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As she begins her seventh year as a WNBA head coach and fourth with the Seattle Storm, Anne Donovan stands atop her peers as the league's best coach.

"There's so many people that went before me and I have so many great peers in this game that I just am trying to keep up." Jeff Reinking/NBAE/Getty

Yes, Donovan has work to do to catch Houston Comets Coach Van Chancellor in terms of career legacy, most notably his four WNBA Championship rings. Yes, John Whisenant is the coach of the defending champions and the reigning Coach of the Year. Yes, Mike Thibault has led his team to back-to-back WNBA Finals. Still, what Donovan has done in her WNBA career thus far cannot be ignored. The league's general managers said as much earlier this week when they voted Donovan the WNBA's best head coach.

Donovan's resume-padding has been rapid over the last two seasons. In leading the Storm to the 2004 WNBA Championship, Donovan became the first woman coach ever to guide a title-winner. Last year, her 100th career WNBA win made her the first female to that milestone as well.

This year promises more of the same. If the Storm finishes .500 or better, Donovan will pass former Los Angeles Coach Michael Cooper for third in WNBA history in coaching wins. She gained four games last year on Washington's Richie Adubato, who is second to Chancellor in career wins amongst active coaches, starting the season 13 career wins ahead of Donovan.

Then, there is USA Basketball. As an assistant to Chancellor, Donovan helped the USA Senior Women's National Team to gold in Athens in 2004. Now it is her turn, and she will guide the U.S. women in September in the World Championship in Brazil.

Perhaps the person least concerned with Donovan's legacy as Donovan herself, but even she was forced to consider her place amongst the top coaches in the history of the women's game when she won her 100th WNBA game last August.

"After that happened last year, it made me stop to think about it," she says. "There's so many people that went before me and I have so many great peers in this game that I just am trying to keep up. That's the way I look at it. I'm trying to win another championship. I'm trying to go get another gold medal, things that have already been accomplished by numerous people ahead of me."

While those achievements obviously motivate Donovan, her goal is more subtle.

"The biggest goal for me has been to professionally to enjoy the moment, enjoy the process," she says, "which I think I'm a little bit more able to do with each passing year because of that comfort zone."

When Donovan first took the helm of the Storm three years ago, leaving the Charlotte Sting after two seasons because of uncertainty about the Sting's future, virtually everything about the organization was new to her. She inherited a support staff, like Director of Basketball Operations Missy Bequette, from predecessor Lin Dunn. Donovan had a chance to build her own coaching staff, but hired a pair of assistants, Jenny Boucek and Jessie Kenlaw, with whom she had never worked before. Donovan had only previously coached one of her new players, reserve center Danielle McCulley.

During her time in Seattle, Donovan has both put her own stamp on the Storm while also growing closer to those around her. Now, there is an unshakeable bond between Donovan and her Storm players, to the point where All-Star forward Lauren Jackson said that she was willing to sign a multi-year contract this past off-season in large part because Donovan had agreed to terms on her own multi-year extension at the conclusion of the 2005 regular season.

"It feels like I've been here more than three years," says Donovan. "I'm just so much more comfortable and confident in the people around me, in trusting the people around me to do their jobs, whether it be staff or players. I know Sue (Bird's) and Lauren's strengths and weaknesses and have total confidence in them. Their confidence and their trust in me has grown because they know what the expectations are from me. It's different entirely (from when I first came to Seattle) in that sense of comfort zone."

Donovan has developed her own unique style as a coach. She is regarded as one of the league's most versatile coaches. Only she and Thibault received votes from GMs in each of the three different specific categories listed by the WNBA - best manager/motivator of people; best strategic/X's and O's coach; and best at developing young players. At its core, Donovan's style is about trust between her and her players. It's something she learned from her career as a star player.

"One of the reasons I had confidence that I was going to be a good coach is because I played for so many coaches with so many different styles," Donovan says. "Through the course of that, not ever planning to be a coach, but just knowing as a person how I liked to be treated, how I liked to be coached. So I learned through all those different coaches, picking up the nuances of different people and their styles. And of course the basketball stuff too. Then trying to figure out what works for me. It doesn't necessarily work for every player that's ever played for me, but I think a majority of the times it works for me."

As Donovan has grown as a coach and become more comfortable in Seattle, part of that maturation process has been a better understanding of which players will fit in with her system. This off-season, Donovan, wearing her director of player personnel hat, found quite possibly the perfect fit in forward Wendy Palmer.

Fitting in, says Donovan, is "really, really important. I guess I'm one that believes players have to have the confidence of their coaches in order to succeed. The same thing for me - I have to have confidence in these players that are in this system. We're very selective in the free agents we go after."

Because Palmer has been in the league for nine years with six different teams, Donovan knew almost exactly what she was getting. A more pleasant surprise has been rookie Barbara Turner bringing everything the Storm had hoped for and more, on and off the court.

"You do your homework, you do the best you can, but it's tough to really get personality scouting reports on college kids," says Donovan. "You will not find one college coach who tells you anything but positive things about their players. You have to really do your homework, watch when they play, watch them on the bench, talk to people around them, and then it's an educated guess. You latch on to somebody like Tanisha Wright, Barbara Turner, whose personality is perfect for this staff."

It is this approach - along with the not-inconsiderable efforts of Bird, Jackson and Betty Lennox - that has brought the Storm consecutive 20-win seasons and a WNBA title. And it has made Donovan the WNBA's best coach.