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Dawn Staley near Temple University successful her autochthonal Philadelphia aft the 2007-08 play and was named caput manager of the South Carolina women's basketball team.
In much than a decennary and a fractional since, Staley has taken the Gamecocks programme to unprecedented heights, starring South Carolina to 3 national titles during her tenure.
In her caller book, "Uncommon Favor," Staley revealed different SEC schoolhouse expressed involvement successful her successful 2005.
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Dawn Staley of the South Carolina Gamecocks against the Iowa Hawkeyes during the nationalist title crippled astatine Rocket Mortgage Fieldhouse April 7, 2024, successful Cleveland. (Ben Solomon/NCAA Photos via Getty Images)
"Alabama came aft maine archetypal successful 2005," Staley wrote.
She was coaching astatine Temple astatine the clip she was approached by Alabama. The Owls finished the 2004-05 play with a 28–4 grounds and precocious to the 2nd circular of the NCAA Tournament.
While Staley landed successful the aforesaid league arsenic the Crimson Tide, she believed South Carolina was the champion acceptable for her household and career.
"I visited the campus. I liked the diversion director. But I couldn't spot myself surviving successful Alabama," she noted.
Head manager Dawn Staley of the South Carolina Gamecocks reacts against the Texas Longhorns during a Final Four crippled astatine Amalie Arena April 4, 2025, successful Tampa, Florida. (Ben Solomon/NCAA Photos via Getty Images)
While Staley didn't attraction for the thought of moving to Alabama, she said the determination to South Carolina meant she would inactive beryllium joining a league successful which respective coaches had built legendary careers.
"I was drawn to the information that USC was portion of the SEC and its storied bequest successful women's basketball," Staley wrote. "Pat Summitt was successful this league, Andy Landers, Melanie Balcomb, each these legendary coaches. I was looking to refine my skills, emergence to vie with the best. The cherry connected apical was that my parents were primitively from South Carolina."
Staley was besides anxious for a reunion with her mother, Estelle, and her siblings.
University of South Carolina caput manager Dawn Staley celebrates winning the Albany determination and advancing to the Final Four aft cutting a portion of the nett astatine MVP Arena successful Albany, N.Y., March 31, 2024. (Tracy Glantz/The State/Tribune News Service via Getty Images)
By each accounts, Staley has go a beloved fig successful Columbia, South Carolina's superior metropolis and the location of the Gamecocks. The metropolis precocious unveiled an on-campus statue successful grant of Staley.
Staley reflected connected a authorities embracing her fixed her analyzable past with her family. Estelle near South Carolina decades agone owed to racism and discrimination.
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Staley described the homecoming arsenic a "full-circle moment."
"Time is simply a comic thing, isn't it? That I find myself thriving successful the precise authorities that drove my parent into exile is an irony I ne'er forget," Staley wrote. "That she was capable to instrumentality to her home, her spot of belonging, erstwhile I came to enactment astatine South Carolina was a full-circle infinitesimal made imaginable by societal progress, the civilian rights movement, myriad changes seismic and small, but also, successful ample part, by faith."
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Chantz Martin is simply a sports writer for Fox News Digital.
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