Chicago Sky Add Tanisha Wright to Coaching Staff
Sat, Jan 4, 2025, 4:06 PM
CHICAGO (January 4, 2025) — The Chicago Sky announced today that Tanisha Wright will join Head Coach Tyler Marsh’s staff as an assistant coach. This comes after the Sky recently named Courtney Paris on December 18 as an assistant coach.
Wright joins the Sky with over 15 years in the league as a veteran player and coach. She was recently the head coach of the Atlanta Dream from 2021-24 and an assistant with the Las Vegas Aces in 2020.
With the Dream, Wright secured back-to-back playoff appearances for the first time since 2013, while maintaining double-digit wins in each of her three seasons. She was named AP Coach of the Year in 2022 after she led Atlanta to its most wins in a season (14) since 2018. She also led Rhyne Howard and Allisha Gray to back-to-back All-Star nods in 2022-23 and 2023-24, respectively. Under Wright, Howard was also named 2022 WNBA Rookie of the Year. Wright is only the second coach in Dream franchise history to have a player be named with the honor.
“Tanisha has built an outstanding resume as a player and coach in the WNBA with more than a decade of experience,” Marsh said. “With a long history of accomplishment and player development, she will help us to build a winning culture at the Sky.”
Wright also served as a scout for the USA Basketball Women’s National Team at the 2024 Paris Olympics, and prior to that, served as a court coach for the team at the 2024 FIBA Women’s Olympic Qualifying Tournament in Antwerp, Belgium.
As a former 14-year WNBA veteran, Wright played her first ten seasons with Seattle after being drafted there as the No. 12 overall pick in the 2005 WNBA Draft. She helped the team to nine straight playoff berths and won a championship with the Storm in 2010. She also made stops with New York (2015-16) and Minnesota (2018) before retiring in 2019. She earned WNBA All-Defensive First Team honors five times in her career (2009-10, 2011, 2013-14) with Seattle and All-Defensive Second Team honors twice (2015-16) with New York. Wright also played professionally overseas in Israel, France, Poland and Turkey.
She began her coaching career while still playing in the WNBA as an assistant at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte 49ers in 2017.
Prior to her professional career, Wright was a standout collegiate athlete at Penn State, where she was named a three-time Big Ten Defensive Player of the Year (2003-05), First-Team USBWA All-American (2005), AP Third-Team All-American (2005) and led the conference in scoring in her senior year with 19.3 points per game.
The Sky will tip off the 2025 regular season on Saturday, May 17 against the Indiana Fever at Gainbridge Fieldhouse at 12 p.m. CT. Follow @chicagosky on all social media platforms and head to sky.wnba.com for the latest news, content and ticket purchasing. The full 2025 Sky season schedule can be viewed here.
