VANCOUVER—The guest in the Raptors coaches’ meeting on the weekend was a typical young wannabe, inquisitive and respectful, anxious to learn the nuances of a difficult business from Dwane Casey and his staff with an eye to one day being on an NBA bench, a dream of one day running a team.

It is a sign of the NBA times — as enlightened a professional sports league as there is on earth — that the guest was a 30-year-old woman and no one in the room cared in the least.

Lindsey Harding, a former first overall WNBA draft pick, a basketball lifer whose playing career continues this winter in Turkey, is one of a growing list of young women who see opportunities now where none used to exist, who see the NBA as a viable opportunity to ply their craft.

“I’ve always liked coaching. When I was like 13 and started playing basketball — I grew up in Houston — I remember telling my dad I wanted to coach for the Rockets and he said, ‘OK, do it,’ because I had a father who told me I could do anything,” said Harding, who spent two days observing Raptors camp here, sitting in on meetings, watching practice, absorbing information.

“Now as I’m getting older, it’s becoming a reality to me and talking to (highly regarded agent) Warren LeGarie, I told him I was going be the first woman to coach in the NBA. I’m not the first but I want to be one of the first.”

It should really come as no surprise that NBA teams are exploring every option — regardless of gender, nationality — to find talent. It’s long been seen as progressive league, with officials and high-ranking front office employees who are female.

Coaching was just the next step and when Gregg Popovich and the San Antonio Spurs made Becky Hammon the first full-time, sit-on-the-bench assistant in league history this summer, it caused a bit of a stir but it quickly dissipated. It was seen as an enlightened move but not necessarily a surprising one.

“More than anything, it’s perhaps an idea whose time has come,” Rick Carlisle, head coach of the Dallas Mavericks and president of the NBA Coaches Association.

“I respect Lindsey a lot because she’s taken a proactive approach to beginning her coaching career. She talked to (NBA commissioner) Adam Silver last year at the all-star game, I was put in contact with her this summer and I talked to her about some ideas to kind of get going with it and she’s taken all that stuff and run with it.”

Harding and Casey became acquainted when Harding, at the urging of Carlisle, attended an NBA coaches meeting in Chicago last summer. The Raptors head coach had no problem inviting her to camp to watch and learn.

“I’m like pop,” Casey said. “If someone can bring something to the table, I’m all ears. Also, I’m all for helping young coaches and Lindsey, to me, is one of those young talents who are going to be a coach in the league.

“I think that’s a thing of the future, I think our league is becoming a blind-to-gender league (but) you have to have the right personality, the right approach, right knowledge to get the respect of the players.”

That was the common theme through every conversation on the matter. Players, coaches and officials don’t care about gender, they care about knowledge.

“I think if you know the game, you know the game,” said Toronto’s Kyle Lowry. “As long as it makes sense and they know what they’re talking about, it doesn’t matter who it is.”

Said Carlisle:

“I completely agree with Kyle Lowry on that point. The credibility that you earn is because you know what you’re doing and you’ve put the work and the time in and you know how to communicate. If there are women who can do that effectively, then they deserve a chance.”

Added Casey:

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“There’s two groups you can’t fool: kids and NBA players. They smell it and that’s one reason they will accept it. If a person doesn’t know what he’s talking about, they won’t accept it.

“As long as you’re knowledgeable — man or women — they’re very accepting, as they should be.”

It’s not rocket science.

“The biggest thing is, a lot of people talk to me and say, ‘You play women’s basketball, how do you know you can coach guys? Is it going to be different?’ ” Harding said.

“Everything, about 99 per cent, is the same. Drills are the same, language the same, scenarios. Everything. I think that’s the biggest thing I’ve really learned, that every single drill, every single thing they talk about is the same thing.”

The defending champion Spurs made the most recent step when they added Hammon to Popovich’s staff. She had just finished an illustrious career with the WNBA’s Shooting Stars and had been a guest coach with Popovich’s staff for most of last season while she rehabbed an injured knee. Her hiring gave reason for optimism to women like Harding.

“She is the first and a great friend of mine, someone I respect a lot and she is opening the door and we just need more women to do so,” said Harding. “I think that this is a good time to really try to step in there and learn and grow.

“I mean it’s not necessarily that she’s a woman, in their opinion she was the best for that job and that’s what I want to be and that’s why I want to continue to learn and grow regardless of my gender.”

While it might not be a wave that comes off the Hammon hiring, there are other women now in the minds of NBA head coaches. Jenny Boucek, the head coach of the WNBA’s Seattle Storm, is spending the entire month of the pre-season with Carlisle and the Mavericks (Casey spoke to Boucek but she had committed to Dallas). Hall of Famer Nancy Lieberman has long been thought to be NBA coaching material. It’s a matter of time before there are more.

“You’ve got Gregg Popovich, who is in my mind the greatest NBA coach in history, who hires the first full-time woman who is going to be on the bench, that’s huge,” said Carlisle. “Doc Rivers (of the Los Angeles Clippers), who is one of our top coaches, has a woman who’s going to be behind his bench this year who’s earned her way up from the video room, Natalie Nakase.

“As a profession, we’ve got to be proactive and we’ve got to be open-minded. The bottom line is, you need to find the best people and if the best people happen to be women, then they can’t be overlooked.”

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