Randi and Duez Henderson enter their fourth season coaching the Washington University women’s basketball team, with Randi as the head coach and Duez an assistant coach.
Duez played four seasons at University of Iowa, which included the Hawkeyes advancing to the Sweet 16 in his freshman campaign and capturing the Big 10 title his junior season. He played professional basketball for five years in Germany, leading the league in scoring and rebounding four times. He also owns Henderson Basketball Training and served as a director for Point Guard College, a nationwide organization for training athletes in leadership, understanding the game, and player skill development.
Randi has posted a 226-127 record (.679 percentage) with four NCAA appearances in her 13-year coaching career, including one UAA title and two postseason trips in her first three years at WashU. The Bears advanced to the sectional semifinal round in 2018-19. Prior to leading the Bears, she coached for nine years at Coe College, leading the program to its first three 20-win seasons. Randi was a three-year starter and team captain at Iowa, helping lead the Hawkeyes to NCAA bids in 1998 and in 2001, when they won the Big 10 title. She concluded her career with 936 points and 745 rebounds.
The UAA “Conversations About Race and Racism” series seeks to lift the voices of people of color and recognize the challenges faced in both athletics and academics at the collegiate level. By sharing personal stories, we hope to elevate the conversation about race to raise awareness and bring about change.
University of Iowa: Culture Change
“The first time that race came into play for me was in college. I grew up in Detroit around Black people, family, and friends,” Duez stated. “I had a few white teachers and some white co-workers, but my teammates were Black and the teams we played were made of up a majority of Black players. Once I got to Iowa, I saw that neither the student body nor the state was diverse. I remember my first flight into Cedar Rapids. The pilot comes on and says we are making our final descent. I was thinking, ‘What do you mean? There is nothing here.’”
Randi’s experience was nearly the opposite. “I grew up in Cedar Falls (Iowa) and there was not much diversity. One of my first experiences with a large number of Black people was when our high school team played East High School in Waterloo, a predominantly Black high school in a neighboring town,” she recalled. “When we walked in, the students were lined up in the hall watching us walk by. When I got to Iowa, I was one of three white women on the team so that was dramatically different for me. I was first recruited by C. Vivian Stringer (who became the first African-American basketball coach to win 1,000 career games in 2018), who left to go to Rutgers.”
Duez realized he was in a new world at Iowa. “I knew I was in a different place and was seen differently. I had learned really early that because I was a Black athlete, the bar was automatically set lower. I was not supposed to excel in the classroom or be there for the college experience,” he remarked. “It wasn’t expected for the classroom to be my number one focus. All eyes were on me and I wasn’t going to follow those stereotypes. I was extra careful to interact with as many people as possible. I wanted to be more than an athlete and to be looked upon as a person.”
Randi’s experience on a predominantly Black basketball team at Iowa was a positive one. “I never felt different or was treated differently. I didn’t think anything of it. I’m still friends with my teammates,” she recorded. “Sports can bring people together. I spent a lot of time getting to know the women on my team. There were a lot of new things for me, including attending my first step show, and I learned so much from being friends with my teammates. I have always wanted to be around a lot of different people and have not been afraid to be in what others may see as uncomfortable settings. I once traveled around Europe for 30 days with just a backpack and no plans. I have always wanted to understand as much as I can about people and places in the world.”
Misconceptions Based on Race
“My entire career, I have been asked who I played for or where I played. I’m athletic looking and often wear athletic clothes,” Duez described. “I admit I have assumed athleticism myself at a restaurant when the host or server is 6’-4” or 6’-5”. I don’t love when it happens so I need to be better in doing it to others.”
“I have talked to former teammates who are coaching now who find it hard to recruit white players to play on teams with several Black players. It never occurred to me that I shouldn’t care about people for who they are,” Randi remarked. “Some of that is how I was raised. It never entered my mind that playing with or against Black players was a problem. Now I realize it is for some people.”
Duez finds that people often try to pigeonhole him based on his circumstances. “I’m almost splitting the line, coaching at a PWI (predominantly white institution), married to a white woman, and living in the suburbs. Some people see me and think I don’t understand or know the real struggle or that I am not as into the fight for racial justice as I should be,” he communicated. “At the same time, I face microaggressions from white people, particularly saying that I am ‘different’ from most Black people. It’s as if they think I can’t grow up Black in Detroit and be educated, be a good father, and coach at a highly-academic university.”
Randi also deals with racist discourse in a bi-racial marriage. “An alarming number of people say to me that Duez ‘is one of the good ones.’ There is absolutely no possible way that you should be saying that,” she made clear. “I have to balance that with people thinking he represents all Black people. Black people are not a monolith.”
“No matter how successful you are as a Black person, you are always fighting something,” expressed Duez, who relayed a story shared by Auburn Athletic Director Allen Greene, the first Black athletic director in school history, on a social justice in college athletics webinar. “No matter how successful and well-known he is on campus, he talked about how when he takes his family to the beach, they pack their lunches and eat in the car so they don’t have to stop in any small towns along the way where they may not be safe.”
Representation and Conversations
“It can be intimidating any time you look around the room and no one looks like you. Whenever issues of diversity or race come up in whatever capacity, I know the sandstorm that is coming my way,” Duez relayed. “I am supposed to have all the answers. I am the spokesman for the Black coach and the Black athlete. I have had enough experiences to know this happens. I only know my perspective. I can’t speak for all Black people.”
Being one of two Black coaches at WashU (assistant track and field coach Raven Robinson being the other), Duez recognizes that when he speaks up, he is just one voice. “The sample size is so small when only two percent of us are asked what we think. It is uncomfortable. I like to see people who look like me, we all do” he explained. “It is unnerving to a certain extent.”
“I think diversity training helps white people, but Black people don’t get much out of it. The starting point should be a dialogue, something we all need to be better at,” Randi added. “We have recruited a lot of different people to create a diverse team, but we haven’t had enough dialogue about race, personal and social identities, individuality, and about marginalized groups. Now we know where to start. Dialogue is not one conversation. People want action and the dialogue needs to be normalized so we know what actions should be taken.”
Duez believes that normalizing these challenging conversations begin in each person’s own circle. “The mini solution is death by a thousand cuts in small interactions, to not let crazy comments go. The people we call on it will call someone else on it. Bring change in within your building, your department,” he recommended. “That goes for sports, business, family, and school. We need to move to a place where we are making a true impact with the people we work with, play with, and love with. Do I want to feel bad about not saying something 15 years from now?”
“We choose between five seconds of courage and 15 years or more of regret. It is a skill that older generations need to practice. We allow saying the wrong thing or asking the wrong question to be an excuse. That is fear. We need to frame speaking up as courage, not confrontation,” Randi added.
“We cannot freeze ourselves in time,” Randi continued. “We have to be constantly learning. My mother-in-law loves to cook and to feed everybody. One time, my mother was concerned she had spent the entire day preparing and cooking and she said, ‘You have been slaving away in the kitchen all day.’ There was no malice in my mother at all, but having the conversation about that saying was important. My mother has never said that once since.”
“The Black culture could fill 10 dictionaries of sayings,” Duez joked. “If I call my dad and he has had a long day, he may say he’s ‘been working like a Hebrew slave.’ It is such commonplace language that we really don’t think about what is being said.”
Advice for Current and Future Coaches
“Set the goal of being a coach, do the work, and see where that takes you,” Duez stated. “Let the opportunities you take advantage of be the catapult in your career instead of chasing things. Luck and timing are involved. A lot of people set a goal and if they don’t hit it in three or four years, they don’t know what to do. Know what you are doing, not where you want to do it.”
“We need more women and more people of color in coaching. People need others who look like them to see that it is something they can accomplish,” Randi said. “If coaching matters to you, don’t let being different or looking different be a limitation. Change comes from stepping over those fears.”
Role of Teams and Coaches
“We should be respectful that everyone is in a different place. The reality and depths of the racial issues have been super emotional for me. I want my players to intentionally grow and offer grace. That will be messy,” Randi admitted. “If you want to change, things will get messy. We need to think about how we can create an environment of growth and grace. We are about forming, storming, norming, and performing. Players and athletic departments need to get more comfortable with the messiness change requires.”
“Being willing to speak out is the only way to bring about change. We have seen that with Iowa football and at Kansas State (current and former Iowa student-athletes spoke out about racist experiences, helping to force out strength and conditioning coach Chris Doyle, while Kansas State student-athletes and faculty members protested racial injustice on campus). Student-athletes have a big platform and so many things are riding on it,” Duez described. “It takes courage to speak out and then defend and deflect when there is opposition. Student-athletes speaking out shows the power of the team, not just one or two individuals. Being willing to step up and be courageous as a unit is powerful.”
“Tragedy sometimes catapults change. It creates necessary change and confidence. People who didn’t see people supporting them before now are seeing that support,” he continued. “There is power in knowing ‘we’ are doing this if my teammates have my back.”
“A lot of people’s belief systems are being challenged right now,” Randi remarked. “I am not who I was even a month ago and I am happy about that. Allow people the space to determine where they are and what they need to change.”
“Approaching conversations from privilege does not allow for understanding what a Black person is doing to fit into what is happening on a campus. Ask questions to find out where people are coming from,” Duez suggested. “So many factors are part of a person’s experience. What matters is not what we think of someone’s situation, but what that person actually needs.”