Charli Turner Thorne (born March 10, 1966) is a former head coach for the

Arizona State Sun Devils The Arizona State Sun Devils are the sport, athletic teams that represent Arizona State University. ASU has nine men's and eleven women's Varsity team, varsity teams competing at the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) NCAA Divisi ...

women's basketball Women's basketball is the team sport of basketball played by women. It was first played in 1892, one year after men's basketball, at Smith College in Massachusetts. It spread across the United States, in large parts via women's college compet ...

team and assistant coach for the

Phoenix Mercury The Phoenix Mercury are an American professional basketball team based in Phoenix, Arizona. The Mercury compete in the Women's National Basketball Association (WNBA) as a member of the Western Conference. One of eight original franchises, it wa ...

of the WNBA. She has coached for 28 seasons from 1993 to 2022. She is the winningest Sun Devil coach since the team was established and , stood as No. 2 all-time in the Pac-10/Pac-12 for career wins.

Biography

Turner Thorne studied psychology at

Stanford University Leland Stanford Junior University, commonly referred to as Stanford University, is a Private university, private research university in Stanford, California, United States. It was founded in 1885 by railroad magnate Leland Stanford (the eighth ...

, where she played

basketball Basketball is a team sport in which two teams, most commonly of five players each, opposing one another on a rectangular Basketball court, court, compete with the primary objective of #Shooting, shooting a basketball (ball), basketball (appro ...

under

Tara VanDerveer Tara Ann VanDerveer (born June 26, 1953) is an American former basketball coach who was the head women's basketball coach at Stanford University from 1985 until her retirement in 2024. Designated the Setsuko Ishiyama Director of Women's Basketba ...

. She graduated in 1988 with a bachelor's degree and later studied for a master's degree in education at the

University of Washington The University of Washington (UW and informally U-Dub or U Dub) is a public research university in Seattle, Washington, United States. Founded in 1861, the University of Washington is one of the oldest universities on the West Coast of the Uni ...

, graduating in 1990. She is married to Will Thorne and they have three children, Conor, Liam, and Quinn.

Coaching career

Turner Thorne began her coaching career as a graduate assistant at

Washington Washington most commonly refers to: * George Washington (1732–1799), the first president of the United States * Washington (state), a state in the Pacific Northwest of the United States * Washington, D.C., the capital of the United States ** A ...

in 1988, then an assistant coach at Santa Clara in 1990. In 1993, Turner Thorne became head coach at

Northern Arizona Northern Arizona is an unofficial, colloquially defined region of the U.S. state of Arizona. Generally consisting of Apache, Coconino, Mohave, Navajo, and Yavapai counties, the region is geographically dominated by the Colorado Plateau, the ...

, winning consecutive seasons in 1994-95 and 1995–96, the first time the school had accomplished this. In 1996, she moved over to become the head coach at Arizona State University. Turner Thorne has led the Arizona State women's

team to the

NCAA The National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) is a nonprofit organization that regulates College athletics in the United States, student athletics among about 1,100 schools in the United States, and Simon Fraser University, 1 in Canada. ...

Tournament 14 times. In the 2000-01 season, the Sun Devils under Turner Thorne achieved a 20-11 overall record and its first NCAA appearance in 22 years. In the 2001-2002 season, the team achieved a record of 25-9, which matched the single-season school record for most wins at that time. ASU shared the

Pac-10 The Pac-12 Conference is a collegiate athletic conference in the Western United States. It participates at the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) Division I level for all sports, and its football teams compete in the Football Bowl ...

title in 2001 and the inaugural

Tournament title in 2002, the first league championships the school had achieved. In the 2006-07 season, the Sun Devils won 31 games, including a school record 16

wins, which brought them to the

Elite Eight In the NCAA Division I men's basketball tournament, NCAA men's Division I basketball championship or the NCAA Division I women's basketball tournament, NCAA women's Division I basketball championship, the "Elite Eight" comprises the final eight t ...

of the NCAA Tournament for the first time. At the end of the 2006-07 season, the Sun Devils ranked No. 8 in the final USA Today/ESPN coaches poll and No. 10 in the final Associated Press poll, the highest final rankings in each poll that the school had ever achieved. In the summer of 2007 Turner Thorne served as an assistant coach on USA Basketball's U-21 World Championship Team which won the gold medal at the U-21

FIBA World Championship The FIBA Basketball World Cup is an international basketball competition between the senior men's national teams of the members of the International Basketball Federation (FIBA), the sport's global governing body. It takes place every four ye ...

in Moscow, Russia. In 2009 the Sun Devils made the Elite Eight of the NCAA Tournament for the second time in three seasons under Turner Thorne's leadership. Having achieved 26 wins in the 2008-09 season, Turner Thorne became one of three Pac-10 coaches alongside

head coach Chris Gobrecht and

head coach

to have led their respective schools to five or more consecutive 20-win seasons. During the summer of 2009, Turner Thorne served as the head coach for the USA Women's World University Games Team which won the gold medal at the 2009 World University Games in

Belgrade Belgrade is the Capital city, capital and List of cities in Serbia, largest city of Serbia. It is located at the confluence of the Sava and Danube rivers and at the crossroads of the Pannonian Basin, Pannonian Plain and the Balkan Peninsula. T ...

, Serbia, having won all seven of their games. It was Turner Thorne's second time working with

USA Basketball USA Basketball (USAB) is a non-profit organization and the governing body for basketball in the United States. The organization represents the United States in FIBA, and the men's and women's national basketball teams in the United States ...

. In July 2009, Turner Thorne became vice president of the Women's Basketball Coaches Association's ( WBCA) Executive Committee. For the 2011–12 basketball season, Turner Thorne took a

leave of absence The labour law concept of leave, specifically paid leave or, in some countries' long-form, a leave of absence, is an authorised prolonged absence from work, for any reason authorised by the workplace. When people "take leave" in this way, they ar ...

from her coaching duties and returned for the 2012–13 season. On March 3, 2022, Turner Thorne announced her coaching retirement. Turner Thorne returned to the bench in 2023, when she was hired by the

of the WNBA on June 30, 2023. She became an assistant coach for the Mercury, reuniting with former Sun Devil assistant coach

Nikki Blue Anitra Necole "Nikki" Blue (born March 29, 1984) is an American professional basketball coach and former player who is an assistant coach for the USC Trojans of the Big Ten Conference. High school Born and raised in Bakersfield, California, Blue ...

who became the interim head coach.

Year-by-year results

Career statistics

College

, - , style="text-align:left;" , 1987–88 , style="text-align:left;" ,

Stanford Leland Stanford Junior University, commonly referred to as Stanford University, is a private research university in Stanford, California, United States. It was founded in 1885 by railroad magnate Leland Stanford (the eighth governor of and th ...

, 31, , -, , -, 41.3, , 22.2, , 86.7, , 0.8, , 1.7, , 0.4, , 0.0, , -, , 1.8 , - , style="text-align:center;" colspan=2 , Career , 31, , -, , -, 41.3, , 22.2, , 86.7, , 0.8, , 1.7, , 0.4, , 0.0, , -, , 1.8 , - class="sortbottom" , style="text-align:center;" colspan="14", Statistics retrieved from

Sports-Reference Sports Reference, LLC is an American sports statistics company that operates databases of several sports. They include Pro Football Reference for American football, Baseball Reference for baseball, Basketball Reference for basketball, Hockey Ref ...

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Turner Thorne, Charli 1966 births Living people American women's basketball coaches American women's basketball players Arizona State Sun Devils women's basketball coaches Northern Arizona Lumberjacks women's basketball coaches Phoenix Mercury coaches Santa Clara Broncos women's basketball coaches Stanford Cardinal women's basketball players University of Washington College of Education alumni Washington Huskies women's basketball coaches Guards (basketball) 20th-century American sportswomen