The Pivot, is a documentary that follows NCAA Head Coach Terrell Coburn, as he attempts to transform the Division I Wagner University Women’s Basketball program, during the NCAA’s most tumultuous times.

He is the only Black male head coach in the Northeastern Conference, and the first in Wagner’s Women’s Basketball history. He is on a mission to transform the program at a time when the NCAA is undergoing a massive reorganization, leaving its future in peril.

Coach Coburn attempts to create a sustainable basketball community in a world where the sport has become hyper-commercialized into a multi-billion dollar industry. Can Coach Coburn’s philosophy of building relationships, consistency, and discipline survive a rapidly changing environment, where money is becoming the only thing that matters?

Meet The Squad

  • Jahmia Phillips

    DIRECTOR, CINEMATOGRAPHER, PRODUCER

    Jahmia Phillips is a Peabody award winning and 3 time Emmy nominated Black trans filmmaker from Chicago. I am a former Division I Women’s Basketball player at LIU Brooklyn, and I was forced into early retirement in 2015, during my Junior year of college after sustaining 7 concussions, with a total of 13 to date.I majored in Broadcast journalism, pivoting from the post to production. Interning at ABC’s 20/20 my senior year, where I was a freelance journalist for 8 years. I am currently doing a fellowship with Elevate Media Films.

    For the last ten years in the media industry, Jahmia has worked as an assistant editor at Zealot Productions, associate producer at ABC 20/20, and Soul of a Nation, where they earned both a Peabody and NABJ awards. They also hold three Emmy nominations, a GLAAD, NAACP, and Webby award nomination for their work in news.

    Recently, Jahmia worked as a DP for the Gender Liberation March, Doll Invasion, Production Coordinator for Wide Angle Productions at Essence Festival, Director of Photography (DP) for Elevate News Media, and "Trans Bodies Trans Choices," making it to Outfest and a dozen other film festival circuits. They also collaborate with Khitam Jabr, the director working on "Discoloration," a music video for Katy and the Drive, becoming an official selection at the Garden State and Los Angeles film festival. At the end of 2022, Jahmia produced their first segment on primetime television for ABC's "The Year: with Robin Roberts," highlighting the sports champions of the year.

    Currently, Jahmia is a DP and founder of Chroma Obsidia, a production company aiming to aid black and brown LGBTQIA+ at risk students and athletes with the proper resources to create and tell their own stories.

  • Rafael Samanez

    EDITOR


    Rafael was born in Bahia, Brazil to Peruvian parents of Quechua descent. He grew up in Cleveland, OH after migrating to the US at the age of 12. He currently resides in Queens, NY. He served as Founder and Executive Director of VAMOS Unidos in the Bronx, NY, advocating immigrant and worker’s rights.

    His films delve into the intersectionality of gender, race, migration, and class. Rafael received a 2018 Princess Grace Award in film, was a John Grist Documentary/BAFTA New York Scholar, and is a 2023 Jerome Foundation Fellow. He graduated with an MFA from The City College of New York in 2019.

    His short film, “Out of the Shadows,” won Best Documentary Film Award in the 2019 Cityvisions and has appeared in festivals across the US. In 2019 he was assistant director for the documentary and fiction blend film, “Caer,” which premiered at Sheffield Doc Fest 2021 and debuted in the US at the 2021 Outfest Fusion Festival.

    He is currently working on two documentaries, “Defend the Sacred” and “My Existence is Resistance” while teaching media production courses at the City College of New York.

  • Leilani Clark

    CO-PRODUCER

    Leilani Clark is an Afro-Indigenous (Santa Clara Pueblo/Diné-Navajo) filmmaker, poet, performance artist, and community organizer. Born and raised in Tucson, AZ, during her youth she became involved in human and immigrant rights organizing in the borderlands and the fight for cultural education in Arizona public schools.

    Since 2013, Leilani has developed her art of poetry, storytelling and spoken word to inspire liberatory practices of racial, gender and environmental justice. Leilani has been a featured artist, keynote speaker, and presenter for numerous community and academic events throughout the Southwest and West Coast.

    She currently resides between New York City and Raleigh, North Carolina and is producing two documentary films under her production company, Elevate Media Films, and releasing short stories on issues of human rights, equity, arts & culture with her independent digital media news outlet, Elevate Media News.

  • Hassan Biggus

    INTERN, PRODUCTION ASSISTANT

    Hassan Biggus, Intern/PA, is a member of Midland University's Men's football program. He is a disciplined, motivated athlete inspired to make change in his community and country in any way he can, on and off the field.