TORRANCE — Fred Williams said he found out Derek Fisher’s time coaching the Sparks was over directly from Fisher, who called his assistant coach on Monday afternoon to break the news.

He also suggested that Williams “step in and keep things going” before recommending as much to the team’s ownership group, who agreed the 65-year-old veteran coach would be the right person to take over.

Sparks guard Brittney Sykes said she was getting her hair done, enjoying a surprise second day off Tuesday when she suddenly was inundated with calls and messages from friends who were starting to see early reports online.

That afternoon, the Sparks made it official: 12 games into the 36-game season they were parting ways with Fisher, who was in his fourth year coaching the team and second as its general manager. The former Lakers point guard finished his Sparks tenure with a 54-46 regular-season record – they’re 5-7 this season – having gone 1-4 in the postseason.

Williams has 40 years of women’s basketball coaching experience, including a couple of years at USC in the 1990s and about 25 in the WNBA.

He came aboard in L.A. in 2019 with Fisher and current assistant coach Latricia Trammell. Before that, Williams coached WNBA greats including Jennifer Azzi and Natalie Williams in Utah, Dawn Staley in Charlotte, Angel McCoughtry in Atlanta (where the Dream reached the WNBA Finals on Williams’ watch) and, notably, current Spark Liz Cambage in Dallas.

The Sparks’ stated plan is that Williams will, at least, finish the season as the Sparks’ interim coach. After that? Well, he and Johnnie Harris, the Auburn women’s basketball coach who hired him as an assistant for next season, have agreed to “see what happens and determine at the end of the (WNBA) season what needs to be done.”

More immediately, Williams’ Sparks head coaching tenure started Tuesday, when he said he spent time calling each player to gauge her temperature before they convened for his first practice as head coach on Wednesday at Jump Beyond Sports, their home gym this summer.

Of course, those conversations included one with Nneka Ogwumike, a six-time All-Star forward and the Sparks’ longest-tenured member who is also the president of the players union. She said Wednesday she was not part of the decision to go in a different coaching direction, and that coaching changes (this is the team’s third in her 10-plus seasons in L.A.) are something “I’d like to experience less.”

Still, she expressed confidence in and a comfortability with Williams, praising his experience, his “sage-ness” and calling him “kind of an O.G.”

“I’m just glad,” she said, “that if there were changes made, the ball is in his court.”

Said Williams: “We’re on the same page with a lot of stuff the players want, and what our staff wants. We’re gonna make sure all that comes together.”

Ogwumike said she talked with Williams about Cambage, Fisher’s marquee offseason signing. This season, the 6-foot-9 All-Star center has had an uneven start, averaging 15.3 points but just 6.1 rebounds. In the Sparks’ 81-74 loss to the slumping Phoenix Mercury on Sunday – Fisher’s final game – she played only 13 minutes despite having no fouls.

“I said, ‘You know … having one of, if not the most prominent centers in the game, you’ve already coached her. That’s a lot of ground that we’ve covered,’” Ogwumike said. “I think that will really enhance our chemistry because we can’t have her out there without the ball running through her.”

It remains to be seen whether Williams changes how the Sparks deploy Cambage, but his litany of planned “tweaks” will go well beyond fresh terminology.

“My thing is just to get up and down a little bit more in practice,” Williams said, adding that come game time, fans can expect to “see a little bit more uptempo offensive and, defensively, just getting a little bit more aggressive on the ball – and a lot more help.”

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Furthermore, Williams said the Sparks’ starting lineup likely will fluctuate for the next three or four games until he gets enough analytical and statistical information to make a decision on his rotations.

“We will tinker, yes,” he said. “We will tinker with that a little bit. At the point guard position, in the post area – all positions, actually.”

But that wasn’t it. Williams also wants the team to “go harder, push harder” as the Sparks continue to implement plays and schemes they haven’t yet gotten to this season.

“It’s gonna take a little time for that to kick in,” Williams said. “Look for three or four games to still have some bumps, but it’s gonna get fixed.”

Williams will face a tough test in his Sparks head coaching debut on Saturday at Crytpo.com Arena, when they’ll face the surging Las Vegas Aces, who started 10-2 under first-year head coach Becky Hammon.

Nneka Ogwumike reacts to the Sparks’ coaching change. pic.twitter.com/gyBYQOVNR9

— Mirjam Swanson (@MirjamSwanson) June 8, 2022