with the Mercury?

MW: “First of all, it’s just an expansion of doing whatever they need me to do. I went down there with the intent to do whatever is asked of me, and I’ll keep going with that and focus on how I can get better. The one thing that’s awesome about that is you get a lot of feedback from Coach Tibbetts and the other coaches. It’s amazing to just continue to be around those people and see how they go about their business, because, I’m telling you, the talent level in our coaching staff is remarkable. I have been lucky to have that experience, and I didn’t anticipate how much I would value that. I knew that it would be really good, but it’s even better than what I expected.”

On being away from family and home: “As great as the job was, there’s no question it was equally hard not being home. I was gone for six months while Lindsay (Wilber) was here running our household and dealing with all of our kids, so it was tough being away. They were tremendously supportive and even got down there (to Phoenix) a few times, and I was able to get back for a couple of weeks during the Olympic break to spread it out. But my boys are obviously active in a lot of things, so I’m trying to watch all their stuff through live stats, and there were just some tough days. One of them right away was the state golf meet. I was basically the Hanson golf coach, and now I’m watching it on live stats. I tell you what, there’s not a worse sport to watch on live stats than your kids golfing and then they get runner-up by one stroke. So I’m like, ‘Double bogey, what the heck?’ But there are a lot of people who have helped out and supported my family while I’ve been gone, and I appreciate that.”

On the transition from longtime head coach to being an assistant: “Talk about a massive culture shift, going from being a head coach with an assistant (at DWU) to being one of six assistants. You go from making basically every decision for the past 19 years — I’ve been my own boss from running my own business to being at DWU — to not having much input at all.”

“There’s pressure to win, and I know how that feels sitting out there, but as an assistant, I don’t really feel that. I talk to Tibbetts a lot about that, and I’ll help Nate feel that because he’s the one standing out there in front of 14,000 people. But I’m like, ‘Hey, I’m sorry, man, but I’m sleeping OK after the losses. Where, for 11 years, I didn’t. For 11 years, I wanted to puke after every freaking loss we had. We were going into one of the games, and somebody asked me if I was nervous. I was like, ‘Nervous? I’ve coached in a national championship game for crying out loud. I’m not nervous to remind Nate that he has two timeouts or hand him a stick of gum or a water bottle.'”

On working with the Phoenix Mercury players: “I was a little concerned about leaving DWU because I had a ton of great relationships with our players, and I always say that was probably the No. 1 thing out of the job. I wasn’t prepared to have a strong relationship with the Mercury players going into this first year, but it was there. I can’t tell you how great of people we have in the players. It was a new staff, and they welcomed us in with open arms. You go from coaching 19 and 20-year-old dudes who don’t talk much to coaching Diana Taurasi, who has 20 years of WNBA experience, then Brittney Griner with 10, and Kahleah Copper, Natasha Cloud and Rebecca Allen with nine. Our starting five had about 60 years of WNBA experience, and so you have some very outgoing, big personalities on our roster. It was awesome to work with them.”

“The assistant coaches get assigned players to work with, like watching film and individual workouts, and every coach has maybe one or two. I was working with Rebecca Allen, who’s an Australian, and she’s awesome. And then I was lucky enough to get assigned Diana Taurasi. So, obviously, I’m not telling Diana Taurasi much about what’s going on, but I will tell you she’s open to and willing to hear any of it. Getting to work with her and see what she’s like — she’s 42 this year, playing her 20th season, and she averaged 15 or 16 points a game for us. She is absolutely something else. … She’s the most instinctual, intelligent basketball player and mind I’ve ever been around.”

On the physicality of play in the WNBA: “These women beat the ever-living crap out of each other. It is so physical. I didn’t realize how physical it was, and then you get out there. They are big and strong, and to see some of these players in person, it’s wild. There are a lot of new fans watching, and a lot of people who followed Caitlin Clark into the WNBA, as far as watching it, saying that they’re targeting Caitlin. No, they’re targeting everybody. Everybody’s getting hit out there. So it will be interesting to see what the league does to kind of protect the product because it’s really physical.”