Albuquerque Journal · Jul 3, 2022
Title IX paved an unexpected career path for coaching icon Flanagan
Don Flanagan is seen in a portrait photo taken recently at his Albuuqerque Foothills home. (Adolphe Pierre-Louis/Journal)Don Flanagan remembers his reaction when Title IX first made girls high school basketball part of the American landscape.
It was the mid-1970s, Flanagan was coaching boys basketball at Arizona’s Window Rock High, and he decided to watch the school’s newly formed girls team practice.
“I thought, ‘This is never gonna work,'” Flanagan recalled. “Those kids had never been coached and the skill level was so lacking. They had no idea how to be strong with the ball. There were jump balls on almost every possession. It wasn’t pretty.”