Candi Harvey led the Utah Starzz to a 14-5 record and the team's first-ever WNBA playoff berth after she took over as coach from Fred Williams on July 6.
Keeping Harvey was a no-brainer.
But with attorneys for both the Starzz and Harvey living in different parts of the country, working on other trials and depositions and playing a lot of phone tag, completing a letter-perfect contract took a little longer than might be expected, even though "there was no huge sticking point," said Kevin O'Connor, the Starzz vice president of basketball operations.
The deal is finally done, and Harvey was to meet the media Thursday at noon in the Delta Center to announce her new, multiyear deal to coach the Starzz.
"The reason it took the length of time it did," said O'Connor, "is that there was a comfort level on both sides. We knew we would get a deal done.
"We didn't feel like we needed to be on a timetable. We knew that there would be closure to it. We knew we wanted Candi as the coach, and knew she wanted to come back as the coach, and it was just a matter of dotting the I's and crossing the T's."
Even after Harvey's original contract ran out in October, the Starzz continued to pay her.
"Kevin and I had good conversations," said Harvey recently. "I've trusted what he's told me and expected him to follow through." She said her main interest was getting a multiyear deal and that never seemed to be a problem.
Harvey's .667 winning percentage, including two playoff losses, is the best of any Starzz coach to date.
"She brought stability to the team. She had a direction," O'Connor said.
He said Harvey will be free to hire her own assistant coaches for the 2002 season.
Harvey, who owns a home in Tennessee, will continue to live there much of the off-season with the Starzz's blessing. It is such a hotbed for women's basketball that it affords her good talent-scouting possibilities because most of the top teams travel to that area to play.
O'Connor said she will come to Salt Lake City every month to six weeks during the off-season.
Harvey came to the Starzz as the top assistant to Williams partway through the 1999 season after Frank Layden resigned four games into that year. She has coached at Texas A&M, Tulane and Stephen F. Austin and was head coach of a Nashville ABL team that folded with the league just a few games into the season.
E-mail: lham@desnews.com