EDITOR'S NOTE: A previous version of this story implied certain WNBA players were Asian American. We have updated the story for clarity.
The newly formed San Francisco basketball team, the Golden State Valkyries, have officially been part of the WNBA for a couple of weeks now.
Today, we bring you the second episode of BOUNCE. KALW’s basketball podcast that’s all about The Valkyries first season in the Bay. This one’s all about the team’s fearless leader: Coach Natalie Nakase.
Click the button above to listen!
Story Transcript:
Intro:
HOST ERIN LIM: After an opening night loss to the L.A. Sparks the Valkyries took the court against the Washington Mystics at Chase Center. It was their second straight sellout crowd.
ANNOUNCER: I mean, it just keeps getting better and better in this building…
Sound of crowd cheering.
Eighteen thousand fans filled the arena.
ANNOUNCER: Alright, the Valkyries win the tip, and we’re underway. Glad you could join us from Ballhalla…
The team had a new player in the starting lineup: rookie forward Janelle Salaün from France. She got right to work.
ANNOUNCER: Salaun right to the rim with her first basket as a Valkyrie.
Salaün scored the first four points in the game and had a total of 10 against the Mystics.
It was a back and forth first half. Washington took a late lead, and then… Ballhalla magic.
ANNOUNCER: Salaun inbounds to Carla Leite. Clock going down. Bounce pass. Burton. This would be for the lead at halftime. Ahhh! She banked it in. A lead at the half for the Valkyries.
Sound of crowd cheering.
Veronica Burton nailed a 38 foot shot.
VERONICA BURTON: (Laughing) And obviously that shot was a little lucky. A little faith. But to see that go in helped me to see a few more go in.
She scored a career high 22 points.
And let’s not count out Kayla Thorton. Her teammates call her KT. She scored 18 points in the game.
ANNOUNCER: Pass out. Fagbenle intercepts it, for Thornton. Three! Fouled! Hopping her way to a potential four point play!
It was a close game through all four quarters. The Valkyries took the lead with less than two minutes to go. They clung to a 76 to 74 lead.
ANNOUNCER: And it’s a two point game with 4.7. Into Burton. They’ve gotta get the foul. (CHEERING) She throws it away.
KT gave props to her teammates
KAYLA THORNTON: I’m just so proud of this team, cause we could have just folded, you know? We just pushed through it and everybody contributed to this win tonight. So I'm just proud of everybody. And also for the fans…it’s our first win and it’s just the beginning. Definitely the energy from the crowd. They helped us, but they pushed us through. And then just everybody coming off the bench, the starters, everybody just locking in, uh, our first win and, you know, it's just, it's just the beginning.
The Golden State Valkyries roller coaster season has taken off. Who’s on board for the twists and turns?
— — —
Host Erin Lim and Executive Producer Ben Trefny:
HOST ERIN LIM: This is BOUNCE: The Valkyries First Season In The Bay. I'm Erin Lim. As we get started here, I'm joined by our Executive Producer, Ben Trefny.
BEN TREFNY: Hey.
ERIN: Hey Ben.
BEN: Good to be here,
ERIN: Man. It's been a couple of weeks, huh? For the Valkyries?
BEN: I mean, everything at the start of a franchise history is amazing. I was at a game recently and looking up at the banners for the championships for the Warriors, and they go back like 80 years. The Warriors do way back to the days outside of the Bay Area. And just to think that we are here at the very beginning of a franchise is super cool. And they're successful.
ERIN: And successful. We just talked about their first ever win against the mystics. Mm-hmm. But then (LA!) the next day they won against the LA Sparks. (Mm-hmm) In their house.
BEN: Yeah, it was so nice to have that retribution and then to have a winning record. I mean, this is an expansion team. Erin, last time the WNBA had an expansion team was the Atlanta Dream, 17 years ago or so, and they went oh and 17 to begin their tenure as a franchise.
BEN: I mean, I was expecting maybe this team is gonna get no wins at all, but. Somehow, you know, I mean, they seem a lot better than I'd expected.
ERIN: Yeah. I mean, every game gets a little better, even if they're not winning every game. But the team dynamics are really, really something to watch every time you watch the Valkyries.
BEN: Yeah, it really is. And so, you know, one of the fun things that we've seen here, I mean, we've got these awesome fans here going on and people listening to Bounce, and we had our live in-person Bounce launch party here at KLW studio event space, and there were a lot of big, big fans who are here to, to join us in celebrating the launch of this podcast.
ERIN: Yeah, it was a great crowd. Uh, I would call it a sellout, here at, uh, at our studios. And we just, we had a good time and yeah, we had big fans sitting in the audience
BEN: And we wanted to ask them how they were feeling about the prospects of this season. There was, there was this guy sitting in the front row, Alan l Mario, and he had thoughts, let's, let's play the tape.
FROM BOUNCE LAUNCH PARTY: Hey, super fan. So, sorry, what's your name by the way? Sorry, a Alan. I'm Alan. Alan. Hi Alan. Thank you so much for being here. Thank you. Yeah, thank you. How many games are this season, do you know? Uh, I think it's 44. So 22 home games. 22 away. Alright. Alan, what do you think is the over under on the number of wins this year? Whew. Uh, let's get us to like 12. Okay. That would be good. Oh, no, sorry. No. 12 wins outta 44. That's not that great. Gimme 16. 16? Yeah. Alright. Alright. What do you think, Erin? Realistically. Oh, I, I mean, they're gonna win it. All right. Come on.
BEN: So you are definitely feeling good about this season, Erin?
ERIN: Yeah, I'm optimistic the whole way through. Even when they lose for me, they're, they're winning. So I love every game. I'm feeling the magic.
BEN: It is amazing. I mean, we have lost a few, you know, to, to end this little stretch here, but they've been against the very best teams and for the most part we have given them really, really good games. And I think that it's because we have somebody who's really strong holding this team together.
ERIN: Yeah, I mean, uh, the first Asian American, WNBA head coach, Natalie Nakase.
BEN: She is a boss.
ERIN: Yes. She brings it. She is the soul of this team.
BEN: Absolutely. And the, the first feature that you made for this podcast series is about Coach Nakase. Let's go ahead and hear it.
ERIN: Let's go.
— — —
Story Transcript: WNBA’s first Asian American Coach has had many firsts
REPORTER ERIN LIM: It’s 10 days before the regular season starts and I’m at the first ever pre-season game for the Golden State Valkyries. You can feel the excitement. For the team, and also for the coach.
Natalie Nakase comes out in her own uniform. Head to toe in black, wearing black and white Jordans, standing at only five foot two. She is a whole vibe. For me, it’s exciting to see this kind of representation on a WNBA court. To be able to see someone who looks like me becoming the first Asian American head coach, truthfully got me teary-eyed.
As tip off is just moments away, Nakase huddles with the team on the sidelines one more time before WNBA history is made. Off the court, she tells me basketball for her is all about the people.
NATALIE NAKASE: Coaching to me is a couple of things. It's caring about a ton of people. More importantly, their confidence. I think that's the biggest thing. That's what my dad instilled in me when I was young.
When she was around second or third grade age, she would stay out late shooting hoops in the front yard with her dad and two older sisters.
NAKASE: They're a little taller than me and so they would just block me and block me and block me. My mom would be yelling at us, “Get in the house, it's dinner time!” and we're like, “No, we have to see who wins.”
She played every day. She got the passion for basketball from her dad, Gary.
NAKASE: I think without me knowing it was my love language with my dad. We bonded over it.
Even in high school, Nakase was a star and followed her own rules. She was named Orange County player of the year. She turned down a full basketball scholarship to UC Irvine to take her chances at her dream school, UCLA. There, she was a walk on player for the Bruins basketball team. After injuring her knee as a freshman she came back to play as a starting point guard.
After college, she went on to play professionally, becoming the first Asian American player in the National Women’s Basketball Association. This was her first “first.” But then, Nakase injured her knee again. That’s when she decided to follow her instinct to coach.
NAKASE: When I couldn't get on the court for eight months, so not having that ability to have that feeling to be on the court, then I realized like, it is my true passion.
So Nakase became another first: the first female coach for a Japanese professional men’s basketball team. But her dad encouraged her to come back to the U.S. to try coaching in the NBA.
She started out as an intern for the L.A. Clippers and worked her way to become the first woman assistant coach to sit on the bench during an NBA game. If you’re keeping score, that’s now three big firsts in her young career.
In 2022, Nakase joined the WNBA as an assistant to the head coach of the Las Vegas Aces, where she helped lead the team to two back-to-back championships.
And then in the fall of 2024, she became yet another first. A first that she had been dreaming of for a long time.
It took more than a decade of hard-work and grit to get to this point: the first Asian American head coach of a professional U.S. team. But it’s all in Nakase’s DNA.
Like when she was being considered for the job she sat down to lunch with the owner of the Golden State Warriors, Joe Lacob…
NAKASE: He reminded me of my dad. So when Joe Lacob said, if you take this job, we have to win in 5 years. I slammed my hand on the table and I said, Let's go.
Leading the newest WNBA team since 2008 is a huge job. As a former player turned coach, Natalie leans on her own experiences and how her dad coached her.
NAKASE: I think at the end of the day, no matter the talent, the best team that's more connected and family-feel, I think we'll probably win.
Nakase knows that there are WNBA players that are just as good on the court as their NBA counterparts.
NAKASE: The women are just on a very high level that the more you expose them, then I think people are really going to appreciate the level of the WNBA.
Social media has been the place where Coach Nakase finds up-and-coming players, specifically Asian American basketball players. For her, growing up, there was just one high profile Asian player, and he was in the NBA - Jeremy Lin. But now there are AAPI players in the WNBA like Te-Hina Paopao of the Atlanta Dream, and Alissa Pili of the Minnesota Lynx.
NAKASE: It's really nice to see all these, you know, Asian Americans coming into fruition and they're coming into the WNBA.]
Having and being that kind of representation is big for Nakase. It feels like that’s why the Bay has embraced her so hard.
NAKASE: I talked to a fan and he just said, you know, Oakland's about grit, it's about struggle. Everyone has gone through something where they had to get out of some type of adversity. I think as a head coach, I can bring them joy. I think that's what attracted me to the bay once I really settled in is that there's a lot of tough people here. There's a lot of survivors. There's a lot of people that really love the fact that they come from the bay. They're really prideful of where they came from.
Nakase says that she’s going to bring that kind of pride and grit to the court.
NAKASE: I kind of have a mentality too of when we do play, it's gonna be like win or die.
Coach Nakase’s dad passed away in 2021 but the rest of her family will be in the stands at Valkyries games. Being half-Chinese, I had to ask Coach Nakase how they are feeling about her head coaching debut.
NAKASE: You've mentioned your family. Is the family finally proud of you? Are they proud of Natalie? You know, our community can be hard on us a little bit.
NAKASE: As Japanese Americans, I would say we don't really share, but what I do know is the way we show that we're proud is that we show up for each other. I know my family's going to show up. We get, we call it the “head nod of approval.” It's something my dad, you know, did with our family to show that he's proud and as long as my sister, all my sisters–my mom won't do it– but if all my sisters do this, I think, yeah, that's our signal.
Adding to her firsts, Natalie Nakase had her first win as the head coach of the Golden State Valkyries against the Washington Mystics. It was at the Chase Center, in front of the home crowd, and Valkyries fans went wild. They’d been waiting for this since 2008.
It was another history making moment for her and the Valkyries, setting us up for an exciting season of more firsts.
Show Credits:
BOUNCE is a production of KALW public radio. Our theme music was made by Daoud Anthony. Artwork is by Illuminaries and the Bay Area Mural Project with help from Charles Lighthouse. Thanks to KPIX+ for use of their broadcast sound. And to the Golden State Valkyries for providing access and support.
Our team includes Isabel Angell, Justin Ebrahimi, Galnadgee Joe-Johnson, Truc Nguyen, James Rowlands, Molly Blair Salyer, and Victor Tence. Ben Trefny is executive producer. Demetrius Johnson is co-producer. Erin Lim is co-producer and the host of BOUNCE season two.