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Silver: NBA wants half of new officials to be women, wants more female coaches

Zach Gibson / Getty Images News / Getty

Adam Silver wants half of all officials entering the league to be women and wants more teams hiring female coaches, the NBA commissioner said during an appearance at The Economic Club of Washington D.C. on Thursday.

"It's an area, frankly, where I've acknowledged that I'm not sure how it was that it remained so male-dominated for so long," Silver said, according to The Associated Press. "Because it's an area of the game where physically, certainly, there's no benefit to being a man, as opposed to a woman, when it comes to refereeing."

There are currently three female referees in the Association: Ashley Moyer-Gleich, Natalie Sago, and Lauren Holtkamp.

"The goal is: Going forward, it should be roughly 50-50 of new officials entering in the league," Silver said. "Same for coaches, by the way. We have a program, too. There's no reason why women shouldn't be coaching men's basketball."

Though there has never been a female head coach in the NBA, Becky Hammon (San Antonio Spurs), Kristi Toliver (Washington Wizards), Natalie Nakase (LA Clippers), and Lindsey Harding (Philadelphia 76ers) currently serve as assistants. Jenny Boucek is a player development coach with the Dallas Mavericks.

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