Speaking to reporters after her University of South Carolina Gamecocks advanced into the Final Four for this year’s NCAA Women’s Basketball Tournament Sunday, Coach Dawn Staley reflected on “the devastating loss that we had last year.” She said it “pulled us back here with a totally different team,” adding, “If you don’t believe in God, something’s wrong with you.”
She added, “I’m a believer because … He makes things come true. When you’re at your worst, He’s at His best.”
The comments did not sit well with the Freedom From Religion Foundation, a Wisconsin-based legal organization that advocates for a strict separation of church and state.
In a letter to the University of South Carolina on Monday, FFRF staff attorney Christopher Line cited the remarks as an example of “Staley’s ongoing promotion of her personal religious beliefs and her denigration of non-Christians through the women’s basketball program.”
Line ordered the university to “take action to protect its student athletes and to ensure that Staley understands that she has been hired as a basketball coach and not a pastor.”
The organization also suggested Staley is coercing her students to adopt religion.
Staley is unfazed by the criticism. In a post on X, Staley declared, “I am not ashamed to praise him for what he continues to do for me and mine.”