9 minute read
Intense With Christ
INTENSE
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WITH CHRIST
CHELSEA NEWTON NEVER SAW HERSELF AS A COACH, BUT THROUGH THE INFLUENCE OF TWO ELITE COACHES, NEWTON IS RISING THROUGH THE RANKS. SHE’S GROWING IN HER FAITH AND LIVING IT OUT AS SHE IMPACTS LIVES AND HELPS GEORGIA WIN GAMES.
Chelsea Newton is an assistant coach and recruiting coordinator for the University of Georgia women’s basketball program. She has coached an impressive list of 14 WNBA players and 17 allconference selections in 12 seasons of college basketball coaching with Georgia and Rutgers.
A standout player at Rutgers under legendary coach C. Vivian Stringer, Newton was a fouryear starter, and as a senior in 2005 was named Big East Defensive Player of the Year. The Sacramento Monarchs made her a second-round selection in the 2005 WNBA Draft, and she helped them win the WNBA championship later that year.
Before the conclusion of her playing career — which included overseas stops in Israel, Poland and Italy — Newton moved into coaching, first serving as the director of player development at Rutgers during the Scarlet Knights’ NCAA runner-up season of 2006-07. But after she officially retired from playing in 2010, she joined Stringer’s staff full time. Newton left for Georgia coach Joni Taylor’s staff in 2015.
We recently talked to Newton about the pivot she’s had to make in recruiting during the pandemic, how she defines success, playing and learning from Coach Stringer, and how her faith in Christ guides her.
By Jason Romano
LET’S START WITH RECRUITING. YOU’RE A COACH BUT ALSO THE RECRUITING COORDINATOR. WHAT DID RECRUITING LOOK LIKE THIS PAST YEAR DURING THE PANDEMIC?
When everything shut down, I had literally just come from doing an in-home visit in New York and we were going on spring break. We didn’t really know there would be a shutdown, but then the first tournament game got canceled and everybody was like, “What is happening?” We still weren’t quite sure what was going on and we were in the midst of trying to sign a huge class for 2021. We needed to do on-campus visits, we
Newton (right) with Georgia head coach Joni Taylor. needed to do official visits, that’s our thing. So when it was March and everything started to shut down, we were still in shock, thinking this wasn’t really happening.
It still took us a while to figure out that we really weren’t going to be recruiting this year, so we have to figure out how to change the game and reinvent how this stuff happens. So then it became Zoom presentations, Zoom meetings and trying to figure out how we can bring Georgia to someone’s home via computer. We were able to redirect and we feel like we did a pretty good job with getting the kids we were supposed to get.
Newton (left) with Rutgers coach C. Vivian Stringer in 2012.
HOW IMPORTANT IS INTEGRITY IN THE MIDST OF RECRUITING AND DOING THINGS THE RIGHT WAY?
It can be difficult. It really can because your competitive nature comes out. There are times where you have to check yourself. You have to really go back to the drawing board and look at what’s important. What are we doing here and what is the ultimate goal as far as our impact as coaches? It’s not to get the best talent by any means necessary. It’s about building relationships and doing what’s best for the recruit and their family, as well as your program.
But what’s amazing, too, is the way we do things at the University of Georgia, especially with Joni as our lead. She is about integrity and that makes it so easy when your boss is about that. To go against the grain is very difficult, especially in this business. So it is important to surround yourself with likeminded people, and I think Joni has done that.
WHAT DO YOU MEAN WHEN YOU SAY “THE WAY WE DO THINGS AT GEORGIA”?
It is family first. There is a purpose for everything that we do. Joni is huge on community, huge on service, huge on culture, fit. We’re a praying team. We’re a Bible study team. We’re a Bible study staff. Throughout the pandemic, we met every Wednesday or Thursday morning with our chaplain and it was consistent.
We believe that through hard times you’ve got to pray through it, and through great times you’ve got to pray through it. That has been our motto and everybody that has been around us knows that. So in order for us to feel comfortable and to be able to function the way we need to as a staff and as a team, we have to have like-minded people who believe in the culture that Joni has established here.
YOU’VE BEEN AROUND BASKETBALL FOR A WHILE. WHAT IS YOUR DEFINITION OF SUCCESS?
It’s wins (laughs). Wins are important now. You can’t keep a job without winning games. That’s just the truth. You can do a lot of amazing things on and off the court and impact lives, but if you don’t have wins on the court, that’s ultimately what we get measured on. And that’s the hard part of the job, when you’re trying to do it the right way and you’re impacting lives and you’re doing all of the things that nobody sees, but you’re doing it because you know it’s important. You’re doing things right morally and ethically.
To listen to the entire interview with Chelsea Newton, visit SportsSpectrum.com
WHAT WAS LIFE LIKE GROWING UP IN LOUISIANA?
Growing up in Monroe, Louisiana, my parents were originally from Arkansas. I’m the baby girl; I have an older sister so it’s just the two of us. My mom is a psychologist, my dad is an electrician, so you can imagine growing up in a house with a child psychologist. I always had to be on my p’s and q’s.
I’m so grateful for my family. My parents at a young age, showed me Christ, had me in church, the basis of my faith. I tell people, “You don’t understand how lucky you are to grow up in a family where Jesus is the first thing, because some people don’t get that at all. And they’re fighting as an adult to figure it all out and that’s tough.” But to have a base is what I’m forever grateful for from my parents.
I went to an all-Black high school and during that time I met with the FCA (Fellowship of Christian Athletes) president. I went to FCA camp a couple times in New Orleans and that was a turning point for me. For the first time in my life, I realized my connection with Christ. This was not my parents’ faith. This is me, this is my relationship.
DID YOU KNOW THAT YOU ALWAYS WANTED TO COACH?
No, I did not want to coach (laughs). At all. I wanted to play basketball and be in sports administration. My intention after school was to get my MBA and get in administration. In my mind, I wanted to be a general manager for a sports team; I just knew I wanted to be in sports. But I got drafted into the WNBA and plans change. After my first year playing professionally, I went back to Rutgers and Coach Stringer in 2006-07 during my offseason, and was doing some work for the team. It happened to be the year we went to the national championship game. And so that was my first introduction to coaching and I was like, “Nope, absolutely not. This is not what I want to do, and it was way too much work.” I wanted to be able to be around basketball but not live in it. And at the end of that year, I was like, “No Coach (Stringer), I’m good. I don’t want to do this anymore.”
I continued to play and every year she would call and tell me I should be coaching. And so my last year playing overseas, through prayer and reading, I just kept having this overwhelming feeling that I wasn’t supposed to be playing basketball anymore. I
was always injured anyway, but finally the last month of me playing in Italy, I called Coach and told her I thought this was my last year. I remember knowing that my career was over and I called Coach Stringer and told her I was retiring. She was like, “All right,” and a month later, I was at Rutgers as an assistant coach.
YOUR TWITTER BIO HAS 1 PETER 2:24-25 IN IT. CAN YOU TELL US ABOUT THAT PASSAGE AND WHAT IT MEANS TO YOU?
I’ve had ups and downs in my faith. I’ve been the one to encourage others to read and even led chapels in the WNBA. And then there have been moments where I just felt lost, and it lasted for quite some time where I was just up and down and up and down. I was fighting the feeling, fighting the Spirit talking to me, and then the pandemic came.
Actually, the last two years, Joni has been an integral part in everything that’s been happening to me spiritually just because I’ve been able to see an example every single day. When you’re around spiritual people every single day, our entire staff, it helped me. When [people] say it’s about who you are around every single day, oh my goodness, it is.
And I was going through it. I was at a low low last year in 2019. And people like Joni got me an appointment with a therapist and I was able to do some therapy. It was the best thing ever. It was able to get me grounded again. The pandemic slowed my work life down in order for me to be able to dive in and build an intense relationship with Christ. It has been surreal.
That verse has been so important to remind me to come back to the Shepherd. I was a lost sheep and needed that help and nudge to come back to the Shepherd.
“’He Himself bore our sins’ in His body on the cross, so that we might die to sins and live for righteousness; ‘by His wounds you have been healed.’ For ‘you were like sheep going astray,’ but now you have returned to the Shepherd and Overseer of your souls.” — 1 Peter 2:24-25.
