Aces coach Becky Hammon was named the 2022 WNBA Coach the of the Year, the league announced Friday.
Hammon becomes the first former WNBA player to earn the honor in her first season as coach and the league’s only coach to win the award for a franchise she previously played with. The six-time WNBA All-Star also becomes the third former WNBA player to receive the honor, joining the likes of Sandy Brondello in ’14 and Suzie McConnell-Serio in ’04.
In her first season, Hammon led the Aces to a 26–10 mark during the regular season, marking the third-highest regular season winning percentage (.722) in franchise history as well earning the No. 1 seed in this year’s playoffs. The Aces finished with a 9–1 mark in Commissioner’s Cup competition en route to defeating the Sky in the Commissioner’s Cup championship game last month.
Four Aces players—Kelsey Plum, Jackie Young, Dearica Hamby and A’ja Wilson—earned WNBA All-Star selections this season in Hammon’s spread-out offensive attack that averaged a league-high 90.4 points per game this season.
Prior to becoming the Aces’ coach in December, Hammon was an assistant with the NBA’s Spurs for six seasons. With San Antonio, Hammon was the first woman to serve as acting head coach of an NBA regular season game and the first woman to serve as head coach in the NBA Summer League.
Hammon spent 16 seasons in the WNBA with eight of those being with the San Antonio Stars, which moved to Las Vegas and became the Aces in 2018. Currently, Hammon has the Aces preparing for the WNBA semifinals against the Storm, which begin on Sunday. She has hopes of leading the franchise to its first WNBA title.
