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    W.N.B.A.’s Nneka Ogwumike Takes Over More Than a Vote From LeBron James

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    Nneka Ogwumike, a nine-time All-Star, will lead More Than a Vote, which will focus on women’s reproductive rights this election cycle.More Than a Vote, a nonprofit organization founded by LeBron James in 2020, is rebooting this fall with a new focus on women’s issues and reproductive rights.Nneka Ogwumike, a nine-time W.N.B.A. All-Star with the Seattle Storm and president of the players union, will take over James’s role in leading the organization, and has recruited a group of female athletes to her cause.“It’s more than just abortion,” Ogwumike said in an interview. “It’s all about educating people about all the different roles that exist in society that support and protect the freedoms of women when it comes to family planning, I.V.F., birth control, everything. There’s just a lot that’s at stake.”More Than a Vote was founded when, motivated by nationwide protest movements after the killing by police of George Floyd and Breonna Taylor, athletes like James said they were starting to think more deeply about how they could use their platforms.The organization was focused on protecting voting access for Black voters, including collaborating with NAACP Legal Defense Fund on a multimillion-dollar initiative to recruit poll workers. It partnered with teams to open sports arenas and stadiums as polling locations and created television ads and digital content designed to encourage voting. The organization raised about $4.2 million in 2020, twice the amount it expected. However, it has been essentially dormant for the past few years.Ogwumike, who volunteered as a poll worker in 2020, began speaking with James this year. At that point, James and his associates had been discussing the prominence of discussions about reproductive rights, as well as the increased attention around women’s sports. (Vice President Kamala Harris is expected to make abortion rights a focus of her campaign against former President Donald J. Trump.)We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      WNBA Playoff Preview: The Aces and Liberty Are On a Collision Course

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      The Aces and the Liberty towered above the competition this season. Will they meet in the finals?Two superteams, the Las Vegas Aces and the New York Liberty, dominated the W.N.B.A. season, as expected. They were so good that only two others teams in the 12-team league even managed a winning record.A final between them has the potential to be a classic. But first, they will have to make it through the six other teams in the W.N.B.A. playoffs.When do the playoffs start?The first game of the best-of-three quarterfinals, Minnesota at Connecticut, is on Wednesday at 8 p.m. Eastern, with Chicago at Las Vegas following at 10 p.m. The Washington-New York and Atlanta-Dallas series will start on Friday.The best-of-five semifinals are scheduled from Sept. 24 to Oct. 3, and the finals will start Oct. 8 and run through Oct. 20, if all five games are necessary.What do the first-round matchups look like?The big two teams, the Aces (34-6 in the regular season) and the Liberty (32-8), are prohibitive favorites over the Chicago Sky and the Washington Mystics, though the Mystics have their former M.V.P., Elena Delle Donne, back from injury, and the Sky have a history of deep playoff runs after subpar regular seasons.The league’s third-best team has clearly been the Connecticut Sun (27-13), which would be expected to beat the Minnesota Lynx. In the final series, the Dallas Wings were three games better than the Atlanta Dream in the regular season and have home-court advantage, so should be the favorite.Who’s going to win it all?The Aces or the Liberty, the Liberty or the Aces? That’s been the question all season.The Aces are the reigning champions, and they have been even better this year. The Liberty managed to land Jonquel Jones, Breanna Stewart and Courtney Vandersloot in the off-season to soar from an average team to greatness.The teams split their four regular-season league meetings, but the Liberty won a fifth game, the final of the new Commissioner’s Cup. The betting odds favor the Aces, but, in truth, it looks too close to call.Could the Sun spoil the party? A 1-6 record against the top two teams doesn’t bode well. The other five teams in the playoffs would need a run of form not seen all season to win the title.How can I watch the games?ABC and the ESPN channels will be telecasting the games.What’s this I hear about flights?Unlike in the N.B.A., travel in the W.N.B.A. is mostly commercial, which has been a point of contention between the players and the league. This year, the league announced that, for the playoffs at least, teams would fly charter.But there are limits, sources have reported: Charter flights would be allowed only once between series, allowing a team, for example, to fly home from a series by charter but not onward to the next series.Who are the players to watch?Just about every Ace who steps on the court. The star forward and reigning M.V.P. A’ja Wilson (22.8 points, 9.5 rebounds and 2.2 blocks a game, and a record-tying 53-point game) is complemented by the sharpshooting guard trio of Kelsey Plum, Jackie Young and Chelsea Gray (seven assists per game).A longer W.N.B.A. season this year allowed Stewart to break the league record for points scored, though Jewell Loyd of Seattle broke her record a few days later. In addition to Jones and Vandersloot, the Liberty have Sabrina Ionescu, the top 3-point shooter in the league.The Sun are led by the versatile forward Alyssa Thomas, who led the league in rebounds, and nearly in assists. And she recorded six triple-doubles this season, a league record.What teams and players are missing?Candace Parker joined the Aces as a splashy off-season signing, but the two-time M.V.P. has been sidelined indefinitely with a fractured foot. She played the first half of the season but has been out since early July.It would have been fun to see the No. 1 draft pick and probable rookie of the year Aliyah Boston in action, but her Indiana Fever did not make the playoffs.After 10 straight seasons in the playoffs, the Phoenix Mercury finished last and did not qualify. That means no playoffs for Brittney Griner, who rejoined the league after spending 10 months in Russian prison on drug charges. Remarkably, she returned to make the All-Star team and average 17.5 points a game, just about her career average. More

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      A’ja Wilson’s 53-Point Game Ties the W.N.B.A. Record

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      Wilson, of the Las Vegas Aces, became just the third W.N.B.A. player to score at least 50 in a game.Fifty-point games in the N.B.A. can almost be ho-hum: There were 25 last season alone, and they are increasing in frequency. But in the W.N.B.A., they are nearly unheard-of.A’ja Wilson of the Las Vegas Aces didn’t just score 50 on Tuesday night in Atlanta; she made four free throws in the last minute to reach 53, tying the league record.Wilson’s is just the third 50-point game in W.N.B.A. history, following a 53-point game by Liz Cambage of the Dallas Wings in 2018 and a 51-point game by Riquna Williams of the Tulsa Shock in 2013.There have been only 33 games in which a player has scored 40 points or more in the league’s history, which dates to 1997. But as in the N.B.A., the trend line is upward. A third of those games have come this season.After her heroic individual effort, Wilson chose to spread the credit. “I didn’t do this alone,” she said. “My teammates get all the glory because without them I don’t even get the basketball.” Chelsea Gray had 12 assists, and Kelsey Plum had seven for the Aces.Wilson, a 6-foot-4 forward, shot 16 for 23 from the floor with one 3-pointer and made 20 of 21 free throws. Defensively, she found time to record a game-high four blocks. The Aces defeated the host Atlanta Dream, 112-100.When it comes to putting up high-scoring totals, N.B.A. players have the distinct advantage of playing 48-minute games, rather than the 40-minute games of the W.N.B.A.N.B.A. teams also score more efficiently, averaging 114.8 points per 100 possessions last season, compared with 103.8 in the W.N.B.A. this season. (Or looking at it another way, W.N.B.A. players are more efficient defensively.) And N.B.A. teams also play at a slightly faster pace, averaging 2.06 possessions per minute compared with 1.98 in the W.N.B.A.That all adds up to higher scoring games: 114.7 points per team in the N.B.A. versus 82.5 in the W.N.B.A. in the most recent seasons.Looking at it that way, Wilson’s 53 points amounted to 64 percent of an average W.N.B.A. team’s point total. The equivalent percentage in the N.B.A. would be a 73-point game, something that has happened only six times in N.B.A. history and only once in the years since the W.N.B.A. was founded.The game was an outlier even for Wilson, a two-time league M.V.P. and an Olympic gold medalist in Tokyo. Her previous career high, 11 days before, was 40 points, and she has only 10 games of 30 points or more in her six-year career.Wilson also has the advantage of playing for the Aces, the league’s best team, with a gaudy 29-4 record, and the defending league champions. If they could win all of their remaining seven games, their 36-4 mark and .900 winning percentage would match the record set by the 1998 Houston Comets, who were 27-3 in a shorter season. More

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      Once Rare, 40-Point Games Are Surging in the W.N.B.A.

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      Breanna Stewart of the Liberty scored 42 on Sunday for her third 40-point game of the season, and the 10th in the league this year.The 40-point game had disappeared from the W.N.B.A. over the past several years. This season, it has made a comeback.Ten times this year a player has scored at least 40 points in a game, by far the most in a single season in the league’s 27-year history. Before this year, there had been no such regular-season showings since 2018, when the star center Liz Cambage had two. And with at least nine games left for every team, as the W.N.B.A. stages its longest regular season ever, there is still time for more scoring outbursts.“You see a lot of 40-point games this year, and I think that we’re just continuing to get eyes on women’s basketball,” Breanna Stewart, the star Liberty forward, said Sunday in a television interview after notching the league’s most recent 40-point game in a 100-89 victory over the Indiana Fever.Stewart scored 30 of her 42 points in the first half on the way to her third 40-point game in 2023, becoming the first player in W.N.B.A. history with three in a regular season. (In 2015, Elena Delle Donne recorded two 40-point games in the regular season and one in the postseason for the Chicago Sky.)True to her versatile style of play, Stewart scored on Sunday in myriad ways: backing down the smaller Kristy Wallace and finishing with a left-handed layup; making a turnaround fadeaway over Lexie Hull from the baseline; knocking down a long 3-pointer after trailing the play.Though she had not scored 40 points in a regular-season game until this year, Stewart had shown she was capable. She had 42 points, tying a postseason record, in her final game with the Seattle Storm, and that kind of output has continued in her first season with New York.In May, in her first home game with the Liberty, she scored a career-high 45 points against the Fever, who are very likely grateful that New York is no longer on their regular-season schedule. She also dropped 43 points in a win over the Phoenix Mercury in July.Stewart’s outing Sunday came only two days after Las Vegas Aces center A’ja Wilson had her first career 40-point game, shooting 17 of 25 in a blowout win over Washington. Wilson and Stewart, past Most Valuable Player Award winners, are both in the top five in points and rebounds per game this year and are among the leading contenders for another M.V.P.“I don’t know, there’s something in the water,” Stewart said when asked if there was a “40-point rivalry” developing.A’ja Wilson and Las Vegas have a three-game lead on Stewart’s Liberty for the W.N.B.A.’s best record. John Locher/Associated PressTheir teams are atop the league standings, too. The reigning champion Aces (27-3) are within striking distance of the 1998 Houston Comets’ record for best single-season winning percentage, and the Liberty (24-6) are off to their best start in franchise history as they look to win their first title. The teams have split their two games, including a romp by the Liberty earlier this month, but they play three more times in August, including on Tuesday and Thursday.The Liberty made a splash by signing top players this off-season, but the Aces have elite talent, too, and one of those players, the two-time All-Star Kelsey Plum, has also recorded a 40-point game this season. While the sharpshooting Plum made six 3-pointers as part of her performance against the Minnesota Lynx in July, the 6-foot-4 Wilson racked up her points by overpowering defenders, maneuvering in the post and swishing midrange jumpers.Like Wilson, Plum had never scored 40 points in a regular-season game until 2023. Neither had Rhyne Howard of Atlanta, Jewell Loyd of Seattle, Arike Ogunbowale of Dallas or DeWanna Bonner of Connecticut.But one player who did it this year had.On Aug. 3 against the Atlanta Dream, Phoenix guard Diana Taurasi needed 18 points to become the first player in W.N.B.A. history to score 10,000 in a career. She reached the milestone with a deep 3-pointer over Howard in the third quarter, and she finished with 42 points — her first 40-point game since 2010 and the fourth of her career.“Tomorrow I’ll feel like I’m 50,” the 41-year-old Taurasi said in a postgame news conference.She added later: “I came here a little bit nervous. I didn’t want to disappoint anyone. I just wanted to get it over with for a sense of relief, but at the same time I was just focused on trying to win a game.”Though the 40-point game has had a renaissance in the W.N.B.A., much like the triple-double did last season, the 50-point game remains exceedingly rare. There have been only two: Cambage’s 53 in 2018 and Riquna Williams’s 51 in 2013. Only three other players — Taurasi, Lauren Jackson and Maya Moore — have come within 3 points of it.But if this season shows anything, there are plenty of candidates to get there again. More

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      Aliyah Boston of the Indiana Fever Has Officially Arrived

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      Boston, the Indiana Fever rookie forward and center, has already become a face of the W.N.B.A. just months into her professional career.Aliyah Boston said she usually keeps it cool when she faces the star basketball players she grew up watching on television. But her poker face slipped last month.Boston, a rookie power forward and center for the Indiana Fever, was in a close contest against the Las Vegas Aces and she was shoulder to shoulder with her childhood idol, Candace Parker.“It was unreal,” Boston said. “We’re standing on the free-throw line, cracking jokes. And I’m like: ‘Aliyah, don’t laugh. This is serious business.’”Fifteen years ago, when Boston was just 6 years old, Parker won the W.N.B.A.’s Rookie of the Year Award. Now Boston is on track to do the same.She was the first rookie to be named a starter for the W.N.B.A. All-Star Game in nine years and only the eighth rookie ever. The achievement added to what has been an impressive season for Boston, who is drawing comparisons to greats like Brittney Griner, A’ja Wilson and Elena Delle Donne just weeks into her professional career.“She’s going to be a great one,” said Aces Coach Becky Hammon, who also coached Boston in the All-Star Game in Las Vegas on Saturday. “Indiana has a centerpiece, literally a center piece to build around.”Aliyah Boston, second from left, started in the W.N.B.A. All-Star Game after leading the league in field-goal percentage.Jamie Squire/Jamie Squire/Getty ImagesBoston is averaging 15.4 points per game, the most of any first-year player, and she is shooting a league-leading 61 percent from the field. The No. 1 pick in this year’s draft, Boston has swept rookie of the month award honors so far this season.“I never thought I’d be an All-Star my rookie season,” Boston said on Saturday. “It’s just a blessing to be in this position right now.”Boston exudes confidence. As the All-Star lineups were announced, she danced out onto the stage to the delight of her veteran teammates. And she is poised on the court. With her Indiana Fever down 3 to the Liberty last week, Boston knocked down a 3-pointer at the buzzer to send the game into overtime. The Liberty eventually won, 95-87.“She is going through uncharted territory a little bit,” Liberty forward Breanna Stewart said, “but still making sure that she’s able to have an impact on the court and play her game.”Boston is known for having an impact. While playing for Coach Dawn Staley at South Carolina, Boston was a four-time all-American and set several team records, including in rebounds, double-doubles and triple-doubles. In 2021, she led the Gamecocks to their second N.C.A.A. Division I title in program history. Now she’s trying to make her mark on a Fever team that has struggled for years. Wins are still hard to come by, but Boston has already proved her value.“It’s a smooth transition for her,” Staley said. “She makes it look easy. And I know it’s not.”Boston became known for her multicolored braids in college and has continued the style in the pros.Steph Chambers/Getty ImagesThat transition from college to the W.N.B.A. includes myriad challenges, from the pace of play to the constant travel to the increased physicality, said Liberty guard Sabrina Ionescu, the No. 1 draft pick in 2020.“It’s hard, and hats off to her and the entire Indiana organization for helping her do what she does,” Ionescu said. “That’s why they drafted her at 1, because they know what she’s capable of doing.”Boston said her basketball I.Q. is the main skill that has translated from college to the pros. Staley agreed.“She makes the right basketball decisions,” Staley said. “And when you’ve played that way your entire life, nothing changes. It’s only the people that change.”One of the new people Boston has faced is Delle Donne, who was named the rookie of the year in 2013. Delle Donne said that one of the trickier aspects of joining the league is how quickly players need to get used to a new program, new coach and new teammates, but said that none of that seems to have slowed down Boston. Last month, against Delle Donne’s Washington Mystics, Boston scored 23 points and grabbed 14 rebounds in the Fever’s 87-66 win.Boston with her Indiana teammates.Steph Chambers/Getty Images“She’s so dominant,” Delle Donne said. “I mean, she crushed us the other game. She’s a rookie that requires veteran defensive schemes.”Delle Donne added that it can be hard to manage the pressure of coming in as the No. 1 overall pick. Last season, the Fever finished at the bottom of the 12-team league with a 5-31 record.“To know the expectation that you’re supposed to come and completely change a team is hard, but you can do it,” Delle Donne said. “Coming into the league, there’s always so much excitement about a new player who’s going to continue to raise our game and make it even better. So night in and night out, people are watching what you’re doing.”For now, Boston seems unfazed by the attention.“Something that I always take with me is, never get too high with the highs and too low with the lows,” Boston said. “Stay levelheaded.” More

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      What to Know About the 2023 WNBA Season

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      New superteams, new rules and Brittney Griner’s return are reshaping the league as star rookies try to make their mark.The W.N.B.A. begins its 27th season on Friday with new rules, new rosters and one big return. Here’s what to expect.Brittney Griner is back.After nearly 10 months in detention in Russia, Brittney Griner is playing basketball again.Griner’s detention clouded the W.N.B.A. season last year. She was arrested at an airport near Moscow on drug charges in February 2022, and subsequently convicted and sentenced to nine years in a penal colony. The league regularly paid tribute to her during the season, and her fellow players spoke out on her behalf.Brittney Griner is back with the Phoenix Mercury on a one-year contract after missing the 2022 season while she was detained in Russia.Matt York/Associated PressGriner was released in a prisoner swap in December, and after time spent recovering privately, she signed a one-year contract to return to the Phoenix Mercury.Griner played no basketball during her imprisonment and is still working to get back into game shape. “Everybody tells me to give myself grace and that it’s going to take time,” she said at a news conference in April, “but that’s the hardest thing to do for a pro athlete because we always want to be right back at our top shape.”Griner and the Mercury open their season on Friday in Los Angeles against the Sparks.Star players are joining forces.The off-season was dominated by free-agent signings and trades that established what could be two superteams: the Liberty and the Las Vegas Aces.The Liberty made three key moves: First, they traded with the Connecticut Sun for Jonquel Jones, the league’s most valuable player in 2021. Then they landed one of the top free agents: Breanna Stewart, the 2018 M.V.P., who had won two championships in Seattle. Finally, they signed the league’s active assists leader, Courtney Vandersloot. Those three join the returnees Betnijah Laney and Sabrina Ionescu, who have each made an All-Star team.Breanna Stewart was one of the top free agents. She had been with the Seattle Storm since she was drafted No. 1 overall in 2016.Ethan Miller/Getty ImagesThe reigning champion Aces already featured an impressive collection of talent: last year’s M.V.P., A’ja Wilson (who also won in 2020); Chelsea Gray, the 2022 finals M.V.P.; and their fellow All-Stars, Jackie Young and Kelsey Plum. And then they went and signed Candace Parker, the two-time M.V.P., two-time champion and seven-time All-Star. They also picked up the veteran Alysha Clark, who won two titles with Seattle.The rest of the league isn’t backing down from the superteams. “In the best movies, the underdog ends up on top,” Elena Delle Donne of the Washington Mystics told reporters this month.But still, the Aces and Liberty are far and away the betting favorites to win it all.Rookies look to make their mark.Some of the newest W.N.B.A. players are just weeks removed from finishing their college careers. How they make that transition will be crucial to the fortunes of their new teams.Aliyah Boston was the obvious choice of the Indiana Fever as the No. 1 overall pick in the April draft. Boston, who led South Carolina to a national title in 2022 and back to the Final Four this year, is expected to be a franchise cornerstone for the Fever as they rebuild. Though the competition she faces will be tougher in the W.N.B.A., Boston should be able to score more easily without facing the same double and triple teams she saw in college.With this year’s No. 2 pick, Minnesota drafted Diamond Miller, who led Maryland with nearly 20 points a game in the 2022-23 season. Miller is a versatile and athletic wing who should pair well with Napheesa Collier.Haley Jones, the No. 6 pick in the draft, was a leader for four years at Stanford, including the Cardinals’ 2021 title run. She slots in well on an Atlanta Dream team looking for more playmakers.New rules will add new wrinkles.The league also updated its rule book this off-season.W.N.B.A. coaches will now be able to challenge one — and only one — call per game. Coaches can ask for reviews on three kinds of calls: a foul called on their team, an out-of-bounds call, or a violation for goaltending or basket interference. Coaches will be limited to one challenge even if the challenge is successful, and even if the game goes to overtime.W.N.B.A. coaches, like Seattle’s Noelle Quinn, will have one challenge per game this season as part of series of rule changes.Steph Chambers/Getty ImagesOfficials may also now penalize players for committing a foul during a fast break without making a legitimate play on the ball. For this, a transition take foul, the offensive team will be awarded one free throw, which can be taken by any player on the floor, and the offensive team will keep control of the ball.The W.N.B.A. also has new guidelines governing sideline behavior. In an effort to limit disruptions and distractions, the league is telling players who are not in the game that they may not stand “for a prolonged period.” Players and coaches are also prohibited from “attempting to distract their opponents in an unsportsmanlike manner.” Teams could receive a delay-of-game warning or a technical foul for a violation. More

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      Las Vegas Aces Beat Sun for First WNBA Championship

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      The Aces shook off their reputation for being better in the regular season by holding off several rallies by the Sun.UNCASVILLE, Conn. — With a championship on the line for a team with some of the W.N.B.A.’s biggest stars, the Las Vegas Aces leaned on Riquna Williams, who had scored in double digits just twice this postseason.Williams raised her index finger to her lips to silence the Connecticut Sun’s white-knuckled fans in Game 4 of the finals as she hit one big shot after another in the fourth quarter. The last of her 17 points came on a step-back shot just inside the 3-point line over the outstretched arms of Natisha Hiedeman. Guard Kelsey Plum raised her hands, and Williams ran around the court with her arms spread wide as Sun fans began to leave.The Aces defeated the Sun, 78-71, on Sunday to win their first W.N.B.A. championship, their postseason reflecting the regular-season dominance that led them to tie Chicago for the best record in the league.The Aces led by as many as 10 but had to fight off several furious rallies by the Sun before clinching the title in the final minutes of Las Vegas’s third win in the best-of-five series. Chelsea Gray led the Aces with 20 points and was named the most valuable player of the finals.“I worked so hard for this,” Gray said as she became emotional and her teammates cheered.The Las Vegas Aces had long been considered better in the regular season than in the playoffs.Maddie Meyer/Getty ImagesGray and the Aces’ loaded roster kept Las Vegas a step ahead of the league all season. Four Aces were named All-Stars — A’ja Wilson, Plum, Jackie Young and Dearica Hamby — and Plum was voted M.V.P. of the All-Star Game. Wilson won her second league M.V.P. Award and was named the defensive player of the year. Becky Hammon, in her first season with the team, was named the league’s coach of the year.But coming into Game 4, Williams, who scored 11 points in the fourth quarter, hadn’t scored more than 14 points all season. The Sun held Wilson to just 11 points on Sunday, her third-lowest scoring performance of the playoffs.“I got a group of really resilient players,” Hammon said, adding: “You saw different people step up at different moments tonight and that’s what makes us difficult to beat.”The Aces finished with the best regular-season record in two of the past three seasons and second in the year they didn’t finish first. The Seattle Storm swept them in the 2020 finals. Las Vegas had shouldered the reputation of being a team good enough to win in the regular season but not able — or willing — to make the adjustments needed to succeed in the postseason. Its star-laden roster was seemingly too talented for its own good, with the best players often leaning on the isolation basketball they excel in but that has kept the Aces from closing out championships.This year, a large group of fans in red, black and gold Aces gear made their way down to the lower levels of Mohegan Sun Arena as the Las Vegas players flooded the court after the game. It was an invaluable moment for Gray.“I’ve been on two teams and that was loud,” Gray said of the Aces fans. “They’re going to celebrate us, and we’re going to celebrate them.”Las Vegas Aces guard Chelsea Gray had 20 points and 6 assists on Sunday. She was named the most valuable player of the finals.Jessica Hill/Associated PressLast season, the Aces lost the decisive Game 5 of the semifinals to the Phoenix Mercury, who celebrated on the Aces’ home floor. Gray said that ending had stuck in her mind since.“And now I’ll just have a different replay in my head,” Gray said with a smile.As the buzzer sounded on Sunday, the Aces players — now champions — yelled and hugged each other, their cheers of excitement bouncing around an otherwise quiet stadium that had been rocked with the deafening roars of Sun fans just moments before.As Connecticut players exited the court in tears, Sun center Jonquel Jones walked the length of the floor into the Aces’ celebration to hug and congratulate Wilson. As Jones walked away, she paused to clap and thank the fans that remained before heading to the locker room. Jones dominated the Aces physically in the Sun’s lone win of the series in Game 3, and she nearly led them to another victory in Game 4.Wilson spoke highly of Jones after the game.“I had to go and speak to her because she played her heart out,” Wilson said of Jones, who was last season’s M.V.P. “It’s so hard to guard her, and I just have all the most respect for J.J.”The loss for the Sun, the No. 3 seed, is another disappointing finish for a franchise with the second most wins in W.N.B.A. history but no championships. For the second straight game, Sun forward Alyssa Thomas had a triple-double. She is the only player to have a triple-double in a W.N.B.A. finals game.Hammon said it was a “battle” to beat the Sun. “We knew it wasn’t going to be easy,” she said.Bill Laimbeer, who had been the Aces’ coach for four years, stepped down before the season. The Aces hired Hammon, who had been an assistant with the N.B.A.’s San Antonio Spurs. She took over a team led by Wilson, who won her first M.V.P. Award in 2020.Riquna Williams of the Las Vegas Aces hit big shot after big shot during the fourth quarter of the championship-clinching victory.Maddie Meyer/Getty ImagesAs Hammon guided the Aces to the first seed, she said she saw glimpses of the style of play that had kept the Aces from winning a title. But that shifted in the Aces’ semifinal win over the Storm, during which Hammon said the players were “choosing each other” and learned how to “take a punch.”That proved true as the Aces found ways to win playoff games while their stars struggled and they faced deficits — precisely what happened on Sunday — finally shaking the reputation of a team with unfulfilled potential.Hammon thanked Laimbeer for putting the team together and praised her players.“What I’m most proud of is we became a real team out here, and a team that cares about each other and trusts each other,” she said.Hammon said it was a “little surreal” to win her first W.N.B.A. championship. She played in the league for more than a decade, including several seasons with the Las Vegas franchise when it was in San Antonio.She said the Aces had “tremendous leadership” among the players, and that they had persisted when they weren’t playing well during the season. She applauded Williams for coming through on Sunday when the Aces had been struggling to score.“She knows she’s got the ultimate green light,” Hammon said.Wilson also spoke about growth — hers and the team’s.“I know who I am now more than ever,” Wilson said. “I feel like I’ve established myself in this league. And the Aces aren’t done yet.” More

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      WNBA Upgrades to Charter Flights for Finals

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      For the first time ever, the W.N.B.A. is providing charter flights throughout the finals. Aces and Sun players are loving it — and hope it becomes permanent.UNCASVILLE, Conn. — There were “oohs and aahs” of excitement as the Connecticut Sun players entered their chartered plane on the way to Las Vegas for Game 1 of the W.N.B.A. finals, guard Nia Clouden said.Waiting for them were pillows and blankets, seats that fully reclined and a generous menu of complimentary food. Clouden typically never eats the roasted salted almonds, cookies, chips and other snacks offered on the team’s commercial flights. But on that night, she ordered a pepperoni pizza.Sun center Jonquel Jones pointed to the long legs that make up part of her 6-foot-6, 215-pound frame to show how the leg room on the charter flight made a difference for her. She usually tries to find the exit row seat on flights, but the space is never enough. Jones said she was also happy to avoid “all the unnecessary stuff that happens at airports.”“Sometimes after a game, you don’t really feel like talking, and you go to the airport and people want to talk about the game,” Jones said while laughing. “Or they want to ask you how tall you are — constantly — all the time. ‘How’s the weather up there?’ And it’s just like, dude, I’m just trying to get to the next destination.”She added: “As much as we love our fans — we appreciate them — sometimes it does really get a little exhausting, and it makes the season a little bit tougher.”This season, for the first time ever, the league agreed to provide charter travel throughout the W.N.B.A. finals. Commissioner Cathy Engelbert has said that the league does not have enough revenue to cover travel for all teams during the regular season and playoffs, which she estimated would cost more than $20 million. Teams fly commercially during the season and playoffs, with rare exceptions for extreme travel difficulties.Athletes in major professional sports leagues like the N.F.L., N.B.A. and M.L.B., and even many men’s and women’s Division I athletes, have grown accustomed to charter travel. But those men’s leagues have been around much longer than the W.N.B.A. and have billions of dollars of revenue, while the women’s league regularly operates at a loss.The W.N.B.A. hasn’t committed to offering charter flights for next year’s finals or expanding them to the regular season or any other part of the playoffs. Engelbert said the league was able to provide charters for the finals because of its efforts to increase revenue.“As we focus on growing this league by adding more corporate partners, increasing media exposure and disrupting the outdated media rights valuations of women’s sports,” Engelbert said in a statement, “it would be our hope to continue offering these opportunities when possible.”More on the W.N.B.A.Swan Song: Sue Bird, who had said she would retire after this season, shepherded the Seattle Storm to the playoffs. The team’s loss on Sept. 7 marked the end of her incredible career.Greatness Overshadowed: Sylvia Fowles, who has also announced her retirement from basketball, is one of the most successful American athletes ever. Why isn’t she better known?A Critical Eye: As enthusiasm for women’s basketball and the W.N.B.A grows, fans are becoming more demanding of the league and more vocal about their wishes.Making the Style Rules: Players in women’s basketball are styling themselves before the games. Their choices are an expression of their freedom, and can be lucrative too.The W.N.B.A.’s collective bargaining agreement with the players’ union prohibits teams from chartering flights without league approval. The Liberty were fined $500,000 for secretly traveling to several games by charter last season.So players fly commercially, dealing with the delays, Covid risks and the many flight challenges that everyday customers also deal with. If you’re wondering why professional athletes should have different travel standards anyway, many W.N.B.A. players said it started with rest.Having a relaxing night’s sleep is paramount for playing in a 36-game regular season — with half of those games on the road — when a player’s future salary and place in the league depend on their performance each night, players said. Rest can be especially challenging on a commercial flight for the tall humans that occupy women’s basketball teams. But more important, delays and flight cancellations can result in teams’ having to forfeit games.The Aces forfeited a game in 2018 after dealing with over 25 hours of delays and layovers on their way to Washington, D.C., to play the Mystics. They arrived just four hours ahead of their game. The Aces cited health concerns as the reason not to play and were the first team in league history to forfeit a game. Las Vegas missed the playoffs, finishing one game behind the Dallas Wings.“I definitely think having charters is a trickle-down effect to people being able to take care of their bodies better and rest,” Aces guard Sydney Colson said. “And then you have better games to watch because people are rested and injury free.”Connecticut’s Jonquel Jones said though she loved the Sun’s fans, it can be challenging running into them at the airport after games when players might not feel like talking.Joe Buglewicz for The New York TimesFor those players who played college basketball for major programs in the United States, the special finals travel is a welcome return to the norm, as many of their schools provided charter flights to all games.“There aren’t many times that I can remember at all that we flew commercial,” said Aces forward Theresa Plaisance, who played at Louisiana State University. “And when you get to the W.N.B.A., and you’re going to your middle seat on Southwest — sometimes it’s really hard to swallow that pill and think like: ‘Oh, this is my progression. I went from college to make it to a professional league, and I have to go backward.’”For Peter Feeney, the basketball operations manager for the Sun, who has handled all flight logistics for the past four years, the simplicity of the travel blew his mind, he said. Feeney typically arrives at airports an hour before the team to ensure that they can pass through security without any hiccups. But on their two charter flights, they’ve arrived at the plane less than an hour before takeoff, and the flight staff handled almost everything.The moment made Feeney realize that if the league switched to charter flights for the entire season, he would become less useful in his role. But he also serves as a video coordinator, so he welcomes the idea. “That’s a good problem, right?” he said with a laugh.Aces forward A’ja Wilson, who has been outspoken about the W.N.B.A.’s travel woes, said that the players had talked about what life would be like if chartered flights were normal after they comfortably made the cross-country trip to Connecticut from Las Vegas for Game 3 on Thursday.“We need it. Ain’t nothing else,” Wilson said. “We need to be able to fly like that after every game. I can only imagine how my body would feel if we did. So, I think it’s a huge deal for us to do it. We need to continue to push it.” More

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      The Sun Get Physical to Stay Alive Against Las Vegas

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      On the brink of elimination, Connecticut locked down Chelsea Gray and got superb performances from Jonquel Jones and Alyssa Thomas.UNCASVILLE, Conn. — The Las Vegas Aces were leading the W.N.B.A. finals heading into Thursday largely because of explosive first quarters. They had outscored the Connecticut Sun, 58-32, in the opening period of the first two games, a number that Sun Coach Curt Miller was well aware of. Before Thursday’s Game 3, Miller said he would “love” for the Sun to have an explosive start and force the Aces to take a timeout.It went the other way. An animated and furious Miller sprinted onto the court just over two minutes into the game as the Aces took a quick 9-2 lead.“I was frustrated, but not discouraged,” Miller said. “We’ve been in that situation before. We are in our home building. We just needed to not lose contact with them before the game settled in.”He added: “It’s scary to take a timeout quickly knowing that you have an eight-minute quarter — the rest of the quarter — without a timeout. But it was needed, and we gathered ourselves, and again, the veterans led through that huddle.”The Sun responded to the quick timeout with a 32-10 run, closing the first quarter with 34 points — a W.N.B.A. finals record — and a 19-point lead as their raucous fans were on their feet, swinging white towels.The Sun went on to defeat the Aces, 105-76, and now trail the Aces, two games to one, in the best-of-five series.Jonquel Jones led the way for the Sun with 20 points and 5 rebounds, and Alyssa Thomas added the first triple-double in finals history with 16 points, 15 rebounds, and 11 assists.Miller said the win showed “toughness,” adding: “You know, a grit, a fight, that we’re not going to go away; that we are going to force Vegas to beat us.”Courtney Williams and the Sun were physical all night, limiting Kelsey Plum and the Aces to 76 points.Joe Buglewicz for The New York TimesThe Sun improved to 4-0 when facing postseason elimination this year. On Thursday, they relied on their height and physicality to dominate the Aces on both sides of the ball. The Sun outscored the Aces, 64-26, in the paint thanks largely to Jones, who won the league’s Most Valuable Player Award in 2021. Jones used her 6-foot-6, 190-pound frame to outmuscle this year’s M.V.P. and Defensive Player of the Year, A’ja Wilson, scoring layup after layup, finishing through contact and drawing fouls.“Jonquel played like Jonquel,” Wilson said. “She’s an M.V.P. She played exactly how she’s supposed to play. I’m not going to take anything away from her. She dominated the game the way that she should.”Jones was dominating with 11 points in the third quarter, but with two minutes left, and the Aces comfortably ahead by 11, Miller removed Jones who had reached four fouls. The Aces quickly went on a 5-0 run, cutting the lead to six. A Brionna Jones layup just before the end of the quarter put the lead back at 8, but Jones stayed on the bench as the fourth quarter began.The absence made an Aces comeback seem inevitable, but the Sun were able to hold thanks to strong play from guard DeWanna Bonner and Thomas. When Jones returned with 7 minutes 35 seconds left in the game, the Sun were up 10. The Aces made a free throw, but Natisha Hiedeman knocked down a 3-pointer that put the Sun up by 12, igniting the crowd.Odyssey Sims, a guard for the Sun, mimicked the “night, night” celebration made famous by Golden State’s Stephen Curry as a way to signal to the crowd that the game was over. Minutes later, the Sun extended the lead to 14, and Aces Coach Becky Hammon began pulling her starters.“This game was about physicality and mental toughness, and they smoked us, period,” Hammon said.Part of the turnaround came from the Sun finally finding an answer for Chelsea Gray, the Aces guard who had stepped up during this postseason. Gray has had numerous crucial moments throughout the Aces’ run, but on Thursday she looked decidedly uncomfortable.The Sun matched the 6-foot-4 Bonner on Gray and aggressively double-teamed her on screens to force someone else to beat them. The strategy resulted in four turnovers from Gray and her struggling to get anything going offensively. In the second quarter, Gray tried to assert herself by pulling up for a few deep 3-pointers, at one point scoring 9 straight points. But that was it for Gray. Her last 3-pointer in the first half was her 11th and final point of the game.“I’m just trying to stay locked in and limit her touches as much as I can, not give her too much room,” Bonner said. “Try to use my length more than anything. I’m a 6-foot-4 guard for a reason, so I just try to use my length, use my speed.”The Aces got 22 points from guard Jackie Young — her highest scoring game of the postseason — and Wilson added 19 points, but just four rebounds. It was the worst defensive game of the postseason for Wilson and, by extension, the rest of the Aces.“We just were not locked in on the defensive end,” Wilson said, adding: “For us to come out and lack that, it was going to be a long game regardless of who we played.” More