Jennifer Azzi steps down as USF coach
Jennifer Azzi, a trailblazing basketball legend who led the University of San Francisco back to the postseason this year, is stepping down as head coach of the Dons after six seasons. “I feel that I have accomplished my goal of building a championship caliber program at USF,” Azzi said in a statement released Thursday morning. Azzi led the Dons to their first NCAA Tournament appearance in 19 years this past March, using a dramatic run as a sixth seed to win the West Coast Conference tournament and earn the league’s automatic bid. At a banquet honoring Warriors president Rick Welts, she came out publicly as gay and acknowledged her wife Blair Hardiek, an associate coach at USF. Azzi, a member of the Women’s Basketball Hall of Fame, led Stanford to its first NCAA Championship in 1990 and earned a gold medal at the 1996 Olympics, with her college coach Tara VanDerveer.