“She used to embarrass me”: When Dawn Staley recalled Tara VanDerveer cutting South Carolina HC from 1992 Olympic Team

South Carolina coach Dawn Staley recalled the time when Stanford legend and former US national team coach Tara VanDerveer cut her from the final squad for the 1992 Olympic Games in Barcelona, Spain.

The unfortunate event was discussed in an episode of "The Old Man and the Three's Coaching Series" podcast hosted by current L.A. Lakers coach J.J. Redick and sports podcaster Tommy Alter. The episode was posted on YouTube in January 2022.

Staley described VanDerveer, a three-time national champion with Stanford, as a strict and methodical coach who values high-percentage basketball over the flare and razzle-dazzle of the sport. She told Redick and Alter that VanDerveer cut her in the final lineup of the 1992 team and was relegated to Team B.

"She (Tara VanDerveer) used to embarrass me. Like I tried out for the 1992 Olympic Team and i got cut. I made the B team so we trained and Tara used to come up to me and say 'If the Olympic coach wanted a point guard do you think i would recommend you?,'" Staley said. (15:48)

"I'm like: 'Yeah like why wouldn't you?' She's like: 'No you turn the ball over too much," she added (16:15).

Staley, who was a three-time Olympic gold medalist in the 1996, 2000 and 2004 stagings of the games, admitted VanDerveer's statement initially hurt her feelings but that taught her a valuable lesson of becoming more careful with basketball to be a better point guard.

"I started valuing the ball because that wasn't going to be the thing. There were only two things I wanted to do when I was growing up that was to win a national championship and be an Olympian and win a gold medal," she said (16:27)

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Valuable lesson from Tara VanDerveer helps Dawn Staley become better as a player and coach

Tara VanDerveer's neat lesson of taking care of the ball made Dawn Staley change her ways and be a better ball-handler.

In eight seasons in the WNBA, Staley averaged around 5.1 assists and 2.44 turnovers per game for a 2:09 assist/turnover ratio, considered excellent during her time in the pro leagues.

She carried the lesson over in her coaching career and most of her teams had an assist/TO ratio of more than 1.0 per game. The 2016-17 South Carolina team that won the national championship had an assist-to-turnover ratio of 1.16 as they averaged 14.8 assists against 12.7 TOs.

Last season's team was better despite a higher turnover average. The 2023-24 iteration of the Gamecocks recorded 18.9 assists against 13.3 errors for an assist/turnover rate of 1.42.

The current team is on pace to average the least turnovers in a decade at 12.1 and a high assist/TO ratio of 1.30, ensuring that Staley's lesson from VanDerveer is instilled in every South Carolina player on the roster.