She previously served as the head coach of the Washington Mystics and Indiana Fever of the Women's National Basketball Association (WNBA).

Among her teammates were future prominent women's coaches Theresa Grentz and Rene Portland.

[5] In 2022, Stanley and Theresa Grentz were inducted into the Naismith Hall for their subsequent accomplishments as college coaches.

Stanley's first head coaching position was at Old Dominion University for the Lady Monarchs in 1977–78.

[7] Stanley later coached at Penn, USC, Stanford and California joining the WNBA as an assistant with the Los Angeles Sparks in 2000.

She returned to the college coaching ranks in Sept.of 2006 as an assistant to C. Vivian Stringer at Rutgers University.

Stanley coached parts of three seasons with the team, amassing an 14–49 record before she was fired on May 25, 2022.