Indiana Fever head coach Stephanie White was targeted with calls for her firing for how she handled the recent Sophie Cunningham/DiJonai Carrington situation, which led to members of the media and several Fever stars coming to her defense.
Over the weekend, Phoenix Mercury head coach Nate Tibbetts joined the fray, sticking up for White after being asked about the WNBA having to deal with recent discourse unrelated to the actual play on the court.
Nate Tibbetts spoke on the recent dialogue surrounding politics and the WNBA, especially involving his USA Basketball coaching partner, Stephanie White.
“It really pisses me off. It’s disappointing. This is a great league. We’ve got great players. There are great stories, great… pic.twitter.com/CQwzmmbgDg
— Hayden Cilley (@HaydenCilley) August 15, 2026
‘I don’t know who can help change the narrative’
“It really pisses me off,” Tibbetts told reporters Saturday. “It’s disappointing. This is a great league. We’ve got great players. There’s great stories, great rookies, great teams.
“We just spend so much time talking about the wrong stuff. I don’t know why that happens in our league. It’s disappointing. I don’t know who can help change the narrative. Is it the coaches? Is it the players? Is it the media? There’s outside sources that are trying to create division, and at times it’s not a lot of fun. It’s not a lot of fun for our players. It’s not a lot of fun for our coaches, our organizations, because we are doing great things.”
From there, Tibbetts got into White specifically, as he lamented what “certain coaches in our league have to deal with that on a night-to-night level
“We make it about basketball, but some of the things that Steph has to go through — that’s wrong,” Tibbetts said. “There’s no other coach in any professional sport that has to go through the stuff that she does, and I think of her a lot. It’s not fair. It’s not fair. She’s hired to coach basketball. They got a great team and they’re just dealing with stuff that doesn’t really matter. So that still pisses me off.”
Culture wars continue
As Tibbetts alluded to, White and the Fever have been in the headlines for Cunningham’s comments against transgender women in women’s sports and the ensuing fallout. He’s also not the first coach to accuse outside actors of hijacking the conversation around the league without actually caring about women’s hoops.
Last week, legendary UConn head coach Geno Auriemma called it “an issue that doesn’t exist.”
“Well, not to belittle it at all because I don’t mean to because listen, you know, people have a right to their opinion. I get it,” Auriemma told TMZ. “But why are we making a big issue over an issue that doesn’t exist?”
“I don’t remember reading where there’s transsexual players in the WNBA,” he added. “I don’t remember reading where they were being presented with cases where this is going to happen next week. I don’t see an issue. Why are we making it an issue?”
“We’re making it an issue because there’s enough people out there that need this to be an issue for their own personal gain,” Auriemma concluded.
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