Ime Udoka’s mistress REVEALED as 34-year-old married team service manager with ties to Danny Ainge

The Boston Celtics employee whose affair with head coach Ime Udoka led to his suspension can finally be revealed.

The female employee is team service manager Kathleen Nimmo Lynch, 34, a married mother of three, DailyMail.com can reveal. The Celtics have not identified the woman Udoka was involved in, but Lynch’s name had been leaked online.

She served as a team liaison for arranging travel, lodging and game tickets for Celtics relatives at home and on the road, and has likely arranged travel for Udoka’s fiancé, actress Nia Long.

A source familiar with the investigation told DailyMail.com that the affair was consensual, short-lived and over by the time investigators got involved.

Lynch has longstanding personal ties to the team’s legendary former player, Danny Ainge, who served as the team’s executive director of basketball operations last year before leaving the franchise.

Ainge, 63, a devout Mormon, helped her get her job.

A source familiar with the investigation told DailyMail.com that Ainge learned early in the summer that the Celtics had launched an investigation into Udoka’s relationship with Lynch, but that he did not intervene in the investigation or the decision to suspend the coach.

However, the source added that Ainge was deeply disappointed by the affair, especially considering they have families.

Lynch has known Ainge and his family for over a decade and shares a hometown, college and workplace with the basketball hero.

Ainge left the Celtics last year and took charge of Utah Jazz’s basketball business long before news of the affair went public and resulted in the season’s suspension last month.

“The relationship with the Ainge family or where she went to school or her religious beliefs had nothing to do with the severity of the sentence,” the source said.

“The good thing is that everyone is sorry for what happened and taking responsibility, and being humble, and trying to fight for their families and their lives back,” the source said.

Lynch and Ainge both declined comment when approached by DailyMail.com.

Growing up in an active Mormon family, Lynch lived for years as a teenager in Wellesley, Massachusetts, then Ainge’s hometown, where he and his wife raised a family of six.

She later attended college with Danny Ainge’s daughter at the basketball star’s alma mater Brigham Young University, a school in Provo, Utah, sponsored by the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

She graduated in 2011 and two years later she was hired by the Celtics, where she worked under Ainge who was the head of basketball operations.

He has held the top position since 2003 and retired in 2021, but has retained ties to the Celtics, where his son Austin is the director of the players’ staff.

Udoka, the Celtics sophomore head coach with a once stellar record, was banned for the remainder of the 2022-2023 season for multiple unspecified team rule violations. No disciplinary action has been taken against Lynch.

The power dynamics associated with the inappropriate relationship were reportedly the primary finding.

“I know the whole story from front to back,” says the source. “It’s as basic as it gets. All actions were 100 percent consent.’

Still, the source added, the Celtics decided the suspension was sensible, mainly because “they didn’t want the distraction to last long.”

Sources close to Lynch say she is devastated and afraid to show her face in public these days because she wants to avoid criticism given her name and photo.

“She can’t even go to a supermarket,” said one person.

Ainge’s daughter, Taylor, a close friend of Lynch’s, declined to discuss details when DailyMail.com contacted them, but urged the media to respect the privacy of the parties involved.

“These are involved people who have families and are dealing with a lot of impact themselves, and they don’t need people and Twitter and the news media making it worse,” she said. “There’s a reason people don’t talk about this. It’s been examined and it’s over. The Celtics are doing what they have to do.

“If you run a business and have rules, your hands are tied in the end,” she continued. ‘It is what it is. I know everyone wants a spicy story, but it’s really just a series of unfortunate events.”

In the wake of his suspension, Udoka repented.

“I would like to apologize to our players, fans, the entire Celtics organization and my family for disappointing,” Udoka said in a statement. “I am sorry for putting the team in this difficult situation and I accept the team’s decision. Out of respect for everyone involved, I will not comment further.’

The chaotic situation escalated on Sept. 23 when Udoka’s fiancé said she was “overwhelmed” by the affair and found out just days after moving to Boston that she was with her old boyfriend.

The actress has been with Udoka for over ten years and they share a 10-year-old son.

It is believed that Long only discovered the infidelity when the Celtics announced the suspension.

“The outpouring of love and support from family, friends and the community during this difficult time means so much to me,” Long said through her spokeswoman.

“I ask that my privacy be respected in processing the recent events.

“Above all, I am a mother and will continue to focus on my children,” she added.

Celtics reporter Amanda Pflugrad was forced to deny she was the female collaborator involved with Udoka and slammed the relentless speculation on social media surrounding the female collaborator’s identity.

The decision was made to keep the name of the woman involved a secret, but many allege that this led to unfair online speculation and dragged several innocent women into the rumours, and that point has been echoed by Pflugrad – himself an employee of the Celts.