Dawn Staley

Biography

Dawn Michelle Staley is an American basketball coach and former player who is a three-time national championship winning head coach for the South Carolina Gamecocks women's basketball team. A point guard, she played college basketball for the Virginia Cavaliers and spent eight seasons in the Women's National Basketball Association, primarily with the Charlotte Sting. Staley also played on the United States women's national basketball team, winning three gold medals at the Olympic Games from 1996 to 2004, and was the head coach of the team that won an Olympic gold medal in 2021. She is the only person to win the Naismith Award as both a player and a coach. Staley was inducted into the Women's Basketball Hall of Fame in 2012, and has been inducted into the Naismith Basketball Hall of Fame twice: in 2013 for her individual playing career, and in 2026 as a member of the 1996 United States women's Olympic basketball team.