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      Connecticut Sun Complete Comeback to Reach W.N.B.A. Finals

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      Connecticut forced a decisive Game 5, then beat the reigning champion Sky and set up a finals matchup with the Las Vegas Aces.The Chicago Sky looked like they were on their way to their second straight appearance in the W.N.B.A. finals. They led Connecticut by 9 points with less than five minutes to go in the decisive Game 5, and had held the Sun to just 14 points since halftime. Sky guard Kahleah Copper was dominating, forcing turnovers, flexing her muscles and clapping her hands en route to a game-high 22 points.But that was it for the Sky: They were held scoreless for the final 4 minutes and 46 seconds of the game. The Sun used an 18-0 run to stun the Sky on their home floor, 72-63, and advance to the finals, where they will face the Las Vegas Aces starting Sunday in Las Vegas.The Sun’s win avenges their loss to the Sky in the semifinals last year. It also ends the Chicago’s quest to become the first team to repeat as W.N.B.A. champion since the Los Angeles Sparks in 2001 and 2002.The Sun were paced by double-doubles from Jonquel Jones (15 points and 10 rebounds) and Alyssa Thomas (12 points and 10 rebounds). Sun forward DeWanna Bonner added 15 points and 9 rebounds.Through the first three games of the series, Chicago’s Candace Parker was nearly unstoppable. She averaged 19 points and 11 rebounds to help the Sky get out to a 2-1 series lead. But in Game 4, the Sun neutralized Parker, holding her to just 11 points and 9 rebounds.And on the offensive side of the ball, the Sun dominated Parker and the Sky from the inside. The Sun have one of the tallest and most physical frontcourts in the league with Jonquel Jones (6-foot-6), Bonner (6-foot-4), Brionna Jones (6-foot-3), and Thomas (6-foot-2); they used that to their advantage to score a playoff-record 66 points from the painted area in Game 4. They beat the Sun, 104-80, achieving a franchise playoff record for points scored in a game to tie the series at two games apiece.Early in Game 5, Chicago’s offense was stagnant, with players seeming nervous to shoot the ball close to the basket for fear of being blocked by one of the Sun’s bigs. The Sun ended the first quarter down just 8 points, with Parker scoreless. In the second quarter, Copper took over. She scored 9 points to bring the game to a 40-40 tie to go into halftime with the momentum on the Sky’s side.Parker continued to struggle offensively, but she was dominant on defense, blocking four shots and grabbing three steals. The Sky held the Sun to 8 points in the third and led by 10 points heading into the final quarter. But the Sky would score just 5 points for the remainder of the game, as the Sun scored 24 to silence the Chicago crowd and advance to the finals. More

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      Why Del Harris and Other Hall of Famers Had to Wait

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      The basketball, baseball and pro football halls of fame make some deserving candidates wait decades for enshrinement. For the few who are chosen, the wait is hard but worth it.Del Harris tried not to think about enshrinement in the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame. He told his avid supporters, including the Hall of Famer John Calipari, not to worry about his fate. It did little good.Harris, 85, already had many awards and honors from his coaching career: enshrinement in the Indiana Basketball Hall of Fame, lifetime achievement awards from Naismith and from the National Basketball Coaches Association, screen time in the original “Space Jam.” But he admits that wasn’t quite enough.“I don’t want to diminish any of the other awards and things, but I think everybody understands if you’re a baseball guy, it’s Cooperstown,” he said. “If you’re a football guy, it’s Canton. And in basketball, it’s the birthplace of the game.”On Saturday, Harris will be inducted into the Hall of Fame in Springfield, Mass., the last of the summer’s salutes to sports heroes past after the Pro Football Hall of Fame held its induction in August and the Baseball Hall of Fame held its in July.Harris’s long wait — he was last a head coach in 1999 — isn’t an outlier. Nearly every year’s inductions in the American sports Halls of Fame feature honorees who have been asked to wait decades to receive their officially sanctioned immortality. A mixture of hope, logic and good old-fashioned denial is required. No matter how many times they hear “better luck next year,” the long-skipped want the honor.Del Harris coached the Los Angeles Lakers to 50 or more wins in three straight seasons, the last two of which came with Shaquille O’Neal.Mike Nelson/AFP, via Getty ImagesHarris was honored for his Hall of Fame induction at a Final Four game in April. He had not been a head coach in the N.B.A. since the 1998-99 season.Tom Pennington/Getty ImagesTony Boselli, 50, had not played in the N.F.L. since 2001 and had been a Pro Football Hall of Fame finalist six times before he was inducted this summer. Boselli, who was a superstar left tackle for seven seasons, had talked with his wife, Angi, about the possibility of never getting in. “I’ll be fine; I’ll be OK,” he told her. “I have a great life. I have an amazing family. I’ve been blessed by God to be able to do what I love to do. I have great friends.”It was the best attitude to take, “especially being a finalist that many times and being told that I didn’t make it,” Boselli added.For Drew Pearson, a star receiver for the Dallas Cowboys in the 1970s, the “logjam” of qualified candidates gives the Pro Football Hall of Fame its prestige and meaning. Pearson was finally inducted in 2021 after having retired in 1983. As the Hall of Fame eluded his grasp, Pearson sought clarity. The process for induction, he said, has biases and politics, but it’s the best option available.“There are guys that say, ‘I don’t like the Cowboys so I’m not voting for Drew Pearson’ and that type of thing,” he said, lamenting how there is nothing a former player can do in that situation to help his case. “You can’t go out there and run any more routes. You can’t catch any more balls or Hail Marys. It is what it is, and you hope that it’s good enough.”That doesn’t mean the process doesn’t rankle. Jim Kaat, a star pitcher for the Minnesota Twins who retired in 1983 but was not enshrined in Cooperstown until this summer, knew the writers wouldn’t vote him in. That was for the Seaver-Koufax class of pitchers. And the Hall of Fame’s veterans committees over the years had routinely been populated by people who had never seen him play, he said, which was frustrating.Injuries limited Tony Boselli to seven seasons in the N.F.L., but the left tackle for the Jacksonville Jaguars was a three-time All-Pro and five-time Pro Bowler.Rick Wilson/The Florida Times-Union, via Associated PressTony Boselli, third from left, said he felt an immediate connection to the Pro Hall of Fame’s Class of 2022. Three members of the class did not live to see their induction.Gene J. Puskar/Associated PressThis year, Kaat liked his chances. Voters on the Hall’s Golden Days Era Committee had played against him, played with him or were active when he pitched from 1959 to 1983. They knew he was durable and reliable and that his numbers dipped because he moved to the bullpen. He was named on 12 of the committee’s 16 ballots — exactly the number needed for election.For Kaat, Pearson, Boselli and others, the sense of relief when their sport’s Hall of Fame does come calling can be palpable.After Pearson was passed over one last time in 2020, he broke down. It was filmed by a Dallas news crew, and he said his reaction was not the exception. The rejection is personal. You just never see it.“It showed the committee what it means to us players, so don’t mess around, OK?” he said. “Don’t mess around with us, don’t have the biases, don’t have the politics.”That pain is still the reality of Marques Johnson, a five-time N.B.A. All-Star in the 1970s and 80s, and a star at U.C.L.A. in the late 1970s. He has been a finalist for basketball’s Hall of Fame three times, including 2022. He considered removing his name from consideration until his sons and friends dissuaded him.Induction would put a “cap on a great career, a great life, he said, but “it’s the not the be-all, end-all for me. There are more important things.”Encouragement from Hall of Famers such as Walt “Clyde” Frazier and Bill Walton, he said, reinforced that he had been an elite player. But that praise doesn’t protect a psychic wound.Marques Johnson had his jersey number retired by the Milwaukee Bucks in 2019. He is still hoping to be elected to basketball’s Hall of Fame.Morry Gash/Associated Press“In the recovery process, we try to avoid the deliberate manufacturing of misery,” Johnson, who is 20 years sober, added via text message. “That day, waiting to hear whether I ‘made the cut,’ is one that I can easily do without. It dredges all types of memories, good and bad — my exceptional exploits and my shortcomings as a player and human being, on both counts.”Time, though, can exact a toll. When Johnson’s mother Baasha, whom he referred to as Madea, was hospitalized with a stroke in October, he urged her like “a Baptist preacher” to hang on — Madea had to make that trip to Springfield. She died Jan. 5. Kaat’s wife of 20 years, MaryAnn, died in 2008. His daughter, Jill, died in 2021.Of the seven players elected into Cooperstown this year, only three lived to see their induction.Time, though, can also bestow gifts. Kaat, who has remarried, shared the day with his grandchildren and was inducted with longtime teammate and friend, Tony Oliva. Pearson, 71, has seen an uptick in endorsements and business opportunities. Boselli developed a kinship with his classmates.“You get to know their families — their wives, their kids — who they are as men,” he said. “You go from maybe casually knowing some of these guys — you compete against them, maybe see them around — to really being tied together forever in football history as the Class of 2022.”Bob Dandridge, upper left, was part of fearsome Milwaukee Bucks team that also included, clockwise, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, Greg Smith, Oscar Robertson, Coach Larry Costello and Jon McClocklin.Associated PressDandridge, who retired after the 1981-82 season, was presented at his Hall of Fame induction in 2021 by Robertson. Robertson was inducted in 1980.Maddie Meyer/Getty ImagesFor Bob Dandridge, who was elected into basketball’s Hall of Fame in 2021, the 39-year wait after his N.B.A. career ended resulted in his children being old enough to realize the occasion’s importance. Even his two basketball-obsessed grandsons, Thaddeus, 5, and Zachary, 7, were excited to attend. They recognized the legends of more recent vintage such as Kevin Garnett and Paul Pierce. Family members assembled “without any malice, just love.”“Ten years ago,” Dandridge said, “I wouldn’t have had this type of quality in my life. The wait has been awesome for me.”Weeks before his induction, Harris, recovering from a back operation, could not yet reflect on how the Hall of Fame has changed his life. But he knew the role basketball had played.“I had graduated from college to be a preacher,” Harris said. “My Greek professor called me two weeks before school was supposed to start at seminary. He said, ‘I’ve been thinking about you. I really think you should work a year before you go to graduate school; there are no scholarships for that. If you agree, I already have a job for you.’”Harris coached middle school basketball at King Springs School in Tennessee, a short drive from Milligan College, his alma mater. That was in 1959. Coaching in the N.B.A. finals, writing six books and teaching in clinics worldwide followed. He’s still working in basketball, now as vice president of the G-League’s Texas Legends.It all started with those boys and girls decades ago. “As I saw their lives change,” Harris said, “mine changed.” More

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      Chelsea Gray Leads the Las Vegas Aces to the W.N.B.A. Finals

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      The first 30-point, 10-assist game in playoff history was punctuated by two crunchtime buckets.SEATTLE — Chelsea Gray had just given the Las Vegas Aces a 3-point lead with a minute left in Game 4 of a W.N.B.A. semifinal series on Tuesday night — enough to give them a quick sigh of relief but not enough to put the game out of reach. Gray backpedaled on defense with a stoic look, and after a Seattle Storm miss, she seemed determined to end the game.She dribbled left, crossed right, then hit a fadeaway jump shot a few steps inside the 3-point line over the outstretched arm of Gabby Williams, a W.N.B.A. All-Defensive first-teamer, to give the Aces a 5-point lead, effectively ending the game. And Gray knew it as she ran back, trading her stoicism for exuberance, yelling in celebration at the Seattle crowd that she had silenced.With 31 points and 10 assists, Gray became the only player to reach both totals in a W.N.B.A. playoff game, an exclamation mark on one of the most dominant playoff performances in league history. After the 97-92 win, and a 3-1 series victory, Las Vegas advanced to the W.N.B.A. finals, where it will meet the Connecticut Sun or the Chicago Sky. (That semifinal series is tied, 2-2, with Game 5 on Thursday in Chicago.)“This is something that’s just in her DNA,” Aces Coach Becky Hammon said. “She is stone cold with the game on the line. And, you know, it’s a luxury. You can just put the ball in her hands and let her go to work. So the smartest thing I could do is just get me and everybody else out of the way and let her go.”Aces forward A’ja Wilson said: “I’ve never ever seen someone honestly live do that and dictate the game and just stay composed in all moments. Like, she’s built for this moment.”Gray has advanced far in the playoffs before, winning a championship with the Los Angeles Sparks in 2016, but on that squad, she was much more of a role player, averaging just 9 points per game in the playoffs. Now 29, Gray has evolved into the most important player on one of the most talented teams in the league. The Aces had four W.N.B.A. All-Stars in the regular season, none of whom were named Chelsea Gray.Hammon said Gray does “everything differently” from other players in the league.“I’m her assistant coach,” Hammon said with a smile, adding: “I want to hear what she has to say. And what she hears and what she thinks, and what she sees out there. And she loves big moments. That’s nothing I taught her.”Gray is averaging 24 points and 7.7 assists per game through six playoff games and making 60 percent of her 3-pointers and 63 percent of her shots overall. Those are career highs in every category for Gray: The only season that comes close is when she averaged 16.5 points and 4.5 assists per game in the playoffs with the Sparks in 2018. And yet Gray said she didn’t feel a noticeable difference.“I approach the game the same way every single time,” she said, adding: “I’m taking the shots that I know I could hit. Maybe there have been a couple of shots where it was like, maybe uncharacteristic, but we work on it every day.”Breanna Stewart, right, had 42 points, but, like the rest of the Storm, could not stop Gray, left.Lindsey Wasson/Associated PressGray’s play style often results in the kind of oh-no-oh-no-oh-yes shots that stun spectators and opposing teams, like the step-back 3 with seven minutes left that she hit over the 6-foot-3 Storm center Tina Charles before the shot clock buzzer sounded. It looked like a heave, but went through the hoop without even touching the rim. Such scores have become normal to her teammates. They watch Gray take ridiculous shots at practice, even some with her feet turned in different directions, that consistently go through the net.“I know that ball is going in every single time,” Wilson said.The fascinating part about Gray’s performances is how she scores and finds her teammates. It’s a league where speed is paramount for guards like her teammate Kelsey Plum, who averaged 20 points in the regular season by blowing by defenders for open layups or using quick crossovers for step-back 3s. Or like Chicago’s Kahleah Copper, who runs out on fast breaks and routinely races past guards to score.Gray is different. She moves downcourt at a somewhat lethargic pace — her feet barely leaving the ground as she commands the offense and keeps defenders at a distance. She creates separation with crossovers that put defenders a step behind her, which is all she needs to use her 5-foot-10, 170-pound frame to muscle them on her way to a crafty finish around the rim. Or she creates a sliver of separation that allows her to get the ball over the arms of a defender.“She’s super methodical,” Storm guard Jewell Loyd said. “She’s super smart, intelligent, understands her body, what she can do, and what she can’t do. She doesn’t do anything that she can’t do. She understands where her spots are on the floor when her team needs a bucket.”Gray’s historic night and the Aces’ victory spoiled the final game of guard Sue Bird’s 21-year career in Seattle, where she won four championships. The Storm lost each game in the final minute or seconds and very likely should have won Game 3. But a defensive lapse let Aces guard Jackie Young send the game into overtime, where Las Vegas pulled away. In Game 4 on Tuesday night, Breanna Stewart’s 42 points, tying a playoff record, weren’t enough.The most significant challenge was “a lot of Chelsea Gray,” Storm Coach Noelle Quinn said, repeating that point for emphasis.“I don’t think anyone on planet Earth can guard her,” Quinn said. “I mean, she was unconscious. We did a lot of things in this series to try to slow her down. But you slow down her scoring, limit her scoring, and she has the ability to pass and playmake. She’s an incredible player.”When Gray is “rocking and rolling,” as she has been in the playoffs, Wilson knows what to do: Get out of her way, she said.And staying out of Gray’s way may be the key for Las Vegas to reach its potential and win its first W.N.B.A. title. More

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      Seattle Storm’s Sue Bird Ends WNBA Career With Playoff Loss

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      Bird, 41, the Seattle Storm guard, had said she would retire after this season. The Storm fell to the Las Vegas Aces in the W.N.B.A. semifinals on Tuesday.Seattle Storm fans wanted one more year. Sue Bird gave it to them.She slicked back her signature ponytail, laced up her custom Nike sneakers and added to her legend with a farewell tour.When the Storm set a W.N.B.A. single-game assists record for the regular season with 37, eight of them were hers. She stretched her formidable margin as the league’s career leader in assists and inched higher on the steals and 3-point lists. She helped the Storm make the playoffs for the 16th time in the 19 seasons she played.And then she was done.The Las Vegas Aces beat the Storm, 97-92, in Game 4 of their semifinal series on Tuesday to advance to the W.N.B.A. finals. For Bird, 41, who had said in June that she would retire after the season, the loss on her home court marked the end of an incredible career. As fans cheered and chanted “Thank you, Sue,” Bird stood on the court and cried.At a postgame news conference, Bird said that she hadn’t wanted to leave the court so that she could “soak it all in.” She started to cry again. “I know the tears don’t look like happy tears, but there’s a lot of happiness,” she said.Bird retires as the W.N.B.A.’s career leader in assists and games played. She had 8 points and 8 assists against the Aces on Tuesday.Lindsey Wasson/Associated PressAces Coach Becky Hammon said it was “bittersweet” to have defeated Bird to end her “fairy-tale” career. Bird had 8 points and 8 assists in the loss.“I kind of feel like the girl that beat Serena,” Hammon said, referring to Ajla Tomljanovic, who beat Serena Williams in her final match at the U.S. Open last week. Williams had said she planned to retire after the tournament.Storm Coach Noelle Quinn, who also played with Bird in Seattle, called Bird “the best point guard to ever play this game.”Bird won four championships with Seattle, the last in 2020. That season showcased the traits that have come to define her: resilience and keen court vision. She missed half of the regular season with injuries. But she proved invaluable during Seattle’s six postseason games. Seattle never lost during that playoff run. Bird set a then-W.N.B.A. record for assists in a playoff game with 16 in Game 1 of the finals against the Aces. Then she had a double-double — 16 points and 10 assists — in Game 2. In the series-clinching Game 3, Bird spent the end of the fourth quarter on the bench laughing with forward Breanna Stewart. The Storm won by 33.“The fact that I’m sitting here, I think I’m having this, like, in-shock moment, because it doesn’t really feel real that we just won and that I was able to contribute in the way that I did,” she said afterward.Much of Bird’s 21-year career has come as a surprise, if only because there wasn’t enough time for someone to accomplish such feats before her. “I really didn’t know what to dream,” Bird told The New York Times last month, “and so to sit here now with all the championships I have, I just feel really satisfied.”The Storm drafted her No. 1 overall in 2002 out of UConn before the W.N.B.A.’s sixth season. She immediately became Seattle’s franchise leader in assists, with 191 that year. She came in second for the Rookie of the Year Award, but she and the player who beat her — Indiana’s Tamika Catchings — became the first rookies ever named to the All-W.N.B.A. first team.Fans celebrated Bird with signs and T-shirts all season.Steph Chambers/Getty ImagesAmong parting gifts Bird received was this jacket from the Minnesota Lynx’s Sylvia Fowles, who also retired this season.David Berding/Getty ImagesOver the next 20 years, Bird would pile up honors, including a record 13 W.N.B.A. All-Star selections and five Olympic gold medals with the United States. Last year, she was voted to the W25, the W.N.B.A.’s list of the top 25 players ever as the league celebrated its 25th anniversary.“These athletes have played the game at the highest level on the court — they are scorers and rebounders, assist makers and defensive stoppers, leaders and mentors,” W.N.B.A. Commissioner Cathy Engelbert said in announcing the W25. She added, “Together, they have transformed the way the game is played, changed the way athletes are viewed, become incredible role models and inspired generations of young, diverse athletes.”Bird, who is engaged to the women’s soccer star Megan Rapinoe, is one of the most visible gay professional athletes. For most of the W.N.B.A.’s history, its most prominent stars were not openly gay, and players have said that they felt pressured to conform to heterosexual standards of femininity. But Bird is among a wave of stars — including Brittney Griner, Seimone Augustus, Elena Delle Donne and Diana Taurasi — who have been open about their sexuality and spoken about L.G.B.T.Q. rights and acceptance.Bird has also used her platform as one of the league’s biggest stars to support social justice causes, especially regarding Black women. And as the W.N.B.A. continues to push for the release of Griner, who has been detained in Russia on drug charges since February, Bird has been vocal.“We all feel rattled by this and just want her home,” Bird said at a news conference with Griner’s wife, Cherelle Griner, in July.Bird wearing custom Nike sneakers from the signature line of the N.B.A. star Kyrie Irving.Steph Chambers/Getty ImagesBird’s off-the-court influence has gone beyond politics to style. She is known for her love of sneakers, and her custom Nikes — from the signature line of the N.B.A. star Kyrie Irving — have “Keep Sue Fresh” printed on them each night.But the core of Bird’s legacy is on the court.“That’s a legendary player right there,” said Aces guard Chelsea Gray, who scored 31 points and fueled Las Vegas’s victory in Bird’s final game.Stewart, who had 42 points in Game 4 for Seattle, said that knowing it would be her last game with Bird was more “devastating” than losing.“That’s what hurts the most,” she said, adding that Bird had been a mentor and friend.Storm guard Jewell Loyd said the Game 4 loss was “obviously not how we wanted to finish for her.”Loyd added, “We’ve been very fortunate to play with a generational player like Sue.”Bird said though her body felt good, she was not having second thoughts about retiring. But she will miss basketball.“There’s going to be nothing like this,” she said.Bird gave fans someone to believe in until the end. Her final points in the W.N.B.A. came on a layup with 21.8 seconds to go on Tuesday and Seattle down by 6. It was reminiscent of a play on Sunday, in Game 3. The Storm turned to her when they were down by 1 point with less than two seconds to go. She sank a 3-pointer and held her follow-through, as her teammates went wild around her. Seattle would lose to the Aces in overtime, but that play was what this final season was for.One more chance to celebrate. One last moment with Bird.Bird hit a 3-pointer in Game 3 of the W.N.B.A. semifinals against the Aces, giving the Storm a 2-point lead with less than two seconds to go.Lindsey Wasson/Associated Press More

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      W.N.B.A. Semifinals Check-In: Can’t. Stop. Candace. Parker.

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      Both semifinals series are tied, 1-1. The Las Vegas Aces and Seattle Storm have shown offensive power, while the Connecticut Sun and Chicago Sky dig in on defense.As Chicago Sky guard Kahleah Copper and Connecticut Sun guard Courtney Williams tussled over the basketball in Game 1 of their W.N.B.A. semifinal series, Sky forward Candace Parker walked down the court, waving her hands in the air to ignite the Chicago crowd. The moment reflected how physical the series had been, and it was reminder of the teams’ history.In 2021, the sixth-seeded Sky beat the top-seeded Sun in the semifinals en route to winning the championship, a title that has that has eluded the Sun. If the Sky win the title this season, they will be the first team to repeat since the Los Angeles Sparks in 2001-2. After the Sky’s 85-77 victory in Game 2, the best-of-five series is tied at one game apiece.Sky forward Azurá Stevens said the series is “just about who wants it more, because they have beef with us from last year.”On the other side of the bracket, the Las Vegas Aces and Seattle Storm are also tied at 1-1. The series features some of the most recognizable names in the league and seven former No. 1 overall draft picks: Sue Bird (2002), Tina Charles (2010), Jewell Loyd (2015) and Breanna Stewart (2016) for Seattle; and Kelsey Plum (2017), A’ja Wilson (2018) and Jackie Young (2019) for Las Vegas.This is a rematch of the 2020 W.N.B.A. finals, in which the Storm swept the Aces and Stewart was named the most valuable player of the series. Stewart also won the award after leading the Storm to the title in 2018. If Seattle wins its fifth championship this year, it will break a tie with the Minnesota Lynx and Houston Comets for the most in W.N.B.A history. The Aces are still looking for their first title.Game 3 in each series is Sunday. Here is a look at how the teams have fared so far.No. 1 Las Vegas Aces vs. No. 4 Seattle StormChelsea Gray has been the Las Vegas Aces’ leading scorer against the Seattle Storm.Ethan Miller/Getty ImagesThe Aces were the best offensive team in the W.N.B.A. this year. They led the league in points per game (90.4) and offensive efficiency (109.6). Four starters averaged at least 10 points per game: Plum (20.2), Wilson (19.5), Young (15.9) and Chelsea Gray (13.7).Through the first two games of the series against the Storm, Gray has arguably been the Aces’ most important player, managing the offense and scoring, and making pinpoint passes at crucial moments. She’s leading the team in points (21) and assists (6) per game during the playoffs.But Las Vegas has struggled in the first quarter.In Game 2, the Aces matched the Storm almost point-for-point in the first seven minutes and got out to a 16-13 lead. Then a 3 by Seattle’s Stephanie Talbot tied the game and sparked a 10-0 run that pushed the Storm toward a seven-point advantage going into the second quarter. The first quarter of Game 1 was similar, as the Aces gave up 26 points and trailed by 11 at the end of the period.Stewart and Loyd combined for 50 points on 52.8 percent shooting in Seattle’s Game 1 win. Stewart dominated most of the game, and Loyd scored 10 of the Storm’s final 12 points and assisted on the other basket. Her most impressive basketball of that tear came with just over 30 seconds remaining in the game, with the Storm holding a 1-point lead and Wilson — the defensive player of the year — guarding her at the 3-point line. Loyd crossed from her right to left hand before stepping back and knocking down a long 2-pointer over Wilson’s outstretched arms.But Loyd struggled in the Game 2 loss.Loyd finished 2 of 10 from the field and 0 for 3 from the 3-point line for just 8 points. While Stewart tallied 32 points, 7 rebounds and 3 assists, the only other Storm player in double figures was Charles, who scored 17 points on 17 shot attempts. The good sign for the Storm is that even with Loyd’s struggles, they were in the game until the end.No. 2 Chicago Sky vs. No. 3 Connecticut SunJonquel Jones has helped the Connecticut Sun outrebound the Sky.Michael Reaves/Getty ImagesThe Sky have struggled in Game 1s this postseason, losing both at home. The Sun benefited from that in their semifinal series, but they have felt the pain of playing against Parker.The Sun had the second-best defensive rating in the league in the regular season (96.3), and they held the Sky to their lowest point total of the season in their 68-63 Game 1 victory. But Parker still had an astounding stat line: 19 points, 18 rebounds, 6 blocks, 5 assists and 4 steals. All of that and she had just 2 turnovers.Parker is doing almost everything for the Sky on the floor. She had another impressive stat line in Game 2 with 22 points, 4 rebounds, 4 assists and 3 blocks in the win. She also hit 3 of 4 3-pointers.The most challenging part about playing the Sky is that on any given night, a different player, or multiple players, could go for 20 points. The stat line doesn’t show Parker’s effectiveness in keeping the Sky’s offensive churning: After rebounds, she often looks ahead to Copper, who is often already behind the defense for a score.The Sky’s roster is among the best in the W.N.B.A., and they breezed to a franchise-best 26 wins because of it. Still, the Sun’s physical frontcourt, with Jonquel Jones (6-foot-6), DeWanna Bonner (6-foot-4), Brionna Jones (6-foot-3) and Alyssa Thomas (6-foot-2), has outrebounded the Sky in the series, 86-65. The rebounding advantage didn’t hinder the Sky from picking up a win in Game 2 and nearly securing Game 1, when Parker had 18 rebounds. But they will need a group effort to neutralize the Sun’s size. More

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      Why LeBron James Is Worth $100 Million to the Lakers, Win or Lose

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      If all James did was win basketball games, that would be more than enough. But his value goes beyond the court.If one believes in science, historical trends and the limits of human capabilities, there’s a high likelihood that the 37-year-old LeBron James soon will no longer play like a superstar.After all, in the history of the N.B.A., few players were even in the league at that age, much less playing as well as he does. Last year with the Los Angeles Lakers, in his 19th season, James averaged 30.3 points a game, the second highest of his career and the most on the team. He was named an All-Star for the 18th time.James makes it look easy, but the short list of players who were competing at an All-Star level around James’s age shows that it is not: Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, Karl Malone, John Stockton and Michael Jordan. Chris Paul, who turned 37 in May, may deserve to be on the list.Still, trends would suggest that the Lakers’ recent decision to sign James to a two-year, $97.1 million extension with a player option for a third year might not pay off on the court. The Lakers didn’t make the playoffs last season, and James played just 56 of 82 games because of injuries and rest. His contract will eat up a significant percentage of the team’s salary cap space, making it harder for the team to add other top-tier players. James has defied human limits thus far, but each year is a new chance for science to win.Yet deals like his are often unbound by the rules of basketball, finance or science.“There is a very strong emotional component as well,” Mark Cuban, the owner of the Dallas Mavericks, said in an email. “Professional sports are unlike any other business. You will not find the emotional attachment to players that Mavs and N.B.A. fans have, like they do to Dirk or LeBron or so many others, in any other business.”James’s connection with Los Angeles and Lakers fans can help explain why the team would sign him to a contract extension at an age when most stars have already retired.Chris Young/The Canadian Press, via Associated PressCuban employed his own franchise star in Dirk Nowitzki, who spent his whole career with the Mavericks, from 1998 to 2019. Nowitzki retired at 40 and received multiple late-career contracts for close to the maximum amount.“No one says they have a favorite programmer at Google or the person who updated their iOS at Apple is their all-time favorite and they have their trading card,” Cuban said. “I’m not saying all owners look at it this way, but I know quite a few of us do.”Cuban said he was influenced by Jerry Buss, a former owner of the Lakers, who in 1981 signed Magic Johnson to an unusual 25-year contract worth $25 million after just two seasons with the team. The Lakers also gave a 35-year-old Kobe Bryant a two-year extension worth $48.5 million in 2013 months after he had torn his Achilles’ tendon, keeping him as the highest-paid player in the N.B.A.“When someone has given as much to the organization as Dirk did for the Mavs, you just ask what he wants to do and do it,” Cuban said.This approach serves as a signal to stars on other teams that the Lakers are willing to keep them long-term. Bryant and Johnson, who each separately led the Lakers to five championships, helped recruit James to the Lakers, directly and indirectly.“It will speak volumes in terms of attracting people to that,” Julius Erving, the Hall of Fame guard and forward, said of James’s extension.There’s also a branding benefit for the Lakers in having James — or stars like Johnson and Bryant — associated with the team, said Rick Burton, a sports management professor at Syracuse University.“These are players that the Lakers want you to know: ‘These guys are with us. The best players in the world play for us,’” Burton said.Kobe Bryant’s final season with the Lakers wasn’t very good, but his final game was an all-out spectacle, full of celebrities and a roaring crowd.Harry How/Getty ImagesA souvenir jacket for Bryant’s last game was on sale for $5,824 at the Lakers’ arena.Lucy Nicholson/ReutersBut even if James soon is no longer among the best in the world, his contract is likely to pay off for the Lakers in ways beyond wins: on the business side.“Having his retirement date closer on the horizon creates a sense of urgency, and a scarcity effect,” Irina Pavlova, a former executive for the Nets, said in an email.She added: “I think of it the same way as if it were announced that ‘Hamilton’ only had four more weeks to run: All those people who have been delaying seeing it are now going to rush to do it, paying (even more) exorbitant prices for tickets, and probably buying commemorative playbills.”James has not said when he plans to retire, though it seems it may not be soon: He has said he wants to play with his 17-year-old son, LeBron James Jr., who is known as Bronny. And in a Sports Illustrated article this week, he hinted that he might want to play with his 15-year-old son, Bryce, too.Bryant retired after the last year of his two-year extension. The Lakers were among the worst teams in the N.B.A. those two years, and though outsiders criticized the deal, Bryant never seemed to lose the good will of Lakers fans and staff.“This is a year that’s dedicated to Kobe and his farewell,” Mitch Kupchak, then the Lakers’ general manager, said during Bryant’s final season.Fans flocked to Bryant’s games, hoping to catch a final glimpse of him and generating TV ratings and merchandise sales for the team. In his last game, the Lakers’ home arena reportedly sold more than $1.2 million in merchandise, including five cashmere diamond-encrusted Bryant baseball hats for $24,008. (Bryant wore the jersey numbers 8 and 24.)James has defied conventional wisdom, and science, that says he should not still be playing this well at his age. He averaged 30.3 points per game in 56 games last season.Ron Schwane/Associated PressEven if James is not retiring, he is just 1,325 points behind Abdul-Jabbar for first on the N.B.A.’s career scoring list, giving the Lakers an opportunity to cash in on that chase through apparel and other such sales. James has scored at least that many points in every season except 2020-21, when he played in just 45 games because of injuries. (The season was shortened by 10 games, to 72, because of the coronavirus pandemic.)Non-basketball factors make up “a small percentage” of decision making on contracts, said Rod Thorn, a former N.B.A. front office executive, who drafted Jordan with the Chicago Bulls. The Lakers, he said, want to be a strong basketball team because they have “a big rival on their doorstep” in the Los Angeles Clippers, who are expected to leave their shared arena by the 2024-25 season for their own venue.“It’s still a Laker town, but the Clippers may eclipse them as a team,” Thorn said, adding: “They want to have a great team. That’s how they get to where they want to go. That’s how they maximize the money they can take in. That’s how they maximize their brand.”Of course, if the Lakers continue to underwhelm, as they did last season, James’s contract could draw criticism much like Bryant’s extension did, even though James led the Lakers to a championship in 2020. Jeanie Buss, Jerry Buss’s daughter and the majority owner of the Lakers, declined to comment for this article. But James has long escaped the clutches of critics, and the Lakers have shown that, in special cases, they are willing to invest in their stars.“If we go back, it was Kobe, it was Magic, it was Kareem,” Erving said. “It was Wilt. It was Jerry West. Elgin Baylor was the greatest — he was my favorite. So they’ve always had a guy who fans locally and globally could identify with, and LeBron is that guy for the Lakers.” More

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      Steph Curry’s Graduation From Davidson Was a Long Time Coming

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      Curry, the N.B.A. superstar, returned to Davidson College, where he first showed how great he could be. The college, and its community, still feel his impact over a decade later.DAVIDSON, N.C. — On the first day of the fall semester in 2007, Stephen Curry sat in a class on gender and society at Davidson College, a small, liberal arts school 20 miles north of Charlotte, N.C.Prof. Gayle Kaufman, who was teaching the class, began the roll call alphabetically.At the end of the Cs, she called out, “Steven Curry?”The students erupted in laughter. Curry smiled. “It’s Steph-en,” he said, politely.Kaufman had been on sabbatical the year before, which was probably why she seemed to be one of the few people in Davidson — both the college and the town of 10,000 people then — who didn’t know how to pronounce his name.Five months before, Curry had led Davidson to the N.C.A.A. Division I men’s basketball tournament in his freshman season, gaining local celebrity status that would eventually be dwarfed by his superstardom as a four-time N.B.A. champion with Golden State. But to his fellow students, Curry was just one of them. He made funny videos with his friends, studied in the library and ate at the Outpost, the only late-night eatery on campus. Curry said he “was always a breakfast-at-night type guy.”“In hindsight, he’s obviously the best player in the world,” said Adah Fitzgerald (not pictured), the owner of Main Street Books in Davidson. The book store has one of Curry’s children’s books displayed in the front window.Travis Dove for The New York Times“Everyone is truly a student at Davidson,” said Jason Richards, Curry’s friend and college teammate. “There are no superstars. There’s no one walking the pathways like, ‘Oh, wow, there’s so-and-so.’ You knew who you’d pass on your way to class, and you knew everyone in class by first name. It’s what makes Davidson so special, and so special to Stephen: No one is bigger than the college itself.”But as the past few days showed, Curry comes close.‘Isn’t that the place where … ?’Marshall Oelsen walked into Stephen Curry’s freshman dorm room at the start of the fall 2006 semester and saw oversize pairs of Charlotte Hornets basketball shorts on the floor. He asked whose they were. Curry said they belonged to his father, Dell Curry, who spent 10 seasons with the Hornets.“Those first months, he was just known as Dell Curry’s kid,” said Oelsen, who lived down the hall.But one October afternoon, Bryant Barr, Stephen Curry’s roommate and teammate, told some friends: “Guys, Steph is the real thing. He’s going to be huge.”Chris Clunie, the school’s director of athletics, played on the men’s basketball team for four seasons before Curry arrived. “I describe Davidson basketball as B.S. and A.S. — Before Steph and After Steph,” Clunie said.Dell Curry, left, spent 16 seasons in the N.B.A. But to many people, he may be better known now as “Stephen Curry’s dad.”Clunie’s squad was successful, earning a No. 15 seed in the N.C.A.A. tournament the year before Curry came. But once Curry arrived? “It was a launchpad,” Clunie said.Curry became Davidson’s career leader in points and 3-pointers. The Wildcats made it to the tournament in his freshman and sophomore seasons, including a magical run to the round of 8 in 2008. Curry scored 40 points and made eight 3-pointers in a first-round upset of Gonzaga.After his junior year, Curry left for the N.B.A., and Golden State drafted him seventh overall.Chris Gruber, Davidson’s dean of admission and financial aid, said applications surged after the 2008 tournament run. “It allowed us to be known in many cases,” he said. “It put us on a map in terms of, ‘Isn’t that the place where …?’ ”Gruber said even now the school is “riding that wave.”Davidson men’s basketball relies heavily on recruiting international players. Coach Matt McKillop, whose father, Bob, coached Curry, said the first conversation often starts with the recruit saying, “I know Davidson — that’s where Steph Curry went.”Stephen Curry was — at least kind of — a normal college student. He said he liked to order milkshakes and sausage, egg and cheese bagels from Outpost, a late-night eatery on the Davidson campus.Jane Avinger and her husband, Bob Avinger, started attending games when they moved to Davidson in 1967. Curry, she said, made them go consistently. When the Wildcats made it to the round of 16 in Detroit in 2008, they bought plane tickets and traveled there to cheer on the team. “We’d never done anything like that,” she said.Signs of Curry are everywhere in town. The Ben & Jerry’s ice cream shop on Main Street has a dipped, rainbow-sprinkle waffle cone called #30, after Curry’s jersey number. Sabor Latin Street Grill on Jetton Street has a large mural of Curry painted on a wall inside. At Main Street Books, a basketball-themed children’s book by Curry titled “I Have a Superpower” is displayed by the register.On Thursday, Curry announced that the basketball court at the Ada Jenkins Center, a nonprofit in Davidson, would be refurbished by his Curry Brand with Under Armour; the Eat.Learn.Play. Foundation he started with his wife, Ayesha Curry; and The Summit Foundation.During Davidson’s 2008 tournament run, hundreds of town residents hung bedsheets from their porches with words of support. This past week, with Curry returning to town for a special celebration, townspeople were encouraged to hang their sheets again. “Proud of you #30,” read one. “Congrats, Steph,” was written in black and red ink, Davidson’s school colors, on another.“It’s just so wild that he would end up here for college, to play for this team, because in hindsight, he’s obviously the best player in the world,” said Adah Fitzgerald, the owner of Main Street Books. “Like, what? He doesn’t even have to come back very often or have to pay much attention to us as a town — and we’ll just forever be die-hard fans.”‘I’ve never seen you smile like that’Some people had driven from as far as Florida to be among the nearly 5,000 people crowded into Belk Arena on Davidson’s campus on Wednesday. Mayor Rusty Knox of Davidson was there. Sai Tummala and Jack Brown, Davidson men’s soccer players who said they were drawn to the school because of Curry, were in floor seats with other students. So were Curry’s wife and the couple’s three children: Riley, 10; Ryan, 7; and Canon, 4.Finally, Stephen Curry was there, too.Dressed in cap and gown, he shook hands and offered hugs as the crowd cheered. Curry smiled as he took his seat in the front row next to Ayesha. Thirteen years after leaving Davidson, he had earned his bachelor’s degree in sociology. He missed the school’s graduation ceremony in May because he was a little busy trying to win his fourth N.B.A. championship. But now, Davidson was having a ceremony just for him.“I made a joke the other day: Would we put on an event like this if the president was coming to town?” said Joey Beeler, Davidson’s director of athletic communications.Afterward, Curry said it was “almost overwhelming.”Stephen Curry, right, with his family, left to right: Ayesha Curry, his wife; Riley and Ryan, his daughters; and Canon, his son.The ceremony also marked Curry’s induction into the school’s Athletics Hall of Fame and the retirement of his No. 30 jersey. Davidson had long required inductees to graduate first, but the rule was changed in 2019, in part, for Curry. Still, he refused the honor, wanting to wait until he’d graduated.He took classes in 2011, during an N.B.A. work stoppage, and in December 2019 he called Clunie, the director of athletics, to map out a plan to complete the final few classes for his degree. Then the coronavirus pandemic stalled his plans. But last winter, Curry called Clunie again.Clunie scheduled calls and video conferences with professors before practices, after shootarounds, even after games. Curry said he completed the bulk of his work in March and April, when he missed a dozen games with a foot injury.“Some of the professors had to tell him to slow down,” Clunie said.Kaufman, the gender and society professor, was his adviser for a thesis on advancing gender equality in sports. As the N.B.A. playoffs unfolded, Curry still hadn’t finished. Around midnight on a Wednesday, Kaufman received an email from Curry: “Dr. K, I want to assure you, I will have everything finished, and to you, by Friday night,” he wrote.“It was that moment where I was like, ‘holy, wow,’” Kaufman said. She added, “And sure enough, he finished the paper, and it was great.”Curry wrote a thesis on advancing gender equality in sports to complete his bachelor’s degree in sociology at Davidson.By completing his degree, Curry had given Bob McKillop, his college coach, a 100 percent graduation rate for his players during a 33-year tenure. McKillop, whom Curry has remained close with, retired in June, one day after Curry was named the most valuable player of the N.B.A. finals.“He has given this community, this college, this athletic department a gift that, in my judgment, is unparalleled — the gift being his time and his love,” McKillop said. “Those are the two most prized gifts that I believe we as human beings have.”At his graduation on Wednesday, Curry held up his diploma, grinning. He turned his tassel and threw his hat high into the air on the stage as the crowd cheered, cellphones held aloft.“Few alumni are as well known as you are, Stephen,” Doug Hicks, the president of Davidson, said during the ceremony. “OK, actually, none are.”Almost 5,000 people attended Stephen Curry’s graduation ceremony at Davidson on Wednesday. Some alumni traveled from Florida to attend.As Curry stepped to the podium as the afternoon’s final speaker, chants of “M-V-P!” rang out.“The best decision I ever made was to come to Davidson College,” he said, adding that he cried when he decided to leave early for the N.B.A.“What Davidson stands for lives with me every time I step on the court, and every time I try to impact lives,” he said. “How we represent Davidson in every room we walk into — it matters.”Later, in an interview, he said that his Golden State teammate Draymond Green texted him after the ceremony.“He said, ‘I’ve never seen you smile like that — when you were on that stage,’” Curry said. “I didn’t think people could read through that.”Curry said Davidson “was kind of the beginning of a major evolution in my life, and I have so many memories of every experience, everyone I met, and the support of the community throughout it all. That speaks volumes to why I want to come back, and why yesterday was so special. That’s such a big part of my origin story.” More

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      Isabella Escribano Is the Teen Baller Behind the Brittney Griner Hoodies

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      Isabella Escribano, 14, is popular on Instagram for her basketball skills. She’s using her design skills in the public campaign to free the W.N.B.A. star Brittney Griner.For more hours now than she can remember, Isabella Escribano sat on the orange couch inside her garage, iPad in hand, crafting clothing designs that she hoped would aid one of her favorite basketball players.That player, Phoenix Mercury center Brittney Griner, was arrested in Russia in February after customs officials said they found hashish oil, a cannabis derivative, in her luggage at an airport near Moscow. In May, the U.S. government said that Griner had been wrongfully detained, but on Aug. 4 she was convicted on a drug charge in Russia and sentenced to nine years in a penal colony. She has appealed her conviction.Griner’s agent, Lindsay Kagawa Colas, reached out to Escribano in March to collaborate on apparel that she hoped W.N.B.A. players would wear to bring awareness to Griner’s situation. Kagawa Colas said she had chosen Escribano for two reasons: Escribano, 14, is a popular girls’ basketball player with over 100,000 Instagram followers, and she has her own clothing brand of W.N.B.A. streetwear called Break The Curse.Escribano, who is in the eighth grade, said she “wanted to make the shirt for Brittney Griner as loud as possible.”Operating from the garage at her parents’ home in Santa Clarita, Calif., Escribano and her older brothers, Marco Escribano and Anthony Lizarraga, landed on a colorful design that has been sported by players across the W.N.B.A. this season.Isabella Escribano earned the nickname Jiggy because of her ball-handling and shifty moves on the basketball court.Meg Oliphant for The New York TimesThe front of the design, seen on hoodies and T-shirts, features a smiling Griner in her Mercury jersey with a basketball that reads “WEAREBG” — the phrase that has become the rallying cry in the public campaign for her release. Griner’s jersey number, 42, is wrapped around the left side, and on the back, her first and last name are printed in capital letters.“I wanted to make sure that the shirt meant something,” Isabella Escribano said. “Like, when you see it, it’s something big. It’s basically a statement.” She added: “What we want to do is start a conversation, like whoever wears it is supporting her, basically saying, ‘Free Brittney Griner.’”Sydney Bordonaro, who styles outfits for several W.N.B.A. players, including Las Vegas Aces guards Kelsey Plum and Chelsea Gray, said the distinctive look of the Griner clothing made it attractive.“It’s just super fly,” Bordonaro said. “Like, you could wear it out to the club or to an event. It’s not like it’s a jersey or, you know, just a corny T-shirt.”Connecticut Sun point guard Jasmine Thomas packs the T-shirt or hoodie for every game. Having Griner’s face on the front gives the items an intense and emotional aspect that makes them stand out, she said.“I think for someone that’s not even a W.N.B.A. fan, they automatically see her face, and then if they don’t already know what’s going on, they research B.G. to get to know her, what she’s about, who she is, why she’s so important and why she needs to come home,” Thomas said.“I wanted to make the shirt for Brittney Griner as loud as possible,” Isabella Escribano said.Meg Oliphant for The New York TimesMarco Escribano, 24, said 215 T-shirts and sweatshirts had been sent to W.N.B.A. players, other professional athletes and coaches for free. Break the Curse and Wasserman, the agency that represents Griner, split the manufacturing costs ($75 for the T-shirts, $80 for the sweatshirts) and share some of the shipping costs.Break the Curse also sells the T-shirt for $120 and the sweatshirt for $150 on its website. The proceeds are used to cover the company’s portion of the production and shipping costs for the clothing sent to W.N.B.A. players and others. About 250 total T-shirts and sweatshirts have been sold; that hasn’t been enough yet to cover Break The Curse’s costs, but having players wearing the design has increased the website’s traffic significantly and led to other merchandise sales, Marco Escribano said.The quick turnarounds for some requests have been a challenge, like when Phoenix Suns guard Chris Paul wanted a shirt during his team’s playoff matchup with the Dallas Mavericks in May.At the time, only two shirts were made, and they were samples. One was shipped to Paul overnight, but it never made it to him, somehow lost in the delivery process. So the brothers washed the other one — which they had planned to keep for themselves — and shipped it to Paul, who wore it to Game 5 of the series.“I just was like: ‘We’ll just send him this, bro. Spray some cologne on it and just let it go,’” Marco Escribano said while laughing. “It’s crazy that Chris Paul was wearing our shirt.”Phoenix Mercury guard Skylar Diggins-Smith, left, and Phoenix Suns guard Chris Paul, right, are two of the many athletes who have worn the Brittney Griner apparel from Break the Curse. Isabella Escribano, center, worked on the design with her brothers.Jeff Haynes/NBAE via Getty Images; Meg Oliphant for The New York Times; Kate Frese/NBAE via Getty ImagesNone of the family had experience in manufacturing clothing before last year, and Marco Escribano said they learned new aspects of the fashion industry with every design.Isabella Escribano’s celebrity has drawn athletes and others to the brand. Her YouTube videos show off the tight handle and shifty moves that earned her the moniker Jiggy. She has a larger social media following than some W.N.B.A. players, and many professional men’s and women’s basketball players have followed her journey since she was 10 years old.Utah Jazz guard Jordan Clarkson wore her first-ever design — a Chicago Sky-themed hoodie — last year, and Chance the Rapper wore it onstage at a concert. Plum, the Aces guard, wore an unreleased jacket that Escribano worked on for four months to Game 2 of Las Vegas’s playoff series against Phoenix this month. The jacket featured different W.N.B.A. team logos and had “STOP WNBA HATE” in red on the interior.Thomas, the Sun guard, remembered meeting Escribano years ago after a game, so when she found that “little Isabella” was behind the Griner design, she felt more inclined to support the brand. “I’m just super proud of Isabella for being able to understand how important her platform is and using it at such a young age,” Thomas said. “That’s exactly what we want to see from young girls, and she’s really a role model and a leader in so many ways.”Isabella Escribano said she was still focused on basketball as her clothing brand grows. Her goal is to make it to the W.N.B.A.Meg Oliphant for The New York TimesBut as the brand grows, Escribano’s primary focus is still on playing basketball and making it to the W.N.B.A. When she’s not creating designs, she spends most of her time in the gym, where she trains with Phil Handy, a Los Angeles Lakers assistant coach, among others. She said she would keep the brand going as long as she had a passion for it.“There’s a lot of girls like me or other people that love the W.N.B.A. and want to support the W.N.B.A., but there’s not a lot of clothes to do that,” Escribano said. “So, I just want to give the opportunity for anybody that loves women’s basketball to be able to buy and wear it.”She added: “Most of the time, I think about when I’m in the W.N.B.A. and how I won’t have to go buy clothes. I could just wear my own stuff.” More