Dawn Staley Gives Reason For Rare Show Of Emotion After National Title Win Over Iowa

Andrew Lyon | Apr 7, 2024

Apr 7, 2024; Cleveland, OH, USA; South Carolina Gamecocks guard Raven Johnson (25) and head coach Dawn Staley / Kirby Lee-USA TODAY Sports

In a rare moment of emotional release, Dawn Staley was moved to tears moments after her South Carolina Gamecocks had won the national championship over the Iowa Hawkeyes on Sunday afternoon. It almost came off as a sense of relief for the usually stoic Philadelphia native, who became just the fifth coach in women's college basketball history to win three national titles in her career.

When she met with the media post-game, Dawn was asked about what it was that moved her to tears. It turned out that it wasn't so related much to the accomplishment itself, but more so to the disappointment of what happened to the Gamecocks last April.

"It was emotional for me because of how it ended last year and I'll leave that there, and I was emotional at the beginning of the game because I didn't want what happened last year to happen this year. So I was handling things in real-time, not afterwards," Staley explained. " It's heavy. You carry the burden of, you know, every single one of your players, all the coaches and staff members that put so much into our team. And you know, it's a heavy load to be undefeated to, you know, finish the job and you get emotional because you just want that for them. And you're happy that you're able to, you know because only one team wins the national championship. And when you win the national championship, there's more trust that's built that you could take into the [postseason]," Dawn continued. "There are so many conversations you have with parents [or] with any significant person in our players' lives [and] you just have to face that music with them and sometimes it's good, sometimes it's challenging, sometimes it's just a really hard conversation and then once you win you know this is the reason why I like [this] and it builds trust."

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