Cynthia Cooper
Cynthia Cooper is a prominent figure in women's basketball, best known for her exceptional career in the WNBA and her significant contributions to the sport as a player and coach. Growing up in a large family in Watts, Los Angeles, Cooper faced numerous challenges but found her passion for basketball during her teenage years. She attended the University of Southern California, where she helped the Lady Trojans win national championships and earned recognition as a talented player. Cooper's professional career took off when she joined the Houston Comets, leading the team to four consecutive WNBA Championships from 1997 to 2000 and earning MVP honors in each series.
In addition to her club success, Cooper also made a mark on the international stage, representing the U.S. in the Olympics and the FIBA Women's World Championship, where she won multiple medals. After retiring from playing, she transitioned into coaching, holding positions at various universities and impacting young athletes with her intense coaching style. Cooper is also committed to community outreach and empowerment for young women, advocating for breast cancer awareness in memory of her mother. Her legacy as a player and coach continues to inspire future generations in sports.
Cynthia Cooper
Basketball Player
- Born: April 14, 1963
- Place of Birth: Chicago, Illinois
SPORT: Basketball
Early Life
Cynthia Lynne Cooper grew up in a big family with three brothers and four sisters. She was the middle child. Her mother, Mary Cobb, taught her children the importance of hard work and trusting in the Lord. Her mother raised eight children by herself, working for the rapid transit department in Los Angeles. The family had moved from Chicago when Cooper was about one year old. For a number of years, they lived in the area known as Watts. Cooper faced tough times living in that area, and she desired to get out of the neighborhood someday.
The Road to Excellence
While attending Gompers Junior High School, Cooper had her first introduction to basketball while watching others practice. She persuaded one of the high school coaches, Lucias Franklin, to teach her how to play the summer before she entered Locke High School. As a result, she made the varsity team her first year in high school. In addition to developing as a basketball star, she also ran track, devoting her energies to the 400 meters. During her senior year, the Locke Saints won the California AAAA state championship. Cooper was named the league’s Most Valuable Player (MVP) and Los Angeles Player of the Year in 1981.
The Emerging Champion
Cooper attended the University of Southern California (USC), graduating as a physical education major in 1986. While at college, she helped the USC Lady Trojans to three Final Four competitions and to national championships in 1983 and 1984. After the victory in 1983, she and her teammates received an invitation to the White House to meet President Ronald Reagan.
In 1985, Cooper’s basketball career took a backseat to family obligations when she dropped out of school to work for a bank in Inglewood, California. After spending a season away from the game, she began playing pickup games and joined a local touring team that played in Mexico. From this experience came an offer to play professionally in Austria. Instead, she reenrolled in college to finish her senior year and graduate.
While at USC, Cooper never really had the chance to shine; she played in the backcourt and was overshadowed by stars like Cheryl Miller. She was never named to an all-American team, but she did make the all-Pac-10 Conference team in 1985–86. When she graduated, her choices for continuing her basketball career were fairly limited and outside the United States. In 1986 and 1987, she played in Segovia, Spain, followed by over a decade of playing in Parma and Alcamo, Italy. While in Italy, Cooper was named Rookie of the Year and Player of the Year in 1987.
Cooper played in the Goodwill Games in 1986 and 1990 and the Pan-American Games in 1987, when her team won the gold medal. In addition, she played in the 1986 FIBA Women’s World Championship with the US national team. She also had the joy of representing her country in the Olympics in 1988, 1992, and 2000, winning three medals: two gold and one bronze. She was not asked to play in 1996, when the call seemed to go to younger, better-known players.
Continuing the Story
In 1997, Cooper finally had the chance to play professionally in the United States following the creation of the Women’s National Basketball Association (WNBA). In 1997, she joined the Houston Comets, and the team won WNBA Championships in 1997, 1998, 1999, and 2000. She was named MVP in each of those four series. She was selected to the all-WNBA first team for four consecutive years, and she was a Western Conference all-star in 1997 and 1998. She led the league in scoring from 1997 to 1999. Finally, she was a star in her own country. In 1997–98, she won the ESPY Award for Female Basketball Player of the Year. That same year, she was second in the voting to soccer star Mia Hamm for the Woman Athlete of the Year award. Cooper also won an Arete Award for courage in sports in 1998.
In 1999, Cooper wrote a book about her basketball journey, She Got Game. In this book, she talked about her life from humble beginnings in Watts to her later stardom in the WNBA. She also discussed her family and the people in her life who helped and inspired her to become the best she could be. In December 2000, she was named the head coach of the Phoenix Mercury, replacing Cheryl Miller. Having married sports agent Brian Dyke earlier in 2000, Cynthia Cooper-Dyke returned briefly to the WNBA in 2003, hoping to recapture her past glory on the court. At the age of forty and after two years out of the league, she received a loud ovation during player introductions on her first night, and she scored eleven points and had seven assists in her first game back, reunited with teammate Sheryl Swoopes and the Comets. Her comeback was short-lived, however, as she retired from the league in 2004.
In 2005, Cooper was named the women’s basketball coach at Prairie View A&M University, a small school in Texas primarily known for a losing sports program. The football team had an eighty-game losing streak, and the men’s basketball team finished 0–28 in one season during the 1990s. Cooper, a noted disciplinarian who approached the game with a fierce intensity, made an immediate impact on her new team, leading the Panthers to the Southwestern Athletic Conference tournament title and the school’s first women’s National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) Basketball Tournament bid. However, success came with a high price for Cooper, who was penalized by the NCAA for rules violations in 2008. Prairie View was placed on probation for four years, scholarships were cut, and practice hours were curtailed. Violations committed by Cooper ranged from giving small amounts of money to players, holding unauthorized practices, and giving away free Comets game tickets to her players. School officials at Prairie View accounted for the violations, citing inexperience on the part of coaches and other athletic staff.
After being inducted into the Women's Basketball Hall of Fame in 2009, Cooper stepped down from her post at Prairie View to accept the open position as head coach at the University of North Carolina Wilmington in 2010. That same year, she was inducted into the Basketball Hall of Fame due to her remarkable career on the court. After leading the Seahawks to the Women's National Invitational Tournament two years in a row, she resigned from her position and returned to Texas to coach at Texas Southern University for one year in 2012. The following year, it was announced that she would be welcomed back to her alma mater, USC, as the women's basketball program's head coach. Upon the announcement of her appointment, she stated to the media that it had always been one of her biggest dreams to return to USC to coach the Trojans. That year, the team made it to the NCAA Tournament for the first time since 2006. Cooper spent four years coaching at USC, followed by another three years returning, once again, to coach at Texas Southern. She retired from coaching in 2022. In retirement, Cooper continued to make media and public speaking appearances. She remained committed to empowering young women through community outreach, education programs, and sports clinics.
Summary
Cynthia Cooper retired from professional basketball competition at the end of the 2004 season, having won four consecutive WNBA Championships with the Houston Comets from 1997 to 2000. She left behind much more than that legacy, however. She played basketball with high intensity. The only retired player to be named to the WNBA’s first all-decade team, she averaged twenty-one points in 124 games over five seasons. She considered herself a role model for others, showing them what was possible with hard work. She used her time in the WNBA to become a positive example for others from the inner city and beyond. She also became a spokesperson for breast cancer awareness and research, both on and off the court, wearing a pink ribbon on her uniform as a constant reminder of the disease that killed her mother in 1999.
Bibliography
Berkow, Ira. “Cooper Leaving Behind a Legacy of Greatness.” New York Times, 28 Aug. 2000.
Cooper, Cynthia. She Got Game: My Personal Odyssey. New York: Warner, 2000.
Cooper-Dyke, Cynthia. “I Want My Damn Respect, Too.” The Players' Tribune, 23 Nov. 2020, www.theplayerstribune.com/posts/cynthia-cooper-dyke-wnba-basketball. Accessed 10 June 2024.
Deitsch, Richard, Richard O’Brien, and Mark Bechtel. “Q and A: Cynthia Cooper.” Sports Illustrated 2 June 2003: 31–33.
Ponti, James. WNBA: Stars of Women’s Basketball. New York: Pocket, 1999.
Rutledge, Rachel. The Best of the Best in Basketball. Brookfield: Millbrook, 1998.
Trotter, Jim. “Trotter: For Cynthia Cooper to Return, More Must be Done. The Wounds Are too Fresh.” The New York Times, 7 Apr. 2024, www.nytimes.com/athletic/5396128/2024/04/07/cynthia-cooper-womens-basketball-coach-final-four-all-star-coach. Accessed 10 June 2024.