An unexpected basketball lifer, Lin Dunn relishes challenge of restoring Indiana Fever

When Lin Dunn began high school in Florence, Ala., it was illegal for girls to play interscholastic basketball.

Her family moved to Dresden, Tenn., midway through high school, and she finally got the chance to play on a school team. Except it wasn’t the regulation game boys played. This was half-court, six-on-six basketball, a game where dribbling was limited and only forwards were permitted to score. She only got the chance to play in intramurals in college because UT Martin did not have a varsity team yet.

At her first job, she balanced coaching volleyball, tennis and basketball while supervising cheerleaders and teaching eight classes a quarter. One time, when the employee who typically slipped on the Austin Peay Governor mascot caught the flu, she donned the mascot costume for a men’s basketball game.

Dunn was never supposed to be a basketball lifer. She turned her first job at Austin Peay — which was just supposed to be as a physical education teacher and cheerleading supervisor — into a four-decade run as a head coach at the college and professional levels.

Today, Dunn enters her first season as the full-time general manager of the Indiana Fever, a team with eight Gen Zers on its roster. Pulling the strings for the franchise is a 76-year-old who can’t quit the game.

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Finding a way

“You had to be a pain in the ass, let’s just be honest,” Dunn said in 2014 about coaching women’s athletics in the 1970s. “Everything was ‘No, no, no,’ so you just had to find a way.”

When she got to Austin Peay’s campus in Clarksville, Tenn., in 1970, finding a way is what Dunn did. She volunteered to coach women’s volleyball, tennis and basketball despite having no budget and limited resources available. She relentlessly squeezed the most out of her first role, going as far as scavenging used items like warmups and trainer kits from men’s teams.

Dunn continued to be a “pain in the ass” at Ole Miss, where she coached volleyball and tennis for a year before becoming the head women’s basketball coach. She battled the administration over having Black and gay athletes on her teams, and after just two years, she left to coach Miami.

After nine years with the Hurricanes, Dunn accepted the role as Purdue’s head coach in 1987. In West Lafayette, she had more resources than ever before.

“At Purdue, I had two full-time assistants, a graduate assistant, a secretary, a trainer, a strength coach and a sports information director,” Dunn said as the author of a 2014 ESPN article. “I didn't know what to do with all the help!”

Dunn led Purdue to three Big Ten titles and its first Final Four in 1994. Before Muffet McGraw made Notre Dame a two-time national champion, and before Teri Moren made Indiana a consistent threat in the Big Ten, Dunn set the foundation for Purdue to dominate the state.

In the years following Purdue’s Final Four appearance, a rift began between Dunn and the administration. She insisted on a significant pay raise, but athletic director Morgan Burke wouldn’t oblige. Purdue paid Dunn $65,000 a year, which was less than half as much as her mentor Gene Keady made as the men’s coach. Her salary also ranked eighth among coaches in the Big Ten.

The rigid contract negotiations, along with secondary NCAA recruiting violations in 1995, influenced Burke’s decision not to renew what Dunn called her “one-year-at-a-time-contract” following the 1995-96 season. Just 23 months after leading the Boilermakers to the Final Four, she was done at Purdue.

It was the last college coaching job she’d ever have.

Always a student

Lin Dunn is a basketball filmaholic. She wears that label with pride.

“She's obsessed with the game,” former Fever GM Kelly Krauskopf said. “She's always wanting to learn more.”

When Dunn could afford to — her salary at Austin Peay was only $7,000 a year — she attended numerous coaching clinics. Dunn, who was often the only woman in attendance, studied legends like Bob Knight, Dean Smith and Jim Valvano as they taught the ins and outs of the sport and educated young coaches on how to lead. She read books by Pat Riley and Bill Walsh on leadership. She closely observed the dynasties of the Lakers, Celtics and Pistons of the 1980s.

“She is probably one of the smartest strategists, great communicator with her players that I’ve ever been around,” said Krauskopf, who is now the assistant GM of the Pacers. “She's a master at getting players to understand kind of what she wants, how she wants to play.”

One would think being known as a basketball genius is enough for most people. Except Dunn is a filmaholic. No matter where she is or what her role may be, Dunn is pondering new ways to approach the game.

After some of her wins as Fever coach from 2008-14, Dunn would admit, “That was boring.” How could winning a game at the highest level of the sport be boring? In her words: because the opposing coach “didn’t throw anything new at me.”

Dunn doesn’t just want to be involved. She was not satisfied with making it to the professional level. Even with 560 career wins, a WNBA championship and a spot in the Women's Basketball Hall of Fame, her motor is still running.

It’s not enough to participate. She needs the thrill. The challenge. This is a woman who would draw plays on a cocktail napkin while attending upscale dinners with potential sponsors and partners.

Her basketball brain never shuts off.

'Been there, done that.'

The coaching career of Lin Dunn is a story of timing.

In college, she begged UT Martin women’s athletic director Bettye Giles to start a varsity women’s basketball team. Giles wasn’t able to start the women’s program until 1969, the fall after Dunn graduated.

Three years after she was let go at Purdue, the Boilermakers won the 1999 national championship. Dunn’s former assistant Carolyn Peck guided Purdue to the title led by seniors Stephanie White and Ukari Figgs, whom Dunn recruited and coached as freshmen.

In 2000, Dunn became the Seattle Storm’s first coach and general manager. Dunn drafted three-time WNBA MVP Lauren Jackson and WNBA all-time assists leader Sue Bird first overall in consecutive drafts but resigned in 2002 before the duo won two championships together.

"I'm great. I'm fine. But I do want to put Lin first,” Dunn said when she stepped away from the Storm in September 2002. “I do want to take a break. I just want to re-evaluate, refocus on Lin and decide what my next challenge will be."

As head coach of the Fever, the timing finally aligned for Dunn. The Fever made the playoffs in all seven seasons with her as head coach. In 2012, Dunn and the Fever finally broke through for the franchise's first WNBA championship.

Although she retired as coach in 2014, some wondered if Dunn wanted to return to the sidelines in 2022 when she took over as interim general manager.

“Absolutely not,” Dunn said when asked if she thought about coaching again. “Been there, done that.”

The timing of Dunn becoming the GM of this franchise, at this point in its reconstruction, is peculiar.

What does she have left to prove?

'Enjoying the challenge of putting the Fever back on the map.'

Interim head coaches typically go for the jugular. After all, it may be their only opportunity to hold that position. But interim GMs? Just hold the fort down until the organization finds someone new to carry out their vision.

But this is Lin Dunn. She was never going to hold the fort down for anyone.

When Pacers Sports & Entertainment CEO Rick Fuson called Dunn last February, it was unexpected. He wanted to know if she was interested in being the Fever’s interim general manager.

“The more I thought about it, the more we talked, I thought, ‘You know, this is something that I think I'll do,’” she said. “And I haven’t regretted it. I'm really enjoying the challenge of putting the Fever back on the map.”

Dunn, a special assistant for the Kentucky women’s team at the time, came back to Indiana. By the time Dunn introduced herself to everyone in the building, she had a three-year plan in place.

Less than a month later, Dunn dealt starting center Teaira McCowan to Dallas for two first-round picks in the 2022 WNBA draft. The pair of new picks added to the second and 10th overall picks Indiana already owned. The Fever had seven picks by draft night, highlighted by forward NaLyssa Smith going No. 2 overall.

The plan was underway.

“She was supposed to be retired. She's like, ‘I can't retire, I’ve got too much going on in my brain,’” Krauskopf said. “Lin’s a learner, she’s a doer. She’s just constantly moving.”

The interim tag was removed in January. Her transition into the role hasn’t necessarily been flawless. Duties like making sure facilities are in order, hiring the appropriate support staff and selecting trainers, performance coaches and nutritionists are all fresh territory for Dunn.

“Well, there's a lot more going on as a GM than just free agency and draft… there's just a lot of things going on behind the scenes that are different from coaching, but I like it. I enjoy the challenge,” she said.

It hasn’t always been smooth, but Dunn is figuring it out. She frequently calls Krauskopf for assistance. When Dunn first got the job, the two talked daily.

Early on, Dunn called Krauskopf, saying, “I didn’t know you had to do all this other stuff,” which got an exuberant laugh out of Krauskopf, the Fever GM from 2000-17.

“Lin likes challenges. And she likes to be on this side and get into something that she’s maybe not 100% ready for in terms of understanding all the nuances, but that doesn’t bother her a bit,” Krauskopf said. “She’s going to find a way. She’ll work at it until she feels like, ‘OK, I got this down now.’”

After the Fever finished in the basement of the WNBA for the second consecutive season, Dunn hired Christie Sides as the team’s next coach. Sides spent over two decades as an assistant, with this being her first stint as a head coach at college or pro level.

The partnership between GM and coach couldn’t be more seamless. Both have an in-your-face approach to coaching with the ideology defense should always come first.

“I think I sent a message when I hired Christie Sides,” Dunn said. “She’s high energy, she’s demanding. She’s going to make sure this team defends 24/7.”

Listen to Dunn or Sides talk for two minutes, and you’ll know how badly they want to return a defensive mindset to the Fever franchise. The team has finished last in defensive rating in the WNBA three seasons in a row.

In Dunn’s seven seasons as coach, Indiana had a top-five defense five times and twice had the league’s best defensive rating. Tamika Catchings won three of her WNBA-record five Defensive Player of the Year awards under Dunn’s tutelage.

Sides is coming off a season as an assistant for the Atlanta Dream, where she helped transform the Dream’s defense from 10th to fifth in a season.

“Christie’s like a Lin 2.0,” Krauskopf said. “She’s high energy. She's obsessed with the game. She's the young version of Lin to me and it's a perfect fit.”

The Fever made what Dunn called “an obvious choice” by taking Aliyah Boston with the first pick in this year’s draft. Boston is one of the most decorated college players ever, amassing a 129-9 record in her four years at South Carolina. The center from the U.S. Virgin Islands will play a sizable role in retooling the Fever’s defense. Boston won the SEC Defensive Player of the Year four times, while earning the national award as a junior and senior.

On paper, Dunn has set up the most-talented roster the Fever have had in years. Boston and Smith make a skilled, youthful frontcourt pairing, while veterans Kelsey Mitchell and newly-signed point guard Erica Wheeler lead the backcourt.

“I literally and honestly and sincerely expect for us to challenge for a playoff spot,” Dunn said of the franchise that hasn’t seen postseason play since Catchings’ swan song in 2016.

“Can we do it?” Dunn asked rhetorically. “I don't know.”

That’s Lin Dunn. She didn’t know how to coach basketball. She didn’t know she wanted to be a GM. And she doesn’t know if her second act with the Fever will be successful.

But Dunn is going full throttle to bring this organization back to prominence. There’s something about the challenge she can’t turn down.

She brought a three-year plan to Indiana she needs to see through. The goal for Year 2 is to be in the playoff picture. By Year 3, Dunn wants the Fever to instill a sense of fear into their opponents.

Maybe Dunn leads Indiana to another title. Maybe this is another story of Dunn laying the foundation, but being gone before her work culminates. No one knows how long this is expected to last or how well it will work, but one thing is clear: Dunn will be involved in basketball until she no longer can.

“This woman loves the game of basketball. I joke with her all the time like, ‘You have a house in Florida, go to Florida. Like what are you doing?’” Sides said with a chuckle. “I say that and then once I say it I'm like, ‘Never mind. I'm so glad you're here.’ But she's passionate, she loves the game of basketball. She loves the science behind it. She loves building the players and she loves the relationships.

“I think she would be bored to death if she was sitting in the sun out on the beach in Florida. She wouldn’t know what to do with herself.”

This article originally appeared on Indianapolis Star: WNBA: GM Lin Dunn has 3-year plan to put Indiana Fever back on the map