Duke basketball: Kara Lawson fills out remainder of coaching staff

Newly minted head coach of the women’s Duke basketball program, Kara Lawson, has officially announced her coaching staff.

Kara Lawson’s coaching staff is now set as she continues to get to work as the new head coach of the women’s Duke basketball program.

Lawson has officially hired Beth Morgan Cunningham, Winston Gandy, and Tia Jackson as assistant coaches.

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Beth Morgan Cunningham comes to Durham by way of South Bend, Indiana, as she was an associate head coach with Notre Dame under the legendary Muffet McGraw.

Cunningham announced that she would be leaving the Fighting Irish to pursue other opportunities in mid-May, more than two months before the Blue Devils hired Kara Lawson.

As one of the best players in Notre Dame history, Cunningham started her coaching career at VCU as an assistant and associated head coach before being named as the head coach of the program from 2003 to 2012.

Winston Gandy also has a decorated basketball career after a three-year tenure at Rice as an assistant coach.

Previous to his years with the Owls, Gandy spent time with the Washington Wizards for three years and with the University of Maryland women’s program for a season in which the Terrapins advanced to the Final Four.

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Tia Jackson switches schools in the conference after spending the last five years at Miami (Fla.), but she is no stranger to Duke.

Jackson has a lengthy and detailed basketball life. After starting her playing days at Iowa, she went to the Phoenix Mercury in the 1997 WNBA Draft but shortly thereafter had to end her playing career due to injury.

However, Jackson was clearly not done with the sport of basketball as she quickly got into coaching and has spent time as an assistant at VCU, Stanford, UCLA, Duke, Rutgers, Miami, and eventually back to Durham.

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Tia Jackson and Beth Morgan Cunningham did not cross paths on the same staff at VCU, but Jackson originally left Duke during her first stint as an assistant to become the head coach of Washington University from 2007 to 2011.

With a coaching staff now in place, Kara Lawson can continue her work and find the right players to bring a National Championship to Durham.