Tasha Washington, on the left, knows that as a black female head coach of a junior college women’s basketball program, she is showing others “the amount of play for someone like you.” Her husband, Joe Bonham, is her assistant. (Photo courtesy of Scottsdale Community College)
SCOTTSDALE – At first glance, the coaching staff of the women’s basketball team at Scottsdale Community College looks pretty typical. A variety of voices leading the 12 players. If you look closely, the staff are unique.
Head coach Tasha Washington is married to assistant coach Joe Bonham. The two complement each other well on the basketball court. She has a more defensive mind and he is more suited to the attacking side of the ball.
However, the staff is different from the others for other reasons as well. Washington is a black woman. According to NCAA.org, diversity data is difficult to find at the junior college level, but in Divisions I, II and III, 12% of women’s basketball head coaches are black women. It is compared to 32% of white men. White women build the highest percentage of head coaches at 45%. Just 10 years ago, black female head coaches accounted for 8%.
“The more people who look like me, the more opportunities I have to sit at the table,” Washington said. “I feel better …. I have a very diverse group of players. For our black athletes, I’m not inferior to other athletes, not the size of what I can do. It can feel like I’m getting more and more demanding to be their mentor. To play for someone who looks like you. “
Washington acknowledged that it faced the challenge of stepping into the leadership role of a black woman as head coach. She played for Scottsdale’s longtime coach, the Black Bike Meder, and her high school coach was a woman. Her range of influence varied throughout play, but as she diverged, she realized how rare her experience was.
Washington’s promotion to head coach position as the United States celebrates Title IX’s 50th anniversary shows that it will be available to players after the play day is over. She said she wouldn’t sit in the head coach’s chair without the law.
Joe Bonham is watching a practice with his 4-year-old son, Cialan. Bonham is an assistant coach for the women’s basketball team at Scottsdale Community College. (Photo courtesy of Scottsdale Community College)
“Especially, meeting such women, like our coaches, empowers us,” said second-year forward Ashten Martinez. “Depending on how much she has achieved, we will be like,” Oh, we can do that too. ” So just having that role model in our lives, like inside and outside the court … that’s great. “
For Washington and Bonham, the bystander connection reflects their partnership outside the courtroom. Basketball games never get far from their hearts, because games are always played on TV, even when they are at home. It turned their 4-year-old son Ciaran into a fan.
“It’s great just to look at them off the court, just like connecting on the court,” Martinez said. “It will be with us.”
Bonham is a part-time assistant and has a full-time job at Waste Management. He works closely with employees of the East Coast company, so he starts working early in the morning. This schedule allows him to participate in afternoon practice.
“When you are a head coach, you want to have someone around you that you trust and is better than my husband,” Washington said. “He will have my back more than anyone else, so that works.”
Washington and Bonham began dating when they were both Division I level assistant coaches. She was in North Florida and he was in Tennessee.
Related article
Six months after a long-distance relationship, the two became engaged. It is the eve of the team’s match in 2014. The Washington Osprey won the match with a buzzer beater.
After getting married, the two left the game, but the pause lasted only six months. They had the opportunity to coach together at the AAU circuit in Tennessee, and they jumped at it. They coached on Tennessee Flight and helped transform the team from a longtime loser to a consistent winner.
“There is no doubt that both are compatible,” said Talia Dial, who headed the AIA and scored 25.5 points per game as a senior at Dysart High School in Scottsdale’s freshman season. “It’s great to have a female and male perspective when we’re doing things, just as it’s deeper and helps all the players as a whole.”
From Tennessee, Washington and Bonham came to Scottsdale. So Washington played not only professionally, but before competing in Armstrong Atlantic.
When they joined Scottsdale, they both served as assistant coaches. Washington has been promoted to head coach and this past season was her first season to lead artichokes. Scottsdale finished third at the conference with a comprehensive record of 8-12 marks and 14-14.
The team fought the COVID issue throughout the campaign. After not playing games for the last 11 days of January, Fighting Artichokes played 12 games in the three weeks of February.
“The hurdles of helping others, pouring your heart and soul into others, and doing it together, the hurdles you hit, it doesn’t make your own hurdles feel that big,” Bonham says. I did. “Sure, the big ones are easy to overcome, because your spouse helped others to do it, right?
“And if you can do that, that is, together you can do almost anything.”
