For Natalie Nakase, basketball was everything. The UCLA point guard grew up dreaming of nothing more than playing the game she loved. “That’s my passion,” she once said. “My dad was passionate about basketball.” After graduating from UCLA, she had stints in the National Women’s Basketball League, suiting up for the San Jose Spiders and San Diego Siege across two seasons. A short stop in Germany followed, but injuries cut her playing days short. That’s when she turned the page, embracing coaching—a journey that has now led her to the 2025 WNBA Coach of the Year honor.

Now, a lot has been said about Natalie Nakase, the coach, but what about the player she once was? CBS Sports reporter Matt Lively went back to trace her roots, all the way to Huntington Beach, California, where Nakase’s love for the game first began to take shape.

Interestingly, Matt tracked down her high school coach, Pete Bonny, who shared what it was like coaching the youngest Nakase. Bonny, who went on to win six titles in his decade-long run at Marina High, had a strict rule–no freshmen on varsity. “He thought there was no way I’d make it,” Natalie Nakase recalled. “He said, ‘I don’t put freshmen on varsity.’” But after just 30 minutes of watching her play, Bonny broke his own rule and gave her a spot on the team.

The current Golden State Valkyries coach led Marina High to the 1998 CIF championship and earned Orange County Player of the Year honors. “That was really the epitome of a team,” Bonny said of that run. “She was the choreographer. Defensively, she told people where to go, and offensively, she put everyone in their place.” That instinct, that eye for the game, is what has led an expansion team to the playoffs in its inaugural year.

At the center of Nakase’s pursuit of basketball was her dad, who was also her coach, her mentor, her inspiration, the one who made her fall in love with the game. Turns out, in the 1980s, most nights led her to an Orange County gym, where her father, Gary Nakase, co-founded and ran a Japanese American pickup league. Natalie and her sisters sat courtside with the scorebook in hand, tracking every bucket. For Gary, it wasn’t just about keeping score–it was about teaching his daughters how to see the game, to break it down, and to think like players before they ever stepped on the floor. “I thought that was my normal childhood,” Nakase had said in the interview with Lively. “Now I look, and he was training me for this moment.” 

The 5’1″ point guard graduated from Marina as the all-time leader in assists, steals, and three-pointers made. In 2024, the school retired her jersey, making her the first girls’ basketball player to ever receive that honor. A fitting reminder of just how much she meant to her high school.

Nakase would go on to play college ball at UCLA, though her journey didn’t begin smoothly. In a summer league game, she tore her left ACL and was forced to redshirt her freshman season. But she fought her way back. By the time her Bruins career ended in 2002, she had become a cornerstone of the program—an All-Pac-12 honorable mention who started her final 58 games. She then played three years of pro ball before retiring early due to injuries.

Now we see her choreographing the game from the sidelines instead of running it on the court. Under her watch, the Valkyries set a new record for most wins by an expansion team, finishing 23-21. But their season has now come to a sad end.

Coach Natalie Nakase gives an emotional speech to her players

Entering the Field of 8 as the eighth seed, the odds were stacked against the Valkyries from the start. Their first test? The top-seeded Minnesota Lynx, a team that had dropped only 10 games all season. It was always going to be a tall task–and it showed. In their first-ever playoff game, the Valkyries were handed a harsh welcome, falling 101-72 in a one-sided drubbing.

But Game 2 promised hope. The Valkyries came out firing, going all guns blazing. At one point, they had built a 17-point lead. But the Lynx, being the Lynx, refused to fold. They rallied back and edged out a 75-74 win, ending Coach Nakase and her Valkyries’ dream run. Expansion teams rarely find success right away, but the Valkyries proved to be an outlier. Golden State built its roster with overseas talent and players left behind in the expansion draft, yet it turned that mix into something special. To guide such a team to this kind of season was nothing short of Coach of the Year worthy.

Nakase later delivered an emotional message to her players in the postgame conference. “So proud. So proud. That’s the first thing I said. Number one, I said, ‘Get your f—– heads up.’ They were down, and I said, ‘I want everyone’s eye contact. I wanna feel every single person right now. Your emotions, your heart, I want everything.’ They all looked up, and I just told them how proud I was. To have that place rocking tonight, to have that Ballhalla mentality, to be able to go toe to toe with the number one team, I was so proud,” she said.

The Valkyries’ season might be over, but it will be remembered as the blueprint for every expansion team that follows in the next five years, showing exactly what it takes to survive in a cutthroat league. Natalie Nakase did a remarkable job leading her team to the playoffs despite a wave of injuries, proving that the future is bright for this franchise. And maybe, just maybe, Joe Lacob’s demand: “I have high expectations, and we might as well get that right up front. You have to win a title in five years,” can soon become a reality!