‘I have a job to do, and I’m being watched’: Philly’s Dawn Staley accepts Jimmy V Award at ESPYs
“When someone tells me to shut up and coach, I simply say no,” Staley said.
Ten years ago, the late Stuart Scott delivered a speech after accepting the Jimmy V Award for Perseverance at the ESPY awards. He spoke with courage and bravery about his own cancer battle, and his words left a mark on many, including the 2024 recipient of the yearly award given to “a deserving member of the sporting world who has overcome great obstacles through perseverance and determination.”
“Stuart Scott’s speech is one that’s been etched in my mind,” Philadelphia’s Dawn Staley said.
Scott’s two daughters, Taelor and Sydni, presented Staley with the award at the Dolby Theater in Los Angeles on Thursday alongside Philly’s Quinta Brunson.
Scott’s 2014 speech, Staley said, provided “so many lessons for people that are dealing with [cancer], that have it, and their loved ones that sometimes don’t know how to activate in the way that’s going to help the person going through it.”
Staley said that she was “profoundly honored and deeply moved” to be selected for the award but that she felt “a little undeserving” of the recognition.
Past recipients of the award, named for Jim Valvano, the basketball coach who died of cancer in 1993, have been through many of their own battles, Staley said. “I’ve merely been a spectator to such immense courage and resilience.”
A video before Staley’s speech detailed how cancer has been part of the basketball coach’s life. A year ago, Staley lost a longtime friend and assistant coach, Nikki McCray-Penson.
McCray-Penson’s breast cancer was diagnosed in 2013 while she was on Staley’s staff at South Carolina. Staley went with McCray-Penson to her treatments, moved staff meetings to those treatments, and “was able to just be me and act and just be some comfort for her.”
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It helped prepare Staley to be there for her sister, Tracey Underwood, who received a leukemia diagnosis in 2020. Staley mobilized. She called the best hospitals, called people in her network. The experience helped Staley realize that there weren’t many Black donors on the bone-marrow registry and helped inform some of her activism work.
Underwood’s lifesaving stem-cell donations ended up coming from her brother, Lawrence, but Staley was there every step of the way.
“I am forever grateful for Dawn doing the things that she did to help me with the battle of my life,” Underwood said. “She took on my battle with cancer as the biggest opponent she was ever up against.”
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The video presentation, narrated by musician Darius Rucker, also detailed Staley’s work with children’s hospitals and specifically her relationship with a young girl named Blakely, who made necklaces that Staley wears every day.
“I wear them, one, because they’re meaningful,” Staley said. “But, two, because they’re great conversation pieces and you get to spread the word.”
Staley has made her fame in basketball. Her South Carolina Gamecocks earlier this year completed a perfect 38-0 season for Staley’s third national championship. She rose from North Philadelphia’s Raymond Rosen Projects, was a two-time college player of the year at Virginia, a six-time WNBA all-star, and brought Temple to the NCAA Tournament as head coach before leaving for South Carolina in 2008.
But Staley has become a lot more than just a coach. She has inspired many young Black women and girls to pursue their dreams. She has publicly stood up for the LGBTQ+ community and has advocated for equal treatment for women in sports.
“When someone tells me to shut up and coach, I simply say, ‘No,’” Staley said during her speech Thursday night. “I have a job to do, and I’m being watched.”
Staley then challenged those in attendance to use their platforms.
“You have the power to make a difference,” she said. “You can stand up for what is right. You can inspire, motivate, and help others. All it takes is the will to do so.
“With the tenacity of my angel, Nikki, with the determination of my sister, Tracey, and sweet little Blakely, pay it forward. Do the right thing, even if it’s the hard thing. And when they start to troll you on social media, tell them to come see me.”