Duke conducted a 10-day, nationwide search to fill its women's basketball vacancy. School administrator Nina King explains the process, the role of team members in the selection and why Lawson was the right choice despite limited coaching experience
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00:00but let me briefly take you through the process that took place over the past week plus.
00:06On July 2nd, we engaged collegiate sports associates to conduct a national search for us.
00:12Our main priority was to work swiftly and as efficiently as we could given the unique nature
00:17of the times we're experiencing. We've had a great track record of success with Todd Turner and CSA.
00:24They've assisted us here at Duke in securing now seven outstanding current Duke head coaches.
00:32So along with CSA, we vetted and evaluated over 20 serious candidates. From there, we had
00:39conversations with six and then invited two for finalist interviews before announcing our selection
00:45on Saturday. I'd like to thank several people that assisted us in the process. First and foremost,
00:51President Vince Price, along with select members of the Board of Trustees that we worked with.
00:57We thank them for their unwavering support throughout all of this. A big thank you to the
01:03internal committee that participated in the interview process. I'd like to thank student
01:07athletes Jade Williams, Michaela Boykin, and Aname Akinbadi-James for their participation in the
01:14process. And Michaela, Jade, and Aname all participated when Kara became our top candidate.
01:22We had them spend some time having a conversation with Kara so that we could get their feedback.
01:28You know, this day and age, we certainly want student athlete feedback in a lot of
01:34parts of the process. And so we really valued what they had to say and they obviously had a great
01:39conversation with Kara and are all in. I mean, I think it was the kind of sum total of all of
01:46Kara's experiences and, you know, she even said it while she hasn't been a college coach, she spent
01:53thousands of hours at practices and talking to coaches and around student athletes, you know,
02:00during her time as a broadcaster. And then again, during her time as USA Basketball
02:06three-on-three coach, she's been with a college student athlete. So she's not coming into the
02:11college scene from scratch. It's just a different and unique experience. And so I think in just kind
02:18of looking at the total package, Kara had it all for us and we were really excited to bring her
02:24into the mix. And, you know, when we were evaluating all of our candidates, they all had unique
02:31experiences and unique characteristics. And again, for us, Kara just rose to the top.