Kim Mulkey, the legendary Louisiana State University women’s basketball coach, said twice Saturday she hadn’t yet read The Washington Post’s profile on her everlasting athletic career.
“Are you really surprised by the timing of it?” she rhetorically asked a reporter ahead of the Tigers’ Sweet 16 appearance against UCLA, which LSU won 78-69, paving their way to the Elite Eight and a possible second straight national title.
The highly anticipated article by reporter Kent Babb was published hours before the game.
“I haven’t read it,” Mulkey said of the article, adding that she doesn’t “know that I will read it” and that it will be left up to her attorneys whether she does.
Mulkey lashed out at the Post at a news conference on March 23.
She said the reporter, whom she did not name, had been trying for two years to get her to sit for an interview for the piece, and then contacted LSU on March 19 “as we were getting ready for the first-round game of this tournament with more than a dozen questions, demanding a response by Thursday, right before we’re scheduled to tip off.”
She called the deadline “ridiculous” and said she “could not possibly meet it.”
“It was just an attempt to prevent me from commenting and an attempt to distract us from this tournament. It ain’t going to work, buddy,” Mulkey continued.
She threatened to “sue the Washington Post if they publish a false story about me.”
“Not many people are in a position to hold these kind of journalists accountable, but I am, and I’ll do it,” Mulkey said during the news conference.
The article, published a week after those comments as LSU cruises through the women’s March Madness bracket, delves into Mulkey’s history as both a basketball player and coach.
It touches on personal stories about her family and upbringing — including her strained relationship with her father and sister — details her legendary career as a player at Louisiana Tech, and lays out her history with some of her former players, including Brittney Griner, Kelli Griffin and Emily Niemann, who have questioned whether Mulkey supported their sexuality.
The story paints a picture of a highly skilled player who won two national championships while at Louisiana Tech and an Olympic gold medal for Team USA in 1984, and of a complex and driven coach who has had many highs — including four national titles, three while she led the Baylor Lady Bears.
She has also been mired in controversy, the article lays out, with one former teammate of Mulkey’s saying she wished Mulkey had made more of a statement in support of Griner while she was detained in a Russian prison, save for one comment on a radio show.
Speaking Saturday at a postgame conference following LSU’s win, Mulkey again said she hadn’t read the Post’s article and acted surprised to learn it was published just hours before her team hit the court.
“Imagine that. Must have thought y’all would look at it, right, get some clicks or be a distraction. I haven’t read it and I probably won’t read it. I probably will have my attorneys communicate with me to see if there’s anything there that we need to be concerned about,” Mulkey told reporters.
Asked for comment about the Post article, a representative for LSU pointed NBC News to Mulkey’s postgame conference.
LSU plays the Iowa Hawkeyes on Monday for a spot in the Final Four.
