Lindsay Whalen will coach, not play, for Team Americas

Albany

You can remove the "player/coach" label from Lindsay Whalen for these Aurora Games.

She will just be the coach.

Whalen, recruited to fill both roles for Team Americas during the basketball event Thursday night at Times Union Center, said Wednesday that she won't suit up against Team World in Thursday's game.

"I'm not playing," she said. "That was a year ago."

Whalen, 37, retired from a 15-year WNBA career last summer and took over as head coach of Minnesota, her alma mater.

"I don't even know what would happen if I tried to play basketball right now," she said. "I haven't played since my last (WNBA) game about a year ago."

"You'd still make buckets," Team World player Abby Bishop of Australia told her.

Among the best point guards in women's basketball when she played, Whalen has completed her transition to coaching. The Golden Gophers were 21-11 under their rookie head coach.

"I'll go out and shoot against my players every so often," Whalen said. "I rebounded for my players (Tuesday). That was my role. I'm a great rebounder and a passer, not in a live setting. When it's just one person, I can rebound for them."

Pros, cons of overseas

An injury to Breanna Stewart, the Syracuse native and former Connecticut star, while playing in Europe has cast a new light on Americans playing overseas.

Stewart, the reigning WNBA Most Valuable Player, is missing the entire 2019 season after ruptured her right Achilles' tendon. She is expected to be ready to play for the U.S. in the 2020 Olympics.

During her WNBA career, Whalen went to Europe and played 10 seasons among teams in Russia, the Czech Republic and Turkey. Some of that, she said, was because of the money, but Whalen also wanted to play basketball beyond the summer.

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