San Antonio Spurs’ Summer League Title Latest Sign Becky Hammon Will Become a Head Coach

Becky Hammon Spurs Manu Ginobili
Soobum Im-USA TODAY Sports

The NBA Summer League doesn’t get a ton of attention, but it’s getting more than usual this year because history was made when the San Antonio Spurs won the annual tournament of developmental teams.

Becky Hammon, fresh off her first official year as a Spurs assistant coach, was the head coach of their title-winning Summer League team. If she wasn’t a “she” we’d just be smiling and shaking our heads at yet another Gregg Popovich prodigy on his way to stardom.

But because Hammon is a she, it’s a big deal.

The funny thing is she doesn’t think it’s a big deal, but that’s expected from anyone in the Spurs’ organization, right? In countless interviews this summer, she’s been asked how it feels to be a pioneer and she has not only deflected those questions with Spurs-like humility, but she’s seemed surprised by them, which is also a very Spursy trait.

But what’s also typical for a successful person in the Spurs’ organization is the potential to move up and/or move on. That opportunity seems to be coming quickly for Hammon, and her incredible accomplishment in the Summer League is just the latest indication she won’t be any different than her Popovich-influenced predecessors, regardless of her gender.

No matter your opinion of him, Popovich’s influence as the longest-tenured current head coach in the NBA goes further than you might think. Including the hires that were made this summer, there are six head coaches, six general managers and over a dozen assistant coaches who played under, coached under and/or worked in the Spurs’ front office under Popovich.

Arguably the latest and greatest example from that bunch is Golden State Warriors head coach Steve Kerr, who led his team to a title in his rookie season this past year. The squad was stifling defensively, lights out from beyond the arc and moved the ball like the Harlem Globetrotters.

Sound familiar?

Like Kerr, Hammon has undoubtedly already learned a ton from Popovich after three years at San Antonio practices and now coaching budding star NBA players like Kyle Anderson, the Summer League MVP. And with the way the Spurs’ offseason went from a free agency standpoint (see: Aldridge LaMarcus), she has now garnered even more invaluable experience from one of the greatest basketball minds of all time. Assuming San Antonio contends for a sixth title this year, she’ll put the icing on the metaphorical cake of her apprenticeship under Pop and might even come away with a championship ring in the process.

Hammon has consistently said she’s grateful for this opportunity and has kept the focus on becoming a better basketball coach while effortlessly and classily deflecting questions about her gender in the process. She has continuously stated the obvious: The only thing that matters is her ability as a coach. She refuses to say it, but with her success, she’s disproving the notion that women don’t have a place in professional men’s sports.

So why wouldn’t she be an excellent candidate to fill a head coaching vacancy next year? If your only answer is “because she’s a woman,” you’ve just proven her point.

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