Days after he was hired at Virginia Tech, Kenny Brooks made a proclamation he later feared might have doubled when he put his foot in his mouth.
“If Syracuse can make the Final Four, why can’t we?” he exclaimed to applause.
His point was, if Syracuse, which isn’t known for women’s basketball power, could make it to the promised land, so could Virginia Tech.
Brooks didn’t talk about his race. But even this parallel could not be denied. In 2016, then-Syracuse coach Quentin Hillsman became the first black man to lead a women’s team to the Final Four since the tournament was expanded to 64 teams in 1994.
Until now. Brooks, in his seventh year at Virginia Tech, is also part of this elite firm. His No. 1-seeded Hokies defeated Ohio State 84-74 on Monday to earn their seat in the Final Four, a first for the Blacksburg, Virginia-based program. They play third-placed LSU in the first national semifinals on Friday at 6 p.m. ET.
Follow the madness: Latest NCAA Tournament Women’s College Basketball Scores and Schedule
The importance of the moment is not lost on Brooks, the Power Five’s only black male head coach. (When Houston joins the Big 12 in July, Ronald Hughey will be second.)
“Obviously, that’s a subject I don’t shy away from,” Brooks said. “I know when I was trying to make a name for myself, there weren’t very many people who did it or stood up for people who looked like me.”
Last year at the Final Four, South Carolina coach Dawn Staley, the face of women’s basketball, said she wanted to use her platform to lift other black coaches.
She specifically challenged black male coaches because “they don’t get an opportunity” like white coaches and even black women do.
“When Dawn said that, that was it,” Brooks said. “There’s some rhetoric out there that men don’t belong. There are actually some prominent people who say they would never hire a man. This breaks my heart because that’s all family and families need moms and dads and I think so many black men, men in general, can be father figures.”
OPINION: Kim Mulkey shrugs off critics, an important lesson for her players
MORE: Results, schedule, time and TV for the women’s NCAA tournament
Brooks was partially referring to a 2019 story in which then-Notre Dame coach Muffet McGraw said she would never hire a male assistant again. Other large programs such as Stanford have also hired exclusively female employees.
“We’ve fought so hard to get to this point where we don’t talk about race, we don’t talk about gender, and if people don’t give you a chance because of your race, I don’t think we’re there.” got where we need to be,” Brooks said.
“His success opens the door”
Brooks’ performance has been noticed by other coaches across the country who resemble him.
Before their teams tipped Monday night in the Seattle regional finals, Ohio State assistant Wesley Brooks (no relative) said he always draws for Kenny Brooks.
“His continued success is amazing,” said Wesley Brooks. “He doesn’t get McDonald’s All-Americans per se, but he really coaches and develops kids. He’s a great recruiter, but he’s also a great Xs and Os guy. Sometimes, as black men, we’re just labeled as recruiters. So his success opens the door for people like me. Maybe it’ll come to an athletic director’s mind, ‘Hey, maybe I should give this other (black) guy a shot.’”
Wesley Brooks pointed out that every time he goes to a gym to recruit, he sees dozens of black men coaching girls’ club teams. But for some reason, those numbers haven’t carried over to the collegiate coaching ranks.
“There’s a lot of white male head coaches and a lot of women,” Wesley Brooks said. “And there should be a lot of women because it’s a women’s sport, don’t get me wrong. But if there are 65 Power Five boss jobs, I think five of them should be black men.”
Brooks has his roots in Virginia
Kenny Brooks came to Virginia Tech after 14 years with James Madison, his alma mater. Despite a string of unprecedented successes — over an 11-year period, his teams won an average of 26.3 games and five conference titles — he said he didn’t get calls from big local programs when they had job offers. (The University of Virginia, for example, hired a new head coach ahead of the 2011, 2018, and 2022 seasons.)
Brooks, 54, has close ties to the entire Virginia basketball community. He is close friends with Ralph Sampson and Dell Curry, two of the most famous basketball players in the state. He joked that he was “almost 30 years in the Virginia pension system because I was within a two hour radius of everywhere I’ve worked.”
Curry followed the Hokies’ season closely, recording games on the DVR when he wasn’t able to watch them live. Seeing them win on Monday was “wonderful”.
“Virginia is a big state but a small, family-like community,” Curry told USA TODAY Sports. “When someone who grew up there has that kind of success in a public school, it feels like the family wins, like we all win.”
When Virginia Tech called in 2016, he wasn’t sure it was the right move. But then someone pointed out his 60-3 record in CAA play over the past three seasons. Brooks realized, “It was time to see if I could measure my wits against the best.”
A teacher on and off the ground
Brooks understands his role as a teacher.
During Virginia Tech’s game against Ohio State, the Buckeyes used their vaunted press in the first half. Visibly unsettled, the Hokies turned the ball around. Books called a time-out and hit point guard Georgia Amoore in midcourt. But instead of drawing something on his white board, he guided her through gaps in the press. When she finished nodding, they joined the group.
“This man is so fit,” said Amorre after finishing with 24 points. “We have individual (workouts) and he does the move and I copy it exactly.” She said as a visual learner, playing for a former point guard is beneficial. Brooks shows her what to do and she copies it exactly.
He also teaches off the court.
In the summer of 2020, as protests erupted across the country and a nationwide racial reckoning took place following the murder of George Floyd, Brooks rallied his team, a melting pot of diverse backgrounds, and found himself vulnerable. He spoke openly about life as a black man in America, a conversation he said brought his team closer together.
But Brooks is by no means just business. He’s having fun too, especially when he can engage his favorite movie, Jurassic Park, in conversation. (He’s so obsessed with the film that he drives a Ford F150 Raptor.)
While Amoore was freaking out about meeting Sue Bird in Seattle, Brooks had his own “fanboy” moment when Magic Johnson tweeted his congratulations to Brooks and the Hokies on Monday night. This whole journey was a bit surreal, he admitted. He doesn’t want it to end.
And no, he said, he doesn’t have a piece of the net that Staley, who is on the other side of the bracket, sent to coaches across the country last spring.
“I have to get my own,” he said, a playful smile spreading across his face. “Maybe I’ll send her a piece of it.”
Follow reporter for sports companies Lindsay Schnell on Twitter @Lindsay_Schnell
Comments are closed.