Val Ackerman
President, USA Basketball
The founding president of the Women’s National Basketball Association, Val Ackerman has been associated with USA Basketball in a variety of positions since 1990. She is currently serving as president through the 2008 Olympic Games.
Named WNBA President on August 7, 1996, Ackerman presided over the first WNBA game on June 21, 1997, when the league debuted with eight teams. The launch of the WNBA and its development into the preeminent women’s sports organization earned Ackerman accolades across the sports landscape. The league currently features 13 teams (with a 14th set to debut in 2006) and averaged more than 9,300 fans per game during Ackerman’s tenure.
Ackerman joined the NBA in 1988 as a staff attorney and later served as special assistant to NBA Commissioner David Stern and director and vice president of business affairs. She currently serves on the Executive Committee of the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame, the National Board of Trustees for the March of Dimes, and the National Board of Girls Incorporated.
She was a driving force behind the creation of the historic 1995-96 USA Basketball Women’s Senior National Team program, which recorded a 60-0 record and won the gold medal at the 1996 Atlanta Olympics.
A 1981 graduate of the University of Virginia, Ackerman was a four-year starter for the women’s basketball team and a two-time Academic All-America player. She played professional basketball in France before graduating from the University of California at Los Angeles’ School of Law in 1985, and she worked for two years as an associate at the New York law firm of Simpson Thacher & Bartlett.
