Heidi VanDerveer

Heidi VanDerveer, who has more than two decades of experience on both the collegiate and professional levels, has been named head women’s basketball coach at Occidental College. She began her coaching career as a graduate assistant for Pat Summitt at the University of Tennessee, when the Lady Volunteers won the 1987 national championship and advanced to the 1988 Final Four. She then spent six seasons as an assistant at the University of South Carolina, helping to coach the Gamecocks to three NCAA tournament appearances.

In 1994, she was hired as the head coach at Eastern Washington, where she led the Eagles to 12 victories in her first year and back-to-back Big Sky tournament appearances, including the school's first in five years.

VanDerveer's first stint in the WNBA came as an assistant coach with the Sacramento Monarchs in 1997, before being promoted to head coach in 1997-98. She spent four years with the Minnesota Lynx as both an assistant (1999-2002) and head coach (2002). After serving two years as a WNBA scout from 2003-05, while also working one year at the University of San Francisco as an assistant and later head coach, VanDerveer was hired as a WNBA assistant for the Seattle Storm. The Storm advanced to the WNBA playoffs in each of her two seasons in Seattle.