Design by Lottie Folline
Paving the Way Coaches and players cheer on the team from the sideline.
Photos by Emma Smith
By Emma Smith
F
ormer Washington and Lee University women’s basketball guard Erin Hughes doubts she’d be a coach, or that she would’ve realized it was even possible, if Christine Clancy hadn’t been her head coach.
do that, too,” Clancy said. “Just the, ‘if you see it, you can be it,’ kind of mindset is completely why I ended up in coaching. I think if I had a male coach, it wouldn’t have necessarily clicked that it was a real option for me.”
“You cannot be what you cannot see,” said Hughes, who became an assistant coach for the W&L women’s team in fall 2021. “For me, seeing Clancy as a strong woman who loved her career as a basketball coach showed me that it is acceptable for women to work in athletics.”
“You cannot be what you cannot see”
It’s also true for Clancy, who was coached by a woman, Carol Simon, at Brandeis University. “When you see someone in that role that looks like you, you believe that you could 12
Erin Hughes Clancy became assistant coach of the W&L women’s basketball team in 2011 after coaching at Colby College and Smith College. She only expected to stay a few years, but she became the head coach in 2012. “I really just came here because there was an opening,” she said. “I
fell in love with the school and the people and the place. So, I applied to be the head coach.” In her first year as assistant coach, the team went 14-13. This year, the team had a record-breaking season with a 20-7 record, setting a program high for single-season win percentage. The team landed the No. 1 seed in the Old Dominion Athletic Conference tournament— and an at-large invitation to the NCAA Division III tournament. Clancy also earned the ODAC Coach of the Year award. When she became head coach, Clancy focused on improving the team’s standing in the ODAC and making it to the NCAA tournament. “I cared about our culture and our program and the students, but I was definitely