Rena Wakama wins the Best Coach Women’s Basketball Award in Paris in 2024.

Rena Wakama of D’Tigress earned the gold medal for best coach in the women’s basketball competition at the 2024 Olympic Games in Paris.

Since the women’s Afrobasket competition began in 1966, Wakama is also the first coach of the Nigerian National Female Basketball Team to win the championship.

She advanced the Nigerian women’s team to the tournament’s quarterfinals for the first time ever.

They achieved the rare achievement of becoming the first African team, male or female, to compete at that level of the competition.

Nigeria would ultimately lose to the US 74-88 to exit the women’s basketball competition.

On Sunday night, the International Basketball Federation’s X handle tweeted, “Best coach of #Paris2024 Women’s Basketball, Rene Wakama, Nigeria.”

Ezinne Kalu, the point guard for D’Tigress who was named to the Olympic Women’s Basketball All-Second Team, also joined the 32-year-old Wakama.

She was appointed D’Tigress’s first female head coach in 2023. Prior to that, she was the director of women’s basketball operations. In her third season, she moved up to assistant coach, where she continued to hone her craft and handled the team’s liaison for community service and academics.