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LSU women’s basketball head coach Kim Mulkey declined to comment. Brittney Griner’s detention in Russia at a press conference on Monday, prompting backlash from former Baylor players. Meanwhile, current Baylor head coach Nicki Collen spoke at length about the situation, calling it a “human rights issue”.
Mulkey, who was Griner’s head coach at Baylor when the two fell out in 2013, was asked by a reporter about his thoughts on the The WNBA star’s situationadding that he hadn’t seen any comments from her about it.
Brittney Griner #42 (L) and Jordan Madden (R) #3 of the Baylor Bears hug head coach Kim Mulkey after winning 80-61 over the Notre Dame Fighting Irish in the NCAA Division Women’s Basketball National Championship Final I 2012 at the Pepsi Center on April 3, 2012 in Denver, Colorado.
(Doug Pensinger/Getty Images)
Mulkey interrupted the question by saying, “And you won’t.”
BRITTNEY GRINER’S SITUATION TURNED OFF RUSSIA’S WNBA PLAYERS, PLEADING SAFETY
The incident prompted two former players to speak out against Mulkey’s remark.
Former Baylor Center and 2022 WNBA Draft first-round pickQueen Egbo, took to Twitter to seemingly warn the head coach’s recruits.
WNBA guard Chloe Jackson, who played at Baylor from 2018 to 2019, also tweeted about Mulkey’s “silence”.
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Baylor’s current head coach, Nicki Collen, was also asked about the situation and, although she has never coached Griner personally, she spoke about its impact on women’s basketball and looked at his situation through a more personal lens.
“I think BG, first and foremost, is people first. I think it’s a human rights issue. No one is saying she didn’t make a mistake. None of us isn’t perfect. But I guess I would like to know if I did something and was stuck in a foreign land, and what it was, what it wasn’t. I think we all know 10 years is a long time. I see her as a mother, as a sister, as a wife, as a daughter, as an incredible ambassador for basketball.”
Head Coach Nicki Collen of the Baylor Bears watches from the sideline the first round of the 2022 NCAA Women’s Basketball Tournament against the Hawai’i Rainbow Wahine held at the Ferrell Center on March 18, 2022 in Waco, Texas.
(Darren Carroll/NCAA Photos via Getty Images)
She continued: “I just think about what it would be like to be away from my family for over 200 days. It’s for me first and foremost. I think it’s a humanitarian thing… We should do whatever is in our power to get Brittney home.”
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Mulkey’s comment was brought up in a question to Collen, but she wasn’t asked to comment, to which she replied, “Thank you.”
Baylor University’s Brittney Griner (42) and head coach Kim Mulkey celebrate after defeating the University of Notre Dame in the Division I Women’s Basketball Championship held at the Pepsi Center in Denver, CO. Baylor beat Notre Dame 80-61 to win the national title.
(Jamie Schwaberow/NCAA Photos via Getty Image)
According to ESPN, Griner and Mulkey fell out in 2013 when she claimed players on the team were told not to talk openly about their sexuality.
Collen added that she spoke to Griner after taking the coaching job at Baylor in 2021 to bring her back to campus and have her jersey retired.
“She made Baylor a household name,” she said.
