PHOENIX – Candace Parker watched Chamique Holdsclaw and the 1996 U.S. Olympic women’s basketball team growing up.
Now she and Elena Delle Donne will join him in the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame later this year.
Parker told The Associated Press, “I’m very happy for Chamique, and I’m very happy that she’s getting her flowers. She deserves them.” “Obviously, Elena Della Donne and I grew up fighting against each other and the ’96 team, I think we were all inspired by that. So I think it’s really special.”
Parker was honored to be a part of the 2026 Hall of Fame class which also includes Amar’e Stoudemire, Mike D’Antoni, Joey Crawford, Doc Rivers and Mark Few.
Parker said, “It means a lot to join the club of people I’ve always admired, respected and paved the way for. I think it’s very special.”
Parker won three titles in the WNBA with three teams: los angeles, chicago And las vegas. She is the only player in league history to win both MVP and Rookie of the Year in the same season.
He also won two titles while playing in college Tennessee Two Olympic gold medals and two WNBA MVP awards under Hall of Fame coach Pat Summitt.
Holdsclaw said she has photos on her wall growing up in New York of members of the 1996 Olympic team that won eight consecutive gold medals for women’s basketball and helped launch the WNBA.
“There are four or five players on that team that I have pictures of at my house, Lisa Leslie, Dawn Staley, Teresa Edwards,” Holdsclaw said.
Holdsclaw won three consecutive titles at Tennessee from 1996 to 1998, part of the first team to do so. The 1998 championship was Tennessee’s first undefeated season at 39–0, and the Vols also set the NCAA record for most wins in a season at the time. Parker helped Summit win its last two titles in 2007–08.
“He would be very proud right now,” Holdsclaw said of his former coach. “I know she loved us both.”
Holdsclaw went on to have an 11-year WNBA career. The WNBA and the defunct ABL were actually made possible by the 1996 team. The Americans went undefeated at the Atlanta Games, and the interest the team generated from its barnstorming tour across America before the Olympics attracted the attention of fans across the country.
Coach Tara VanDerveer said, “The ’96 Olympic team was really an incredible group of women that were on a mission and they accomplished the mission.” “It helped establish the ABL and the WNBA, and I think that was really the rocket that was the foundation of what is now the women’s basketball landscape. I think it’s very exciting for all the players and coaches on the team.”
Delle Donne won two WNBA MVP awards in 2015 and 2019, the second of which came when she led washington mystic For his only championship. Delle Donne became the first player in league history to shoot over 50% from the field, 40% from behind the 3-point line, and 90% from the free throw line.
Stoudemire, the only NBA player in this year’s class, was Rookie of the Year in 2003 and a six-time All-Star. He spent the first eight years of his career with phoenix sunWhere he worked closely with D’Antoni.
“It means everything from a basketball standpoint,” Stoudemire told the AP. “When you look at my career, not only as a professional, but in high school and nationally, and ever since I was a kid playing the game of basketball. I love the game. You play the game because you love it, and then you work to become the best you can possibly be, regardless of the circumstances, and get into the Hall of Fame, it shows that the voters appreciate that. And now we’re enshrined forever.”
Rivers has 1,192 wins on his resume, which puts him sixth on the career wins list. he led it boston celtics to the NBA Championship in 2008 and was in charge of LA Clippers During their Lob City era.
Few has won 773 games gonzaga. He set an NCAA Division I men’s coaching record by winning 81 games in his first three years at the school. Some guided the Bulldogs to the national championship game in 2017 and 2021.
Crawford officiated in 2,561 regular season NBA games and 50 Finals games over his 39-year career. He retired in 2016.
D’Antoni influenced the game with his up-tempo philosophy that redefined offensive tactics. He amassed nearly 1,200 career wins and was twice NBA Coach of the Year.
For the first time, the Hall of Fame honored the class heading into the Women’s Final Four on Friday night. Parker, Holdsclaw and all members of the 1996 Olympic team, as well as Stoudemire and D’Antoni, were in attendance.
The enshrinement ceremony will take place in August at the Hall of Fame in Springfield, Massachusetts.
