Detroit — The clock is ticking close to 11 a.m. on a Friday in early December, and Stacey Lovelace is sitting courtside inside Wayne State Fieldhouse as the Motor City Cruise prepares for a regular-season game against the Iowa Wolves.
It’s an early morning for Lovelace, an assistant general manager with the Cruise, the Detroit Pistons’ affiliate in the G League. She spent the previous night at Little Caesars Arena watching the Pistons’ win over the Dallas Mavericks in an overtime thriller. There, she observed from the corner of the arena, right next to Pistons general manager Troy Weaver and the rest of his assistant GMs.
On Cruise game days, Lovelace is much closer to the action, which takes place in a more intimate setting. After pregame chats with several Pistons personnel, Lovelace’s attention shifts to the court after the ball is finally tipped.
She’s in her element.
Lovelace, a Detroit native and former WNBA player, is the only female assistant general manager in the franchise. It’s a unique position to be in because there aren’t many women who hold front-office positions in the NBA or G League. Lovelace is navigating her new role with the intent to provide a different perspective, after spending the last five years as a player development program manager in the G League.
“I needed to be on the team side — to be in the front office — to have a seat at the table in making these decisions,” Lovelace told The Detroit News, “to have a voice in that room because there are not a lot of women (in front-office roles). There are not a lot of former athletes, even, and there are not many minorities.
“There are so many boxes that are not checked most of the time when you look at a war room (for the NBA draft). There’s not a lot of diversity, and when there’s not a lot of diversity in those spaces, obviously, there’s not a lot of diversity in thought. It just helps to make those decisions by bringing in a different perspective.”
Lovelace also serves in a rare position with the Pistons’ front office as a special assistant to Weaver, who wanted to offer her an opportunity to grow within the organization. It’s a role she earned last summer, through her vast set of experiences in basketball — from playing to coaching, and now as an executive.
“It’s a pretty robust skill set,” Weaver told The News. “It’s hard to find that — man or woman — just someone who’s worked in so many different aspects of basketball, and she played (the game). She brings a really diverse skill set that is hard to find, and we really need it. And, her maturity will really help us grow.
“Who knows? She may be the first (female) GM (in the NBA) one day.”
There’s no easy way to describe Lovelace’s responsibilities as assistant general manager for the Cruise. Her primary job is to work alongside Ben Carloni, the first-year general manager for the Cruise. Those duties include coordinating with different staffs within the organization, from equipment to management and operations. She evaluates players, on the Cruise and throughout the G League, and serves as a prominent voice during the draft process.
Weaver, who was hired as the general manager of the Pistons in 2020, said Lovelace was on his radar as soon as he assumed the lead role in the franchise’s front office. She went into the first meeting prepared to sell herself and her experiences to Weaver, who was already aware of her resume.
“That’s a good feeling,” Lovelace said. “When you’re going through things and your experiences, you’re just going through them, but you’re not really understanding who’s paying attention. All of the things I’ve been through really brought me to this moment.”
It’s a full-circle moment for Lovelace, 48, because she was born and raised on the west side of Detroit. It’s her most natural connection with the Pistons. She’s been a fan of the team for as long as she can remember. From the Bad Boys era to the “Goin’ to Work” championship team, along with the three-title run with the Detroit Shock, Lovelace’s love and support for her team — and her city — runs deep.
“We want people that are part of the fabric in the city and she’s absolutely that,” Weaver said. “Born and bred here. We love having people that are vested in not only the Pistons, but the city. You can’t replace that.”
Detroit roots
Lovelace’s basketball career began in middle school, as she watched her older brother, Mike Lovelace, compete at Detroit Southwestern High School under legendary basketball coach Perry Watson. She absorbed enough of his games to pursue her own high school hoops career at St. Martin de Porres in Detroit — which closed in 2005 — where she became a highly recruited player with several Division I scholarship offers.
Lovelace always envisioned herself at a Big Ten school. She grew up a Michigan fan around the Fab Five era and she desired to become a Wolverine, but she had a better opportunity to win at Purdue, which was coming off a Big Ten title the year before she committed to the program.
Lovelace had a dominant collegiate career, which included two Associated Press All-America selections. Lovelace played professionally in Europe for 12 seasons, and she began her WNBA career with the Seattle Storm in 2000.
She played for six different WNBA teams, including a short stint with the Detroit Shock. She always desired to play for her hometown team, but the timing was never right, until she reached a crossroads in her career during the 2008 season.
“At the time, I was ready to stop playing in the WNBA,” Lovelace recalled. “I would still play overseas, but I was like, ‘This year-round (playing) is tough.’ And then, I was a single mom trying to raise my daughter (Ryann Tolbert, who currently plays volleyball at Alabama A&M). I was making way more money overseas.”
Lovelace ultimately had decided to leave the WNBA — that is, until her agent asked her about the possibility of playing in Detroit. The Shock, one of the league’s first expansion franchises, was seeking its third championship in six years. Lovelace joined the team midway through the season in a reserve role. She played just seven games for the team before she was waived. The Shock, then coached by Pistons great Bill Laimbeer, went on to capture their final title that season.
“I didn’t make it through the whole season, which I wish I would have, because they won the championship that year. That was my one shot at a ring,” said Lovelace, laughing.
Her brief time with the Shock resulted in numerous professional relationships with team personnel, bonds that have since migrated to the Pistons organization, along with her No. 32 Shock jersey, which she is in the process of having framed for her new office inside the Pistons’ midtown practice facility.
“I have something tangible to prove that I was on the team,” Lovelace said. “It was a cool experience. Family and friends were actually able to come and see me play because most of my career was spent in different places, different countries.”
Pivoting to the front office
Basketball players don’t always follow a traditional career path after hanging up their jerseys.
A majority of players transition into coaching after their playing careers are finished. Others try their hand in the broadcast booth. However, a select few forge their way into the non-traditional route of working in an NBA front office.
Lovelace had no idea what she wanted to do after retiring from basketball in 2010.
She dabbled in coaching as an assistant for the Tulsa Shock — the franchise moved from Detroit to Oklahoma — in 2013. However, she didn’t want to continue on her climb up the coaching ladder after playing the game her entire life. Instead, she pursued her long-awaited dream of attending the University of Michigan, where she earned her master’s degree in sports management in 2014.
“That gave me an idea that there’s a different route,” Lovelace said, “because as a player, you only see coaches. You know there’s a front office and a GM. You know there’s all these people that work in the building, but you don’t have direct relationships with them.”
Lovelace was an assistant coach at Oakland University when Renee Brown, former WNBA chief of basketball operations, told her about the inaugural NBA Basketball Operations Associate Program, created to prepare former NBA and WNBA players to pursue career opportunities in team management positions. She, along with Allison Feaster, Celtics vice president of player development and organizational growth — as well as former NBA players Brian Cardinal, Drew Gooden, Corey Maggette and Troy Murphy — served as the program’s first class in 2017.
Morgan Cato, who joined the Phoenix Suns’ front office earlier this year as the first woman of color in the NBA to hold the titles of assistant general manager and vice president of basketball operations, helped run the inaugural class. She identified Lovelace’s academic acumen, her well-traveled basketball experience — domestically and internationally — her ability to coach, communication skills and relatability as characteristics that would make her successful not only in the league office, but in life.
“She’s a constant student,” Cato told The News. “She wants to continue learning at all times and wants to give everything she can to really improving this game. Those were no-brainers. I think what she needed was an opportunity to compete, and she paved the way for herself.”
At the conclusion of the one-year program, Lovelace was hired as a player development program officer for the NBA G League, and she spent five years in that role. She was responsible for the execution of NBA G League Player Development programming, including team awareness meetings and the league’s education and life-skills program. She helped with players’ non-profit organizations, their passions outside of basketball and she helped them navigate the early stages of the COVID-19 pandemic.
After six years total at the league office, Lovelace wanted to stretch her wings and seek new opportunities in an NBA front office. The most difficult aspect was her eagerness to transition into a different space, but not being given the opportunities because she was so proficient in her former role.
“That was the biggest challenge, just showing that I wanted to do something different,” Lovelace said. “People just see you in one kind of way. I want to do something else, and they’re like, ‘Why? You’re so good at it.’ That was the biggest challenge for me. How do I reinvent myself in that way?”
Cruisin’ along
Now, as the Cruise’s assistant general manager, Lovelace is trying to contribute to the franchise by using her experiences to put them in the best position to be successful.
When she’s courtside at Cruise games, Lovelace watches intently. She sees the game from a player’s perspective, so she grasps the understanding of being one of 10 people on the court, and how each player is needed to achieve the ultimate goal of winning. She rarely shows emotion during the game — and when she does, it’s in the final quarter, when one play could determine the outcome.
It’s a gig that Lovelace has sought out since her completion of the NBA Basketball Operations Associate Program, and it makes it even more special that it’s in the city of Detroit.
“This is honestly a dream job for me,” Lovelace said, “to work under (Weaver) with such a great group of people whose commitment to restoring the organization is there from the top down.”
Lovelace is exactly where she belongs: in her hometown, around the game she loves, and working in the front office for the organization she’s always been a fan of.
mcurtis@detroitnews.com
Twitter: @MikeACurtis2