Golden State Warriors help transform lives of incarcerated men through coaching program

VACAVILLE, Calif. (AP) — One day last fall, Ray Woodfork found himself being challenged to a fight by a fellow inmate half his age on the grounds of Solano State Prison.

Woodfork would have been tempted not so long ago. The Golden State Warriors have helped turn him toward a different way of thinking.

This time, the once-aspiring college basketball player, who was serving as referee for the prison football league that day, immediately made it clear he had no interest in an altercation. Woodfork said he chose to walk away and return to his dorm.

He acknowledges had he fought there's no way he would now be part of a peer mentoring program or have a chance for the governor to review his case.

And Woodfork certainly wouldn't be a certified basketball coach either if adrenaline and anger had won out.

“I was just like, ‘That’s not who I am, that’s not what I’m about,’ and I walked away,” Woodfork recalled. “It’s hard to do, because the flesh wants to do that.”

The incident happened before Week 5 of a six-week program run by youth coaches from the Warriors Basketball Academy as part of the Twinning Project that is teaching incarcerated men at Solano coaching skills and showing them there is the chance for meaningful transformation.

Woodfork successfully utilized a skill learned in the program: palms down.

With palms facing down, it allows someone to move forward and focus on the next moment or play, forgetting whatever trigger might be right in front of them or something that already happened.

Woodfork began writing rap lyrics about his experience with the Twinning Project, which started in the UK by pairing professional soccer teams like Arsenal and West Ham United of the Premier League with prisons to contribute in the rehabilitation process. U.S. clubs such as D.C. United, Angel City FC and Miami FC have become involved — and other NBA teams are showing interest.

“Golden State will be a hard act to follow,” Twinning Project CEO Hilton Freund said.

“With my palms down, I calm down, next move is on them.”

Several months later, Woodfork grabbed a mic and began rapping those very words in celebration as his 15 basketball teammates danced alongside him and hugged one another.

It's graduation day.

That means a stroll in front of the group to receive a certificate and Warriors jersey with each man's last name on back. The hope is these graduates will now use their skills to teach other incarcerated men not only how to coach but to be positive influences.

When Warriors academy coach Ben Clarfield circles up the group at midcourt to give the men and instructors a chance to provide feedback, there is a common theme.

The Twinning Project has provided these men a sense of self-worth and purpose, a break from the isolation of prison. Many of the participants expressed feeling loved and seen — often for the first time in years.

This has been about grace and forgiveness, inclusion and acceptance. Oftentimes, those ideas have had to be learned or re-learned — and the Twinning Project played a crucial role in that process.

“It reintroduced me to my love of basketball, that people on the outside haven’t given up on us,” former Fresno State student Jonquel Brooks said. “It’s wanting to coach but not knowing how to coach, then now being given the tools to have the opportunity.”

Jeff Addiego, vice president of Warriors Basketball Academy, and his staff have also been changed by the outreach. They beamed and fought tears at the same time, overjoyed to see these men finding meaning in their new roles.

The way this program works, the Warriors players and coaches aren't participating as some of the European professionals are, though former Golden State big man Festus Ezeli has been a regular visitor.

“We’ve gotten to know each and every one of these guys. If one of these guys was anywhere else I would give him a hug the first time I saw him,” Addiego said.

“It’s amazing. We don’t pry or ask them anything it, but what they’ve been willing to share with us, it’s powerful stuff."

Woodfork’s mentor, Viet Kim Le, took part in the second coaching cohort. He has observed the commitment by Woodfork to show remorse for his crime and better himself while serving a life sentence without the possibility of parole for murder.

“His beliefs have changed," Le said, "so he looks at life through a different lens.”

“I don’t react, I respond, I take a breath and I move on."

Spanning four hours each Tuesday, some of these men felt like actual basketball players again. They stepped into a changing area in the Solano gym and traded their prison blues for jerseys featuring the Warriors logo on front and Twinning Project on back before making their way to the court for drills like shooting, dribbling and defense. There was also mental training to find strategies for every situation they might encounter in prison or, for some perhaps eventually, life on the outside.

They backpedaled with extra self-confidence, they high-fived, dishing out good-natured trash talk here and there, but more than anything they cheered each other on — through every great shot or errant pass.

Many might never have mixed otherwise.

Community-building is a big part of it.

Freund launched his charitable foundation in 2018, and he and his wife attended the Feb. 11 graduation of the second group of 16 men at Solano receiving coaching certificates. He is thrilled the Warriors became involved.

Freund references a study from the University of Oxford published last year showing the program's “wholistic benefit" for the incarcerated leading to "better behavior, less propensity for violence, improved relationships amongst themselves and improved relationships with their prison officers.”

“Making coaches out of convicts, we’re taking over cities ... coaching with a passion, that’s how we set the tone.”

The palms-down approach is about having the power to choose a response. That message and other learning tools came from mental skills coach Graham Betchart, who works regularly with the UConn men's basketball team.

On his first drive to Solano, Betchart came up with the rhyme "let it go, give it back, next play I attack.”

He had no idea Woodfork would soon begin turning those words into rap.

“Inspiring to the world," Betchart said, "and it comes in a way that I’ve never seen anybody deliver it the way that he does. ... And everything he’s saying is PG-13 but it’s delivered in a way that’s so powerful you don’t even realize that you’d want your 9-year-old kid listening to this.”

“I let it go and get it back, the next play, you know I’m going to attack.”

Woodfork was arrested at age 20 for killing a man during an attempted robbery. He had expected to start playing college games in a summer tournament mere days later.

“So I was right there, right there,” Woodfork shared.

Now he is hopeful his hard work will be considered by Gov. Gavin Newsom.

A former gang member both outside and inside prison who once had dreams of playing in the NBA, Woodfork has trained to be a peer mentor — a program requiring he have five “clean” years without trouble in order to participate.

The Warriors’ program has filled a major void.

“That’s an understatement,” Woodfork said, “due to the fact my aspirations were to play in the NBA one day, as a kid that was my end all, be all, that was my identity. Basketball was everything.”

“It’s deeper than the game and that name on your shirt, it’s the Twinning Project, where real men put in work.”

It brings Addiego and the others to tears at times witnessing the progress — like Woodfork deciding not to fight that day.

“I talked myself off the ledge by speaking out loud about what happened,” said Woodfork, now working as a drug and alcohol counselor.

“This is an opportunity to show the world I’m not the person I was. It doesn’t define me. I feel like I’ve outgrown prison, I feel like a fish swimming upstream, a salmon.”

AP NBA: https://apnews.com/NBA

Haley Cremen, Program Coordinator of the Golden State Warriors Basketball Academy, right, hugs Jay Cornish as he and other Twinning Project cohort 2 participants graduate during the project's collaboration with the NBA's Golden State Warriors and the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation at Solano State Prison in Vacaville, Calif., Tuesday, Feb. 11, 2025. (AP Photo/Jeff Chiu)

Daniel Lopez performs a basketball drill with other Twinning Project cohort 2 participants during the project's collaboration with the NBA's Golden State Warriors and the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation at Solano State Prison in Vacaville, Calif., Tuesday, Feb. 11, 2025. (AP Photo/Jeff Chiu)

Twinning Project cohort 2 participants perform basketball drills during the project's collaboration with the Golden State Warriors and the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation at Solano State Prison in Vacaville, Calif., Tuesday, Feb. 11, 2025. (AP Photo/Jeff Chiu)

Twinning Project cohort 2 participants gather before performing basketball drills during the project's collaboration with the NBA's Golden State Warriors and the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation at Solano State Prison in Vacaville, Calif., Tuesday, Feb. 11, 2025. (AP Photo/Jeff Chiu)

Ray Woodfork, a graduate of Twinning Project's collaboration with the NBA's Golden State Warriors and the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation's cohort 1, middle, performs a rap song in front of cohort 2 participants and Warriors Basketball Academy members at Solano State Prison in Vacaville, Calif., Tuesday, Feb. 11, 2025. (AP Photo/Jeff Chiu)

Ray Woodfork, a graduate of Twinning Project's collaboration with the NBA's Golden State Warriors and the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation's cohort 1, shoots a basket at Solano State Prison in Vacaville, Calif., Tuesday, Feb. 11, 2025. (AP Photo/Jeff Chiu)

ADELBODEN, Switzerland (AP) — Swiss ski star Marco Odermatt is often unbeatable in the World Cup and especially at his home giant slalom classic that he won for a record fifth straight year Saturday.

Olympic giant slalom champion Odermatt raced through steady falling snow and worsening visibility to protect his first-run lead and win by 0.49 seconds from Lucas Pinheiro Braathen of Brazil. Leo Anguenot of France was third, 0.68 back.

Pinheiro Braathen led the applause in the finish area after watching Odermatt ski at his limit to exactly match the Brazilian's time in the tough second run.

"He is really the king of this hill," Pinheiro Braathen said of Odermatt to Swiss broadcaster RTS. “It is an honor to be able to stand as the last man up at the start gate with him and be able to fight him on arguably the coolest race that you guys have to offer.”

Odermatt has won each Adelboden giant slalom since 2022 to overtake the four-win streak of Swedish great Ingemar Stenmark from 1979 through 1982.

“Adelboden was my first love and it will always be my big love. I was here as a small kid,” Odermatt said.

Home wins once were rare and are wildly appreciated by a noisy crowd of about 25,000 fans on a signature day in Switzerland's sports calendar.

“They really made me push harder," Odermatt said of the home support. "This energy, this extra pressure and motivation helps.”

Racing began Saturday morning after a minute’s silence observed for the victims of the fatal fire in a bar in nearby Crans-Montana, which hosts World Cup races in three weeks’ time.

In another stellar World Cup season for Odermatt, the four-time defending overall champion has almost twice as many race points as his nearest challenger, Pinheiro Braathen.

Odermatt's sixth race win this season was the 51st of his career, fourth on the all-time list, and 29th in giant slalom.

Back when he was racing for his father's nation Norway, Pinheiro Braathen sustained a season-ending knee injury at Adelboden in 2021 crashing over the finish line while setting a fast time in giant slalom.

One year later he stopped his giant slalom run approaching the steep final slope rather than tackle it again.

Pinheiro Braathen said Saturday he later had therapy to help him confront his issues with the storied hill.

“Words cannot describe how proud I am right now.”

The Adelboden giant slalom has been a fixture on the men’s calendar since the first week of World Cup racing in January 1967. Then, the winner was another iconic ski name, Jean-Claude Killy.

The Chuenisbaergli course has signature rolling terrain over summer cow pastures. Skiers crest a rise before entering the steep final slope that funnels then down into a raucous finish area.

The course stages a slalom Sunday, that Odermatt will skip though Pinheiro Braathen will be a contender to repeat his 2023 win.

AP skiing: https://apnews.com/hub/alpine-skiing

Switzerland's Marco Odermatt celebrates winning an alpine ski, men's World Cup giant slalom, in Adelboden, Switzerland, Saturday, Jan. 10, 2026. (AP Photo/Giovanni Zenoni)

Second placed Brazil's Lucas Pinheiro Braathen, left, celebrates with winner Switzerland's Marco Odermatt, after finishing second in a men's World Cup giant slalom, in Adelboden, Switzerland, Saturday, Jan. 10, 2026. (AP Photo/Giovanni Zenoni)

Switzerland's Marco Odermatt celebrates winning an alpine ski, men's World Cup giant slalom, in Adelboden, Switzerland, Saturday, Jan. 10, 2026. (AP Photo/Giovanni Zenoni)

Brazil's Lucas Pinheiro Braathen reacts at the finish line during an alpine ski, men's World Cup giant slalom, in Adelboden, Switzerland, Saturday, Jan. 10, 2026. (AP Photo/Giovanni Zenoni)

Switzerland's Marco Odermatt speeds down the course on his way to win an alpine ski, men's World Cup giant slalom, in Adelboden, Switzerland, Saturday, Jan. 10, 2026. (AP Photo/Gabriele Facciotti)

Norway's Timon Haugan speeds down the course during an alpine ski, men¥s World Cup giant slalom, in Adelboden, Switzerland, Saturday, Jan. 10, 2026. (AP Photo/Giovanni Zenoni)

Brazil's Lucas Pinheiro Braathen speeds down the course during an alpine ski, men's World Cup giant slalom, in Adelboden, Switzerland, Saturday, Jan. 10, 2026. (AP Photo/Gabriele Facciotti)

Switzerland's Marco Odermatt speeds down the course during an alpine ski, men's World Cup giant slalom, in Adelboden, Switzerland, Saturday, Jan. 10, 2026. (AP Photo/Giovanni Zenoni)