Kate Starbird

Last updated
Kate Starbird
Kate Starbird cropped.jpeg
Born
Catherine Evelyn Starbird

(1975-07-30) July 30, 1975 (age 49)
Spouse
Melissa Marsh
(m. 2008)
Parent Margaret Leonard (mother)
Relatives
Academic background
Alma mater
Thesis Crowdwork, Crisis and Convergence: How the Connected Crowd Organizes Information during Mass Disruption Events  (2012)
Doctoral advisor Leysia Palen
Representing Flag of the United States (23px).png  United States
World University Games
Gold medal icon (G initial).svg 1997 Marsala, Italy Team Competition

Catherine Evelyn Starbird (born July 30, 1975) is an American computer scientist and former women's professional basketball player.

Contents

Playing at the guard position, Starbird earned All-American honors as a high school athlete at Lakes High School in Lakewood, Washington, and later at the collegiate level at Stanford. The 1997 Naismith College Player of the Year, Starbird helped Stanford make three consecutive Final Four appearances from 1995 to 1997 and scored 2,215 career points, a school record that stood for 11 years. From 1997 to 2006, Starbird played professional basketball in the American Basketball League, Women's National Basketball Association, and various European teams.

Having been a computer science major at an undergraduate at Stanford, Starbird completed a doctorate in technology, media, and society at the University of Colorado at Boulder in 2012. Later that year, she joined the faculty of the University of Washington. Her research focuses on disinformation and social media communication during disasters.

Early life

Catherine Evelyn Starbird was born July 30, 1975, in West Point, New York, to a military family. [1] [2] [3] Her father Edward Starbird was a United States Army colonel, and her mother Margaret (née Leonard) was a teacher and author. [3] [4]

Growing up in Tacoma, Washington, Starbird attended Lakes High School in nearby Lakewood. [5] As a senior in 1993, Starbird made the Parade All-American first team and was the Kodak All-America MVP. She was also named Washington Player of the Year by Gatorade and USA Today . [5] At the 1993 Women's Basketball Coaches Association High School All-America Game, she scored 12 points and earned MVP honors. [6] [7]

College basketball career

At Stanford University, Starbird played at guard for the Stanford Cardinal under coach Tara VanDerveer from 1993 to 1997 with NCAA tournament appearances every season, including the Final Four from 1995 to 1997. [8] [5] In her first season in 1993–94, Starbird averaged 9.9 points and 2.9 rebounds and made the Pac-10 All-Freshman team. [5] Starbird had a breakout season in 1994–95 with 16.0 points, 4.2 rebounds, and 4.0 assists and was a first-team All-Pac-10 honoree. [5] Averaging 20.1 points, 4.7 rebounds, and 3.5 assists as a junior in 1995–96, Starbird was the Pac-10's Co-Player of the Year and received multiple All-American honors, specifically first team honors from Kodak, Basketball America magazine, and the United States Basketball Writers Association and second team honors from the Associated Press and United Press International. [5] On January 13, 1996, Starbird scored a career high 44 points against USC. [5]

As a senior in 1996–97, Starbird averaged 20.9 points, 3.7 rebounds, and 3.2 assists and was a first-team Associated Press All-American. [9] Starbird also won the Naismith College Player of the Year, USBWA Women's National Player of the Year award, and WBCA Player of the Year awards. [8]

Upon graduating, Starbird had a program record 2,215 career points. [8] That record would be broken 11 years later in 2008 by Candice Wiggins. [10]

Starbird graduated from Stanford in 1997 with a Bachelor of Science in computer science. [11]

Career statistics

WNBA

Regular season

YearTeamGPGSMPGFG%3P%FT%RPGAPGSPGBPGTOPPG
1999 Sacramento 2419.021.813.381.51.00.60.50.20.72.0
2000 Utah 29011.735.821.781.01.11.00.40.41.04.0
2001 Utah 23713.537.321.781.51.30.90.30.00.74.7
2002 Utah 1505.940.025.057.10.50.50.60.30.11.7
Seattle 9020.745.545.588.92.11.30.70.41.25.9
2003 Did not play (waived)
2004 Indiana 1209.826.130.083.30.80.90.50.00.81.7
Career6 years, 4 teams112811.235.024.480.51.10.80.50.20.73.3

Playoffs

YearTeamGPGSMPGFG%3P%FT%RPGAPGSPGBPGTOPPG
1999 Sacramento 1016.020.00.00.02.00.00.01.02.02.0
2001 Utah 102.00.00.00.00.00.00.00.00.00.0
2002 Seattle 2011.550.0100.0100.01.50.50.50.52.02.5
Career3 years, 3 teams4010.325.033.3100.01.30.30.30.51.51.8

College

Sources: [12] [5]

Legend
  GPGames played  GS Games started MPG Minutes per game
 FG%  Field goal percentage 3P%  3-point field goal percentage FT%  Free throw percentage
 RPG  Rebounds per game APG  Assists per game SPG  Steals per game
 BPG  Blocks per game PPG Points per game Bold Career high
YearTeamGPPointsFG%3P%FT%RPGAPGSPGBPGPPG
1993–94Stanford3130850.0%50.0%83.1%2.92.61.30.59.9
1994–95 Stanford 3251152.4%39.2%74.3%4.24.02.70.616.0
1995–96 Stanford 3264347.2%34.5%84.7%4.73.52.10.720.1
1996–97 Stanford 3675351.1%42.5%82.2%3.73.21.60.420.9
Career131221550.1%39.2%81.5%3.93.31.90.516.9

International basketball career

Starbird represented the US at the 1997 World University Games held in Marsala, Sicily, Italy in August 1997. The USA team won all six games, earning the gold medal at the event. Starbird averaged 8.7 points per game. [13]

Professional basketball career

After college, she was selected by the Seattle Reign with the fourth overall pick in the 1997 ABL draft. In two seasons with the Reign, Starbird played in 59 games and averaged 12.9 points, 2.8 rebounds, and 2.8 assists. [8] The ABL shut down and filed for bankruptcy in late December 1998. [14]

In 1999, the Sacramento Monarchs selected Starbird in the third round (26th overall) in the WNBA draft. [15] Starbird played in 24 games with one start for the Monarchs in 1999, averaging 2.0 points and 1.0 rebounds. [15]

In the 2000 expansion draft, the Miami Sol selected Starbird then traded her to the Utah Starzz for Elena Baranova and a second-round pick. [8] Starbird averaged 4.0 points in 2000 and 4.7 points in 2001 with the Starzz. [15] Starbird played professional basketball in Europe during the two offseasons, in France in 2000–01 and Austria in 2001–02. [8]

In 2002, Starbird averaged 1.7 points in 15 games for the Starzz before being traded to the Seattle Storm for Semeka Randall. [8] [15] With the Storm, Starbird averaged a career high 5.9 points. [15] The Storm waived Starbird prior to the 2003 season. [8]

In the 2003–04 offseason, Starbird played in 14 games for the Spanish team Adecco Estudiantes Madrid, averaging 18.7 points and 5.1 rebounds. [8] Starbird played her final year in the WNBA with the Indiana Fever in 2004, averaging 1.7 points and 0.8 rebounds. [15]

After the 2004 WNBA season, Starbird returned to Estudiantes. She played for PDV Ibiza during the 2005–06 season. [16]

Academic career

Starbird earned a National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellowship in 2009. [17] Studying in the Alliance of Technology, Learning, And Society (A.T.L.A.S.) program, she received her Ph.D. in technology, media, and society at the University of Colorado Boulder in 2012; her thesis was titled "Crowdwork, Crisis and Convergence: How the Connected Crowd Organizes Information during Mass Disruption Events." [18]

Beginning in September 2012, she was a faculty member of the University of Washington Department of Human Centered Design & Engineering, [19] [20] where she directs the Emerging Capacities of Mass Participation (emCOMP) lab. [21] [22] [19] In 2019, Starbird was promoted to associate professor. [23]

She studies educational possibilities of social media as well as crisis informatics. [24] Her research sits at the intersection of computer science and social science and falls within the fields of Human-Computer Interaction (HCI) and Computer-Supported Cooperative Work (CSCW). [25] Using a combination of empirical methods, including qualitative, computational and network analysis, Starbird examines both small group and large scale interaction online within the context of disasters and other mass disruption events, studying how digital volunteers and other members of the crowd work to filter and shape the information space. [25] One of the shooting events Starbird documented was the attack at the Pulse nightclub in Orlando. [26] In another research project, her analysis of a dataset of 600,000 tweets about the Deepwater Horizon oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico helped to put together a map of how information was shared among those close to the event and more broadly. [26]

Personal life

Starbird's grandfather Alfred Dodd Starbird was an Olympic athlete who was an Army general during World War II. [3] [27] Grandfather Charles Leonard was an Olympic silver medalist and the first Olympian with a perfect pistol shooting score. [3] Great-great-grandfather George A. Dodd was an Army officer who fought in the Battle of Guerrero. [28] [29]

In 2008, Starbird married Melissa Marsh. [11] [30] Starbird said in a 2011 interview with ESPN the Magazine that she never considered a career in coaching basketball due to concerns that she would need to be closeted. [31]

Besides basketball, Starbird has also played Gaelic football. In 2007, she managed the Seattle Gaels women's Gaelic football team. [14]

Notes

  1. Gutskey, Earl (January 10, 1997). "Spreading Her Wings: Versatile Starbird Gives Stanford Reason to Believe It Can Fly to Top". Los Angeles Times. Retrieved November 29, 2020.
  2. Haub, Kim (1998-11-14). "Standing Tall Through It All -- Seattle Reign Guard Kate Starbird Talks Of Growing Up Tall". The Seattle Times. Retrieved 2019-05-22. 3. Her birthday is July 30, 1975
  3. 1 2 3 4 Newnham, Blaine (October 14, 1997). "Hot Stuff -- Kate Starbird Brings Star Power And A Dazzling Game To ABL". The Seattle Times. Retrieved November 29, 2020.
  4. Palmer, Lauren (April 13, 2017). "Meet the Starbirds". Queen Anne Living. Archived from the original on November 26, 2020. Retrieved December 21, 2020.
  5. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 "Kate Starbird". Stanford University. Archived from the original on August 1, 1997. Retrieved November 29, 2020.
  6. "WBCA High School All-America Game Box Scores". Women's Basketball Coaches Association. Archived from the original on 2014-07-15. Retrieved 29 Jun 2014.
  7. "WBCA High School All-America Game Team MVP's". Women's Basketball Coaches Association. Archived from the original on 2014-07-15. Retrieved 29 Jun 2014.
  8. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 "Kate Starbird: Background". WNBA. Archived from the original on March 3, 2005. Retrieved November 29, 2020.
  9. "NCAA Statistics".
  10. Smith, Michelle (February 1, 2008). "Wiggins breaks scoring record". San Francisco Chronicle. Retrieved November 29, 2020.
  11. 1 2 Evans, Jayda (March 5, 2013). "Kate Starbird, former basketball star, chooses a different route — as usual". The Seattle Times. Retrieved May 22, 2019.
  12. "Women's Basketball Finest" (PDF). fs.ncaa.org. Retrieved 2017-10-03.
  13. "Eighteenth World University Games -- 1993". USA Basketball. Archived from the original on 7 September 2015. Retrieved 12 October 2015.
  14. 1 2 Baskin, Bruce (July 2, 2007). "Finding joy in the shadows". Our Sports Central. Archived from the original on September 1, 2007. Retrieved December 1, 2020.
  15. 1 2 3 4 5 6 "Kate Starbird". Basketball Reference. Retrieved November 29, 2020.
  16. Murillo, Paco (July 19, 2005). "Starbird interesa al PDV". Diario de Ibiza (in Spanish). Retrieved November 29, 2020.
  17. "Starbird Earns Second Place in Random Hacks of Kindness Event Competition". University of Colorado at Boulder Computer Science web site. University of Colorado at Boulder Office of Media Relations and News Services. December 2009. Retrieved 2009-12-15.
  18. Starbird, Kate (2012). Crowdwork, Crisis and Convergence: How the Connected Crowd Organizes Information during Mass Disruption Events (PDF) (Ph.D.). University of Colorado Boulder.
  19. 1 2 "News: Kate Starbird Joins HCDE Faculty". Human Centered Design & Engineering, WU College of Engineering, Washington State University. April 13, 2012. Retrieved April 13, 2012.
  20. Mills, Heidi (16 February 2023). "Most Influential, Education: Kate Starbird". Seattle Magazine. Retrieved 15 August 2023.
  21. "Emerging Capacities of Mass Participation(emCOMP) Laboratory".
  22. "New maritime security project draws Coast Guard's top admiral to visit UW". University of Washington. Retrieved 2015-07-08.
  23. "News: Kate Starbird promoted to associate professor". Human Centered Design & Engineering, WU College of Engineering, Washington State University. March 7, 2019. Archived from the original on August 3, 2020. Retrieved May 22, 2019.
  24. Westneat, Danny (2017-03-29). "UW professor: The information war is real, and we're losing it". The Seattle Times. Retrieved 2017-09-06.
  25. 1 2 "Collective Intelligence Conference 2017". Crains NY Business. 23 May 2017. Retrieved 2017-05-24.
  26. 1 2 "The web of conspiracy theorists that was ready for Donald Trump". Washington Post. Retrieved 2017-04-04.
  27. "Alfred Starbird, retired general". The New York Times. July 30, 1983. Retrieved November 29, 2020.
  28. Starbird, Kate [@katestarbird] (June 5, 2017). "Just inherited a box-full of memorabilia from great-great-grandfather BG George Allan Dodd (inc. spurs and bridle)" (Tweet). Retrieved November 29, 2020 via Twitter.
  29. Howe, Jerome W. (Winter 1966). "Campaigning in Mexico, 1916". The Journal of Arizona History. 7 (4): 168–181. JSTOR   41695383.
  30. Starbird, Kate [@katestarbird] (November 8, 2012). "#R74 Q - Melissa & I got married in CA b4 Prop 8. So it was legal @ the time. Not sure if CA still recognizes. Q - does it carry over to WA?" (Tweet). Retrieved December 1, 2020 via Twitter.
  31. Cyphers, Luke; Fagan, Kate (February 7, 2011). "On homophobia and recruiting". ESPN the Magazine. Archived from the original on September 18, 2011. Retrieved December 1, 2020. Kate Starbird, who spent nine years in the WNBA and Europe, is gay. And she wants no part of the closet. 'I never considered coaching,' she says. 'I didn't want to live my life that way.'

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