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BOOKS
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ortland lesbian writer Sara Gogol has
made a name for herself chronicling the
rise of women’s professional basketball.
Her bxxiks Playing in a N ew League: The
W omen o f the American Basketball League's First
Season and Katy Steding: Pro Basketball Pioneer
are a part of the growing literature about
women in sports.
Her latest project took her off the court and
onto the sidelines— hut by no means into the
background—o f women’s athletics. Hard Fought
Victories: Women Coaches Making a Difference
profiles these leaders, chronicling their impor
tant contributions to sports and
women’s history.
The Portland
Community College
literature and women’s
studies instructor spent
a year traversing the
United States talking to
more than 60 women
coaches about their
experiences, methtxJs,
challenges and successes.
She visited Division 1
schrxils as well as lower
divisions and included a
variety of sports: basketball,
ice hockey, volleyball, tennis
and more.
The result is a compelling
set of interwoven stories
chronicling the lives of, in
Gogol’s words, “strong women
who have made a difference.’’
Take, for instance, Marianna
Freeman, head women’s basket
ball coach at Syracuse Universi
ty. When she graduated from
high school in 1975, she was part of the first
generation of girls to have athletic scholarships
available to them. Freeman was recruited by
three schools and accepted a scholarship from
Cheyney University, a historically black college
outside Philadelphia. Her coach was
C. Vivian Stringer, now head coach of Rutgers’
The sport of surfing
ind more information on women and
minorities in sports on these Web sites:
• Black Coaches Association: www.bcas-
ports.org
• Center for the Study of Sport in
Society: www.sportinsociety.org
• Women’s Sport Foundation:
www.womenssportsfoundation.org
• Sexual Minorities in A thletics:
www.smia.org
Featuring
Sporting chances
sees a vital need for more professional coaching
opportunities. With the number of women
holding head coaching positions for women’s
teams at an all-time low of 45.6 percent in
2000, Lopiano warns, “Women coaches and
administrators are an endangered species.”
A major barrier for women in coaching is
by M eg D aly
homophobia. In a section called "A Question
of Attitude,” Gogol reveals how insidious— and
deeply painful— this continues to be in college
sports. “Homophobia is in the bone
marrow of women’s sports,” says
£ sports sociologist Mary Jo Kane.
Gogol found that Division I
coaches are least inclined to be
open about their sexual orienta-
8 tion “because they have especially
" strong pressure to win, to recruit
top athletes and to present them
selves as public personalities.”
Readers will be inspired, however,
by Beth Bricker, Helen Carroll and
Jenny Allard— several “out” head
coaches.
Hard Fought Victories has been sell
ing well, and Gogol enjoys being able
to “tell some of that history” to so
many people. Her next project,
though, is “totally different. After
1 Sara Gogol records the history of “strong
doing three nonfiction women’s
I women who have made a difference”
sports books, I’m now tumtng back
women’s basketball
to fiction,” she says, referring to a
team and Women’s
volleyball
novel in progress about three generations
Basketball Hall of
coach Laurie Corbelli, “I tell
of women in a Jewish family, including a
Fame inductee.
them how important they are to me and that
Holocaust survivor.
It was Stringer
I’m there for them.”
Learning about one’s history,.she feels, is
who encouraged
vital inspiration. “The more I learn about
Freeman to go into coach
ne reason Gogol wrote Hard Fought Victories
women’s history, the more important it
ing, and eventually Freeman became her
was to make a contribution to the recording
becomes to me.’ ’ i n
assistant coach. As Gogol writes, “It was a
of women’s history. Bom and raised in
coaching move that inspired Marianna to work
Chicago, she grew up before Title IX— the 1972
M eg D aly is a Portland free-lance writer.
even harder to excel.”
educational amendment that bans sex discrimi
One of the issues Gogol’s book highlights is
nation in schools, whether it be in academics or
mentoring. Stringer is noted by several coaches
athletics— and had little to no opportunity to
as a primary role model.
participate in competitive sports.
ara Gogol interviewed a number of area
Now in her role as head coach at Syracuse,
Instead of teams for girls, she explains, “We
coaches for her book, including Willamette
Freeman told Gogol, “It’s important that 1 use
had PE. classes and a little intramural play
University volleyball coach Marlene Piper
basketball to teach young people about life.”
called Girls Athletic Association, for which
and head basketball coach Paula Petrie, U ni
there was no coaching."
Being a role rruxlel for African American play
versity of Oregon assistant track coach Sally
ers is essential too, Freeman says. “I think it’s
Lack of sports opportunities meant Gogol
Harmon and Portland State University softball
real important that I’m out there as a woman
and other young women missed out on having
coach Teri Mariani.
and as an African American woman.”
a female athletic mentor. She cites her aunt
You can support your local womens sports
and mother as her role models of “women who
One of the similarities the writer found
teams by filling up those stadiums. Check out
could use their minds and who had a strong
among the coaches is how they treat their play
these season schedules online:
political awareness.”
ers both on and off the court or field. No mat
Portland State University:
ter how tough they are, most use an ethic of
Though girls and women today have many
goviks.ocsn.com
caring. University of Texas track coach Beverly
more opportunities to participate in competi
• University of Oregon:
Kearney tries to create “a family relationship”
tive sports, we’re a long way from gender parity
goducks.ocsn.com/calendar/ore-calendar.html
with players, while Willamette University
with men in sports— and especially in coaching.
• Willamette University:
Gogol, like Donna Lopiano, executive
volleyball coach Marlene Piper emphasizes
www.willamette.edu/athletics
director of the Women’s Sports Foundation,
“respect for human dignity.” Says Texas A&.M
Sara Gogol’s latest book celebrates victory
and challenges homophobia in women’s sports
History in the making
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am
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