You Must Watch the WNBA Finals Sunday
Even if you don't watch sports, you simply must watch this game!
If you’re a WNBA fan, you already know where you’ll be Sunday night at 8pm ET: watching the New York Liberty take on the Minnesota Lynx in game five of the WNBA Finals on ESPN, live from Barclays Center in Brooklyn. I don’t need to convince you because you are already seated. If, however, you are not a WNBA fan, you might need a little nudge and that’s what I’m here for. I’ve got a reason for everyone to watch!
If you like sports, but aren’t familiar with the WNBA
The WNBA Finals are tied 2-2 and it has been a roller coaster ride to get here. But when I say that, I don’t want you to think I mean like the Dollywood Mystery Mine roller coaster of your youth. I’m talking about one of those roller coasters that lifts you up into the actual clouds and then tilts you head first over a spiked pit of alligators and poison syrup, and then the guy running the thing at the top goes, “Oh weird, your seatbelt’s broken,” and there’s some kind of flashing whirring siren, and the bottom falls out of the ride, sending you careening down into a twirly-whirly doom spiral that’s got your nervous system too messed up to even scream.
The Lynx’s Courtney Williams hit a three near the buzzer after an historic comeback in game one — and got fouled! In New York! The Liberty’s Sabrina Ionescu hit a logo three near the buzzer in game three after another historic comeback! In Minnesota! Game four was decided by one point in the second quarter and one point in the forth quarter! With two minutes left in the game last night, my wife goes, “What’s gonna happen?” And I was like, “Whatever it is, it’s gonna be WILD!” Some things you just know. That’s gonna be game five, all the way.
Last night’s game was also the most viewed finals game on cable ever. Two MILLION viewers.
If you need a feminist storyline to get invested
The WNBA has not grown in a way that indicates how valuable and how culturally legendary the league and the players actually are. Tired of being forced to go overseas to play in the off-season to earn the money they deserve, former college teammates and current MVPs of the Lynx and the Liberty, Napheesa Collier and Breanna Stewart, decided to start their own 3x3 league called Unrivaled.
They’re already shaming the W with their success, including snagging many of the league’s best players; indulging fans in an iconic social media rollout; guaranteeing better salaries and revenue sharing; boasting a slick new court in Miami built on a soundstage; AND they just landed a six-year TV deal with TNT that’s worth more than $100 million. (The W has been around since 1997 and recently negotiated an 11-year deal worth $200 million, just for some perspective.) And? Stewie and Phee are both moms! Doing it all with their toddlers waddling alongside them!
This is Billie Jean King stuff, y’all.
If you need some gays to root for
NO PROBLEM. Breanna Stewart and Jonquel Jones are both Liberty starters and both gay and gay-married. Coming off the bench for New York, there’s Courtney Vandersloot. She and her wife, Allie Quigley, won a championship together (with Candace Parker) in Chicago just a few years ago. Assistant coach Roneeka Hodges is queer and also a fashion icon. For Minnesota, first of all, coach Cheryl Reeve is that kind of power lesbian you see on TV who enthralls and terrifies you. Every game she wears a blazer over some kind of aggressively feminist or queer t-shirt. Then there’s starters Kayla McBride and Courtney Williams, with Natisha Hiedeman and Cecilia Zandalasini coming off the bench. Hiedeman’s rumored to be dating the Washington Mystics’ Shakira Austin, who keeps showing up with Courtney Williams’ dad in the stands at the Finals.
Megan Rapinoe said you can’t win a championship without gays, and she was right, and this year’s WNBA Finals just proves that theory once again!
If you love drama
To be honest, the Liberty and the Lynx are not the most dramatic teams in the WNBA. The opposite really. Unlike the semifinals, you’re not going to get Mariana Mabrey screaming TRAAAAAASH like a very angry-excited possum. HOWEVER, something very dramatic has happened in these Finals.
The New York Liberty mascot, Big Ellie, is honestly the breakout star of this season; she even has her own sneakers and she’s a multi-magazine cover girl! Well, she is now full-on feuding with the Lynx mascot, Prowl! And it’s trickling down to the players and fans! Just yesterday, Liberty superstar Jonquel Jones told reporters, “I didn’t even know the Lynx have a mascot.” The shade! The disrespect! And Lynx superstar Courtney Williams’ dad is chirping at Ellie during and after games! Ellie is the queen of Barclays, where the game’s happening tomorrow, which means this mess will be on the jumbotron!
If you simply want to be entertained
Look, man, the WNBA is just the coolest place to be. If you don’t believe me, turn on the game tomorrow night and see how many stars are out in Brooklyn. Sue Bird and Megan Rapinoe will for sure be there, probably Aubrey Plaza, definitely Spike Lee. We’ve had Meek Mill and Gayle King, Whoopi Goldberg, Jordan Chiles, AOC, Robin Roberts, Ali Krieger, Alicia Keys, Colin Kaepernick, Karlie Kloss, and a whole big thing of boy basketball players. The Cut says Liberty games are the best party in New York! And I haven’t even mentioned Ellie’s extensive costumes and choreography!
If you want a queerer Twitter timeline / TikTok FYP
The Fever’s NaLyssa Smith and the Sun’s Dijonai Carrington rekindled their relationship in a game against each other this season when NaLyssa gently picked up Dijonai after she got knocked over, lingering juuuust a bit around that waist.
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And then! Later in the game! NaLyssa stopped teammate Erica Wheeler from going in on Dijonai with a simple hand to the chest, like, “Not too much on my baby.” The next day, Dijonai tweeted, “As she should.” And now their family is reunited.
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The Aces’ Syd Colson, known affectionally as The Face of the League, is gay in that glorious way where she makes it everybody’s problem. That way that I respect more than anything. For so much of the WNBA’s history, both the league (officially) and just the culture (generally) worked overtime to keep players closeted. Not anymore! This year, Syd just came out and said that everyone in the league is gay, and only like three players pushed back on her. A graphic circulated called Straight Club that had like eight players photoshopped into it and Syd said even that was too many.
On her own team, she launched the name “Stud Butt” for point guard Chelsea Gray after she heard shooting guard Jackie Young call her that in a hotel hallway. In her most recent Aflac commercial, with gay rookie teammate Kate Martin, Syd said the craziest rumor she ever heard about herself is that she was dating a man. Even the commercial editor threw in a record scratch. Kate Martin also is gay and the recipient of all the Aces clowning love, including the time they convinced the bus driver to leave her behind at a steakhouse in Dallas!
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The WNBA is the funniest, gayest sports league. The storylines are endless. And if you follow them even just a little bit, they’ll light up your timelines.
So. I will see you tomorrow at 8pm at ESPN. :)
You are doing the good gay work with this. Being a WNBA fan is such an easy way for people to boost their quality of life
The WNBA should PAY YOU FOR THIS GENIUS!