- Becky Hammon rose from obscurity
to an outstanding pro basketball career.
The 5'6" guard from South Dakota was lightly recruited
out of high school and undrafted out of Colorado State,
but Hammon clawed her way to super-stardom with
an arsenal of skills that defied her size,
an uncanny ability to contort and angle
around bigger rim protectors, a deadly outside stroke,
and a steady passing hand with the sense, timing,
and creative flair to make all her teammates better.
Hammon's skills left her in the top five
on a variety of WNBA career leader boards.
Her performance was honored as it unfolded,
and again after the fact when the WNBA
acknowledged its greatest ever players.
Before Hammon even left the league
she began making history in another one.
But despite all that individual
success and all that trailblazing,
Becky Hammon never won a championship as a WNBA player,
one of the league's few superstars for whom that's true.
How?
What happened?
What forces conspired to leave one
of basketball's best ever stories untitled?
(dramatic orchestra music)
Hammon didn't get picked in the 1999 draft,
but that's partially because it was crowded
with players from the disbanding ABL.
Going undrafted had a silver lining.
Hammon was assigned as a free
agent to the New York Liberty,
a defensive winning team.
She played understudy and apprentice to
legendary point guard Teresa Weatherspoon.
Hammon would rise from bench warmer
to contributor over her first two seasons,
and the Liberty looked like contenders,
but something got in the way, some things, really, plural.
(dramatic orchestra music)
On one of the very first plays of the '99 season,
literally 40 seconds into Hammon's career,
New York star center Rebecca Lobo shredded ligaments
in her left knee coming down from a rebound.
Lobo missed not only the rest of that season,
but all of the next one after reinjuring the knee.
But even with Lobo, New York might have fallen short.
From the inception of the WNBA in 1997
until Cynthia Cooper's retirement,
the Houston Comets were unstoppable.
Led by a titanic big three of Cooper,
Tina Thompson, and Sheryl Swoopes,
the Comets steamrolled to the first four WNBA championships.
The last two came against the Lobo-less
Liberty who did have their moments.
The rookie Hammon rode the bench for
a '99 team stocked with veterans,
but that changed when New York stumbled
out of the gates in the championship.
Houston smoked New York in game one,
then took a big second-half lead in
game two of the three-game series.
Facing elimination, Liberty coach Richie Adubato
turned to his little-used rookie.
The announcers hinted she might inject some life
back into the game with a bigger second half role.
- [Announcer] Becky Hammon back in the game.
She played well in limited minutes in the first half.
- [Narrator] And indeed, Hammon helped erase a deficit
with a big three, then one, two, three, four
ice cold free throws in the final minutes.
All that set up one of the most exciting
basketball finishes ever down to New York's
Crystal Robinson buried a jumper to tie the game.
- [Announcer] Crystal Robinson ties
the game with 16.3 remaining.
- [Narrator] But with just seconds left
and the Liberty out of time outs,
Thompson got this turnaround bucket to put Houston up two.
The Compaq Center crowd got on their feet to watch
a third straight trophy presentation,
and then, Teresa Weatherspoon hit one of
the greatest shots in basketball history.
- [Announcer] Weatherspoon at the buzzer with three.
Oh, she put it in, she put it in!
And the Liberty win game two!
- So yeah, Hammon was part of a classic playoff game,
one of the few the Comets lost during that era.
But yeah, Houston dominated game three to win it all,
and they repeated the following season.
Those 2000 finals had another close game too,
but this time it was Houston's Cooper hitting
a deep three that sent it to overtime
wherein Houston completed the sweep.
Nobody got past the Comets,
and as their big three faded into the sunset,
Lisa Leslie's LA Sparks ensured the
Eastern Conference would get no relief.
The Liberty didn't get a chance to face them in 2001.
They couldn't close out Dawn Staley
and the Charlotte Sting in the Eastern Conference finals.
New York missed multiple opportunities to send
the decisive game three of that series to overtime.
Vickie Johnson forced an initial effort,
and the Liberty mishandled offensive rebounds.
In '02 the Liberty got their shot at the Sparks,
but they fell apart in the second half
of game one at home despite Hammon's
hot shooting, 18 point performance off the bench.
New York kept it closer in game two and had a chance
to send it to overtime until LA's Nikki Teasley buried
the title winning shot in the final seconds.
In my estimation, 2003 should have been the year.
Weatherspoon's WNBA career was winding down,
but she still quarterbacked a starting lineup
with all-star Tari Phillips in the middle
and the Crystal Robinson, Vickie Johnson
duo filling it up from the outside.
Despite still coming off the bench,
Hammon broke out as New York's leading scorer,
including a game in June in which
she hit six threes and dropped 33 points,
a Liberty scoring record that
wouldn't be broken for a decade.
In late June, New York stood at six and four
with Hammon en route to her first all-star team.
Then disaster struck.
Hammon's torn ACL ended her season and immediately
extinguished New York's postseason hopes.
And it's a shame.
The Sparks finally looked vulnerable in '03.
An Eastern Conference team finally won it all in '03,
but it wasn't the Liberty,
who finished that season below 500 and out of the playoffs,
sliding hard after Hammon's injury.
So during Hammon's rise from end of bencher to key player,
New York fell in three WNBA finals,
and then, lost her for most of the season.
Becky's return in 2004 marked a new era.
Weatherspoon was elsewhere, so Hammon was now the starter,
the point guard running the whole show.
And she thrived in that role,
it was just a lot of stuff around her that didn't go so hot.
2004 was a wacky season, and not just because of the
month-long intermission forced by the Athens Olympics.
The Liberty fired coach Adubato after a seven to nine start.
Pat Coyle took over and turned New York's season around,
but not without speed bumps.
Tari Phillip suffered a season-ending injury in June.
New York had a new 6'4" center,
Belgian youngster Ann Wauters,
but she broke her foot in July.
The Liberty were forced to play a bunch of home games
at Radio City Music Hall after the Republican National
Convention booted them from Madison Square Garden.
In spite of all that, New York persevered.
With Coyle coaching, Hammon leading the way on the floor,
and Elena Baranova assuming a
bigger role in the front court,
the Liberty took down the shorthanded reigning champion
Detroit Shock in the first round of the playoffs.
Hammon's game-winning assist to
Bethany Donaphin sealed the deal.
But the Liberty got swept in the
next round by the Connecticut Sun,
a team led by Nykesha Sales and Taj McWilliams-Franklin,
plus rookie Lindsay Whalen
running point guard against Hammon.
Hammon struggled in that series,
unable to strike a balance between scoring
and distributing to her depleted supporting cast.
New York could have pushed the series to
a third and decisive game, but they lacked the firepower.
The Liberty crumbled down the stretch of game two
with a flurry of turnovers and bouts.
Okay, so how about 2005?
Hammon got even more comfortable in her leadership role,
Coyle got to coach a full season,
and crucially, Wauters' foot had healed.
The center busted out for her
first all-star season in America,
joining Hammon in the honor.
The Liberty overcame a slow start to restore
a winning record and join playoff contention.
And then, Wauters broke her hand
in a late-season game versus Charlotte.
More bad timing, more bad luck for Hammon's top target.
A shame because Wauters had been effective
all summer against the Indiana Fever,
New York's first round opponent,
even posting her career high in points
against them during the regular season.
Without Wauters, New York barely put up a fight
and slipped out of the playoffs in a two game sweep.
After that, another injury, Hammon's sprained ankle
in 2006 doomed her final season in New York.
So Hammon's first four seasons in New York
came during the reign of Western Conference powerhouses.
Her next four seasons made her a star,
but were derailed by injury.
The Liberty won just 11 games in '06,
their worst performance to date.
And on draft night '07 they leaned into their rebuild with
a move that surprised everyone, even the commissioner.
- The New York Liberty traded Becky Hammon in
a second round draft pick in 2008 for the draft rights
to Jessica Davenport and a first round draft pick in 2008.
Wow.
- That trade headlined a huge off-season for San Antonio.
They already had all-star Sophia Young and Hammon's
old Liberty teammate Vickie Johnson,
and along with Hammon they added a couple strong bids,
reigning move improved player Erin Buescher
and Ruth Riley who just won a ring with the Shock.
That core led the Stars to winning records and postseasons
for the first time since moving to San Antonio
from Utah where they had been the Starzz.
But the league's next great point guard stood in their way,
and the one time she didn't, someone else did.
(dramatic orchestra music)
In 2007, despite a season-ending injury to Buescher,
the Stars with an S marched into the playoffs.
They split their opening first round games
against the Sacramento Monarchs.
In the closing moments of game three,
Hammon found her old friend Johnson for the game winner.
San Antonio advanced to face the best of the west.
The Phoenix Mercury had the league's top offense,
thanks to a blistering big three
of Cappie Pondexter, Penny Taylor,
and deadly point guard Diana Taurasi.
At home for game one, Hammon gave San Antonio
the jolt they needed with drives like these
to score 13 third quarter points.
In the final minute, Phoenix's leading scorer
Pondexter hit this tough shot to give
the Mercury an eight-point lead,
but San Antonio wasn't done.
This young post up kicked off an improbable rally
and after the Stars pulled within three,
Taurasi committed a horrid turnover,
just slipping and losing the ball with 11 seconds left.
That was more than enough for Becky time.
Hammon took a handoff from Vickie Johnson
and buried one of the biggest shots of her career.
Game tied, overtime on deck, until this.
Pondexter appeared to just fall down untouched,
but the refs whistled a foul on the Stars,
allowing Pondexter to sink two free throws,
giving this classic game an underwhelming finish.
San Antonio's jaw-dropping comeback
and Hammon's clutch shot went for naught,
and in game two the Stars looked deflated.
Pondexter dominated that one with
33 points as Phoenix completed a sweep.
The Mercury haunted San Antonio for years,
but for one season, 2008, Phoenix took a dip.
Right after winning the '07 championship,
the Mercury lost coach Paul Westhead
and not only failed to defend their title,
but missed the playoffs entirely.
That gave the Stars an opportunity, and they seized it.
Hammon and Young had excellent seasons
and they were joined by a key newcomer, Ann Wauters.
Hammon's old Liberty pal and her wintertime
teammate with CSKA Moscow came onboard
and gave the Stars a strong inside presence,
moving Riley to the bench.
San Antonio boasted the league's best defense,
won a league-leading 24 games, and took care of the Monarchs
and Sparks in the first two rounds of the playoffs.
For the first time,
a team led by Becky Hammon was in the WNBA finals,
and the Stars had extra reason to believe.
They'd gone undefeated in the regular season
against Eastern Conference teams,
including two decisive victories over their finals opponent,
the Detroit Shock.
No such luck on the big stage.
San Antonio's defense focused on stopping
Detroit star Deanna Nolan in game one and succeeded,
but that left Katie Smith and Taj McWilliams-Franklin
free to drop a combined 49 points.
Hammon and company kept the game close,
but couldn't get anything to drop in
the final minutes as Detroit pulled away.
That was sort of the vibe of the series.
Smith helped Detroit build a big lead again in game two,
then Hammon tried frantically to
lead San Antonio back into it,
but ran out of steam in the final minutes.
Smith and the Shock had the advantage
of championship winning experience,
while even Hammon as San Antonio's
veteran leader looked flustered at times.
She shot just one of 10 in a blowout game
through defeat that completed Detroit's sweep.
Even with more experience under her belt,
Hammon would never get that close again.
Her Stars couldn't recreate their top-notch
defense over the next few seasons.
They slipped into the playoffs with losing records,
but never again made it out of the first round.
The West was just too full of titans.
Taurasi's Mercury got them in 2009 en route
to a championship, and then, again in 2010.
In 2011 the Minnesota Lynx took their first step
toward an odd-year dynasty by dispatching
San Antonio in the first round.
The Stars took a game in that series,
but blew their best chance at an upset when
Lindsay Whalen stole an inbound pass on what
could have been the winning possession of game one.
The Sparks did it to San Antonio
with a first round sweep in 2012.
Another ACL tear ended Hammon's 2013 season and spurred
a shift toward her pioneering next step into NBA coaching.
Her career wound down just as Danielle Robinson
was rising to stardom for San Antonio.
In 2014 after a first round sweep
and emotional farewell from Minnesota,
Hammon retired from the WNBA
without a championship to her name.
Hammon entered the league on a contending team,
but during an early era of WNBA powerhouses
when the contenders didn't really contend.
She became a star for some great teams,
but teams that constantly ran into injuries
and suffered a few heartbreaking last-second outcomes.
All that denied Becky Hammon a
WNBA ring in her playing days,
but it took nothing away from her remarkable story,
her profound legacy, and her next frontier.