Growing number of Black women in basketball leadership roles provides renewed optimism

This is a column by Shireen Ahmed, who writes opinion for CBC Sports.  For more information about  CBC's Opinion section , please see the  FAQ .

During Black History Month, the Toronto Raptors organization hosted an event called "Soul 2 Sole."

It was a fireside chat featuring some high ranking and influential Black women in basketball. Among the panellists were WNBA player Natalie Achonwa, Phoenix Mercury assistant GM Monica Wright Rogers, and Jhanelle Peters, a mental health clinician with the Raptors Organization. Dr. Laceé Carmon-Johnson, manager of Basketball Advancement (also with the Raptors) moderated the session.

We are certainly not a country where women are in short supply in basketball communities — see the commissioners and founders of Maritime Women's Basketball League, Hoop Queens, Girls Addicted to Basketball and Muslim Women's Summer Basketball League — as well as prominent women in broadcasting, like Kayla Grey, Kate Beirness, Meghan McPeak, Amy Audibert and Savanna Hamilton.

Then there are people like Kia Nurse who work in broadcasting, play professionally and have a development academy for girls.

Although only 26 per cent of university and college coaches in Canada are women, there is a space where women are thriving; and it's in women's basketball.

My friend, Christa Eniojukan, is head coach of women's basketball at York University. During a conversation we had over the phone, she counted at least 26 universities across Canada that have women head coaches. She told me about a coaching grant from Canadian Women & Sport that empowered women to get training and emboldened them to apply for head coaching positions for which they were very much qualified.

"Last year there were four