Coquese Washington, arms folded against her electric pink blazer, her jaw working gum, stares at the swirling motion before her.

Her steely gaze rests on her players, the Lady Lions, as they attack Michigan’s defense in the Bryce Jordan Center. She studies them, her coach’s computer going full tilt, shades of the lawyer who processed complex statutes before she traded one type of court for another.

She frowns. Something bothers her. Something is out of whack.Washington has prepared methodically for the game, peppered her staff with questions. That’s her legal mind in action.

Now she must adjust on the fly. That’s a pro point guard’s mentality, adept at restoring order and harmony.

Washington, in her fifth season at Penn State, draws on both her former selves. The lawyer explores possibilities, devises strategies, nails details, distinguishes right from wrong.

Meanwhile, her inner point guard maintains balance, spreading her energy around the different parts of her life like so many assists.Washington balances a lot— a successful program, her family and philanthropy such as her support for the Feb. 26 Women’s Basketball Coaches Association Pink Zone benefit game for breast cancer research.

Through it all, a sturdy moral compass guides her. It sounds just like her mother, the auto plant worker who raised five children by herself, the words stretching back to Flint, Mich.: Strive to do well. Care for others. Keep growing.

“She instilled that work ethic, that drive in me, about doing the right thing and carrying yourself with class and dignity at all times,”Washington said.

A bookworm who enjoys curling up with a history or biography, she impresses Charmelle Green, a Penn State associate athletic director. Education is paramount to her friend, Green said, noting that Washington’s players learn as much about life as about basketball.

“It’s very deep for her,” Green said. “Coquese is not a surface person.”

Other hands

Decades before Washington became Penn State’s first black female head coach in any sport, her core formed in Flint.

Velma Washington, who now lives in State College, taught her children by example. Despite draining assembly line shifts, she drove her Baptist church’s van and volunteered at schools.

“In our church, it was about doing things and giving back to the community,” her daughter recalled.

At home, the Washington children learned about respect. Musical instruments weren’t left around. Boys picking up Coquese or her two sisters for dates had to walk to the house. If they honked from their cars, forget it.

She still hears her mother’s voice.

“That’s not courteous,” Velma Washington would say. “That doesn’t show any respect for you as a young lady, for me as a mother. If they can’t get out of the car and knock on the door, then what are they saying about how they’re going to treat you?”

She was equally adamant about how her children treated others — and each other. Even if all they had left was a pea, she joked, they had to split it five ways.

Message: You can’t be selfish or self-centered. Washington got it.

She heard echoes growing up, from coaches and others close to her, supporting her.

“It made me realize you can’t get to have the success you have without other hands, people picking you up,” she said. “When I got the opportunity to be the other hands, I wanted to do it.”

Practicing

The lesson followed her to Notre Dame.

A star point guard and four-year starter, she earned a history degree while finding the time to volunteer for World Hunger Coalition and a local women’s shelter.

After graduating in 1992, she considered becoming a college professor, but eventually applied to Notre Dame’s law school.

“I’ve always loved to argue,” she said.

But there was more to it. Law’s reliance on history and precedents appealed to her. So did the altruistic focus of certain realms, such as labor and employment law.

“You’re helping people get through some trying and difficult times and having a positive impact on them,” she said.

Her last year, she juggled her studies with professional basketball.Mornings, she practiced with the Portland Power of the American Basketball League; classes took up evenings. In her first off-season, she practiced law for a New York firm.

Then came six seasons in the Women’s National Basketball Association with the New York Liberty, Houston Comets and Indiana Fever. In 2000, she guided Houston to a title.

Early with the Liberty, she felt a tug, a desire for something other than law to tackle between seasons. She switched to coaching at her alma mater. She envisioned doing it only for as long as she played, but eventually came to see her future.

“What changed was I fell in love with the players,” she said. “I fell in love with the impact you can have on players, women of substance.”

But before she said farewell to the pro ranks in 2003,Washington left her mark.

Relying on her legal acumen, she helped found the WNBA Players Association, then served as its first president for two years before two more as executive vice president. Her negotiating skills led to the league’s first two collective bargaining agreements and the first free agency system in women’s professional sports.

“I do take some satisfaction in that,” she said. “I’m happy to have helped something that has legs.”

‘Phenomenal woman’

Washington brought a record of success to Penn State from eight seasons on Notre Dame’s bench.

As an assistant coach there, she helped mold several All-Americans and win an NCAA championship. Her touch continued in State College. Last year, she restored the Lady Lions to national prominence with a 25-10 record, a runner-up Big Ten Tournament finish and an NCAA Tournament berth. Afterward, Washington received the Black Coaches and Administrators’ Female Coach of the Year award.

Her coaching style reflects her background.

“One of the things you learn in law school is seeing all sides of an issue, and exhausting all possibilities, and asking a million questions before you get an answer,” she said, admitting, “I probably drive my staff nuts.”

Being a point guard taught her about leadership: relating to various people, staying creative, keeping track of multiple goals, seeing the big picture.

“You’ve got to make sure you’re aware of everything that’s going on,” she said.

Mix the intellect, drive and poise, throw in winsome charm, and the result is a magnetic presence.

“There’s a natural tendency to gravitate to her,” Charmelle Green said, calling her a “phenomenal woman” after the title of a Maya Angelou poem. “You have any interaction with her, you’re going to be better for it.”

Russ Rose, the legendary Penn State womens’ volleyball coach and a titanic figure in coaching, counts himself among Washington’s admirers. In fact, he sat on the search committee that hired her.

Washington’s “energy, her positive outlook and certainly her teaching record as a player, as a coach and as a mentor to young women” landed her the job, Rose said. Since then, he said, her players have been “lucky to have her in their lives.”

“I’m a big fan of Coquese,” he said. “I think she’s a breath of fresh air.”

Showing the way

For Washington, her job comes down to teaching fundamentals — and not just on the court.

Her mother once showed her how to live. Now she’s the role model.

Lady Lions see the caring for others, the way Washington has embraced the Pink Zone at Penn State and propelled its rapid growth. Her law degree again proved handy when she handled the complex paperwork that the group needed to achieve nonprofit status.

“We needed someone who had some knowledge of that to guide us in that direction,” said Jennifer James, an assistant athletic director and liaison to the team. “So she took the lead in that to pave the way.”

Washington also has championed the Centre County Women’s Resource Center, helping to raise thousands of dollars to fight domestic violence.

And she’s a mom, raising two children, Quenton, 6, and Rhaiyna, 2, with her husband, Raynell Brown, a Penn State law professor.

As demanding as her job is, she could easily let it consume her. But while carrying her son, she made a vow. “I just decided about that part that I’m going to be a working mom, but I’m not going to have working-mom guilt,” she said.

After work, when she walks into her Patton Township home and into bedtime routines, she hangs up her phone and gives her family her full attention. But she doesn’t draw rigid lines between her work and her home. Players visit so much, her son considers them sisters. Recruiting trips become family adventures when everyone hits the road.

“There is no separation,” Washington said. “My family is part of my team, and my team is part of my family.”

Once again, she’s the point guard achieving balance — and the lawyer hoping to set a precedent. She wants her players to study her as she does them, to follow her example and realize, with enough drive and sweat, they really can have it all.

Consider it the ultimate assist.

“Because I’m living my dream life,” she said.