WASHINGTON, D.C. – Monumental Basketball announced today that Dr. Katherine Evans has been named Vice President of Research & Information Systems. In this newly-created role, Dr. Evans will oversee Monumental Basketball’s research department, supporting the Wizards, Mystics, Go-Go and Wizards District Gaming. She is the first woman to head the research or analytics department of an NBA franchise.
“Dr. Evans is an exceptional talent with a true passion for the game of basketball and is widely-respected within the league and academic circles,” said Monumental Basketball Chief Planning & Operations Officer Sashi Brown. “She brings innovative approaches and perspectives and will be a great leader of our research department, which is charged with identifying competitive advantages for all of our athletes and our athlete care and performance team.”
Prior to joining the Wizards, Dr. Evans served as the director of strategic research for the Toronto Raptors. In that role, she advised various departments including the front office, coaching and medical departments. She oversaw the data sources to build a draft prospects database as well as build models for player projections of draft prospects. Dr. Evans was also instrumental in helping analyze methods and build models for player evaluation and on-court strategy.
“I am very excited to join Monumental Sports & Entertainment,” said Evans. “I am looking forward to contributing to all the Monumental Basketball teams and to helping expand their analytics capabilities.”
Dr. Evans spent two years as a data scientist with Verily Life Sciences where she helped create models predicting medication adherence and analyzed medication adherence interventions to measure causal impact. She received undergraduate and graduate degrees from Harvard University and UC Berkeley, ultimately earning a doctorate in biostatistics from Harvard.