🗽 MEET THE NEW COACH

CHRIS DEMARCO JOINS THE LIBERTY

After a two-month-long search, the New York Liberty finally has its head coach.

On November 21, it was reported that Chris DeMarco will be the new head coach for the Liberty. He succeeds Sandy Brondello, who moved on to Toronto after her four-year tenure in New York concluded in 2025.

DeMarco joins the WNBA after over a decade with the Golden State Warriors, where he won four NBA championships as an assistant. DeMarco has earned plenty throughout his career, and his style as an assistant can translate well to the head coaching position.

“His voice is huge,” Warriors forward Draymond Green told NBC Sports in 2023. “His voice is huge on this coaching staff. Chris DeMarco is one of those guys that’s not afraid to hear his own voice, that’s going to have those tough-ass conversations. He’s not afraid to challenge anyone. And I think that’s a special thing.”

DeMarco joins a Liberty team with championship expectations. 2025 ended on a rough note for New York, and the team hopes they can bounce back with a new voice leading from the bench.

Throughout this year’s coaching cycle, there’s evidence of a couple of trends over the past few years of coaching hires in the W, particularly the lack of Black women head coaches. It brought to mind something I wrote in 2020:

“Whether it’s professional sports, non-profit organizations, tech companies, or any other work setting you can think of, we hear all the time about their plans to increase diversity, expand the pipeline of talent, make leadership more representative of the communities they work in, etc.

However, it almost never shows in the results and we always seem to wind up back at square one wondering what more can be done so that minority candidates get their opportunity to be in leadership positions. It’s frustrating because every hire in a vacuum makes sense individually, but when you zoom out and look at the big picture, the door is shut for certain candidates to get their foot in the door.”

We’ll have plenty more on the next edition of Gotta Get Up.

Although there’s some uncertainty right now in New York, the Liberty remain a premier destination in sports. They have a passionate fanbase that sells out Barclays Center every night. Ownership has shown a willingness to invest in the team and players. And there’s still plenty of wonderful talent up and down the roster

As Jonathan Kolb said, they HAVE to get this hire right. We’ll see if he did.