"I think you can always do better," Delaney-Smith points out. "I'm not critical of myself, but [I am] very demanding of myself."

One area of her life which Delaney-Smith feels cannot be improved, however, is her family support. Her husband of 22 years, Francis, and their 10-year-old son, Jared, are at every Harvard game cheering for her and the Crimson. They are the first to congratulate her after a victory, and they share her pain after a defeat.

"It's the best," says Delaney-Smith, referring to their support. "I take my job home with me all the time. I am sometimes very bothered by a situation, and [Francis] is always there. He's a great listener. And my son is just like him; my son is great."

Her obvious ability and success as a coach and mother she attributes to her own mother, who was her coach in high school.

"My mother was great," Delaney-Smith says. "[She] was my coach and my biggest fan. She was a great coach. She coached back when no one cared about girls, so I'm sure I learned a lot from her."

While playing for her mother, Delaney-Smith became the first Massachusetts high school women's basketball player to score 1,000 career points. Little did she know that this honor would be followed by many more in an illustrious coaching career.

She has received four coach of the year awards, and in 1986 she became the first woman inducted into the Massachusetts Basketball Coaches Hall of Fame.

Last year she was nominated for the New England Women's Leadership Award honoring outstanding women in the region. This season, for guiding her squad to a perfect 14-0 Ivy League record, she was voted Ivy League Coach of the Year.

This is quite an impressive resume, yet Delaney-Smith does not place much importance on all of these distinctions.

"Awards don't really mean that much to me," she says. "I love getting them and that's really nice, but I don't think about them very much."

What is more important than awards for Delaney-Smith is her community involvement. She runs a summer basketball clinic at Harvard, owns the Net Results Basketball Summer Camp and frequently speaks at youth leagues for girls.

She believes that female athletes and coaches can contribute significantly to the lives of children, particularly young girls. However, according to Delaney-Smith, the process requires more action than that which is currently being taken.

"I have a great interest and belief that we should be out in the class-rooms talking to these kids more," she says. "It's an enormous task, but I believe it should be done."

The prospects for community outreach excite Delaney-Smith in the same manner as the future of women's athletics. But, having fought numerous battles over gender equity in her career, she knows that there is still a long road to travel before parity between genders is reached in athletics.

"I think [the development of women's athletics in this country] is so exciting," says Delaney-Smith, "but it is still painful to do what we've done a number of years and never pack [Lavietes Pavilion.] But I don't think that's Harvard, I think that's society. I just think you need marketing, and the schools that have hired marketing people and win are successful. I believe it's in our future."