Women's Basketball

by Noa Dalzell | MSN

The WNBA is continuing to expand — and the latest franchise is coming to Portland, Oregon, the league announced Wednesday morning. With Toronto, San Francisco, and now Portland each getting their own WNBA teams, the league will have 16 teams by 2026.

It’s not the first time WNBA basketball will be played in Oregon. Portland previously had a WNBA team, the Portland Fire from 2000 to 2002, before that franchise was ultimately shut down. The league was close to bringing a team to Portland last fall, but those plans — with a different ownership group — fell through. Portland’s new WNBA team is set to begin play in 2026.

RAJ Sports will head the ownership group, led by owners Lisa Bhathal Merage and her brother, Alex Bhathal. They recently purchased Portland Thorns FC, a professional women’s soccer team. The Portland Thorns have the third-highest attendance in the NWSL, averaging more than 18,000 fans per game this season.

“As the WNBA builds on a season of unprecedented growth, bringing a team back to Portland is another important step forward,” said WNBA Commissioner Cathy Engelbert in a statement. “Portland has been an epicenter of the women’s sports movement and is home to a passionate community of basketball fans. Pairing this energy with the Bhathal family’s vision of leading top-flight professional sports teams will ensure that we deliver a premier WNBA team to the greater Portland area.”

The Portland WNBA team will play its home games at Moda Center in downtown Portland, where the NBA’s Portland Trail Blazers play.

Two other WNBA expansion teams are already in the works: Golden State in 2025 and Toronto in 2026. Golden State’s name and branding have already been revealed — the team will be known as the Valkyries — while Toronto’s has yet to be announced.

The Valkyries are off to a record-breaking start, having already received 17,000 season ticket deposits for next season. Plans for their state-of-the-art facility have also been released.

With Portland’s team now official, the WNBA will include 15 teams by 2026. Previously, Commissioner Cathy Englebert announced that the league’s aims to reach 16 teams by 2028. Denver, Nashville, Philadelphia and Charlotte have all been rumored to be in the mix.

By: Claire Watkins | Just Women’s Sports

The Connecticut Sun earned a big win in more ways than one on Tuesday, defeating the LA Sparks 69-61 in front of a sold-out crowd at Boston’s TD Garden. Hosted by the Sun — who usually play at the Mohegan Sun Arena in Uncasville, Connecticut — it was the first WNBA game ever held inside the home of the reigning NBA champion Boston Celtics.

While Boston will see women’s soccer return in 2026 via an NWSL expansion team, the Sun currently serve as New England’s only WNBA team — and fans came out in force to support their home side. Last night’s announced attendance of 19,156 stands as the largest in Connecticut Sun history, as well as the third-highest WNBA attendance this season.

Fans were treated to an end-to-end battle as the Sparks held a first quarter lead into the fourth quarter when, buoyed by the raucous crowd, DiJonai Carrington led Connecticut to a 14-0 comeback. Her efforts helped the Sun notch their 20th win, becoming just the second WNBA team to hit 20 victories this season.

“Hopefully, this is the start of something beautiful,” Sun star Alyssa Thomas said after the game. “This is the kind of atmosphere you want to play in.”

DiJonai Carrington led the Sun’s fourth-quarter comeback over the Sparks on Tuesday
DiJonai Carrington led the Sun’s fourth-quarter comeback after calling out the game’s lack of promotion.

Lack of WNBA promotion causes stir ahead of untelevised Boston game
Despite the sellout success, the game wasn’t broadcast nationally, with only WNBA League Pass and social media platform X providing live coverage.

“I think that there could have been a lot more publicity or promo from the top,” Carrington — who posted about the issue early Tuesday — told reporters. “You know, Connecticut had announced that we were having this game probably almost a year ago.”

By Sam Federman | Mid Major Madness

Stags rally to down Niagara in MAAC women’s championship game.

In the famous cartoon series, Wile E. Coyote would meticulously design cunning traps to catch his presumed prey, the cunning road runner. Every single time, without fail, the road runner would find a hilarious loophole, leaving the coyote bewildered and oftentimes injured.

In this MAAC women’s basketball season, the Fairfield Stags played the role of road runner, escaping every different wrinkle that the other 10 Wile E. Coyotes threw their way en route to a perfect conference season, and a ticket to the NCAA Tournament. The Stags came from 13 points down in the second half to defeat Niagara, 70-62, in overtime in the MAAC Championship game on Saturday. It extends their winning streak to 29 games, and leaves no hard questions for the NCAA’s Selection Committee.

The road runner analogy isn’t just that, it’s the entire identity of this team. Assistant coach Blake DuDonis coined the term to refer to the team’s versatile post players. It’s even listed as the position for all of the players that would typically be considered forwards on the official roster.

The offensive style and fast pace that the Stags play at don’t call for typical post players. It requires players capable of running the floor, rebounding, and defending multiple positions.

“Blake is our position coach for the Road Runners and I challenged him over the summer,” Stags head coach Carly Thibault-DuDonis said. “Because we knew we were gonna play a little bit differently, we recruited in a way that we have posts that are mobile, versatile, and can play on the perimeter, can play inside and out, and we wanted to have a more true identity for that than your traditional posts.”

Today, it was all about toughness. Coming from behind against a team that presses and traps as aggressively as Niagara does, the Stags needed their Road Runners to vacate the paint and allow for Nellie Brown and Kaety L’Amoreaux to attack the basket. However, it took the Stags a long time to get comfortable.

Brown, the MAAC’s Player of the Year, committed an offensive foul on the first possession of the game, and two minutes later, committed an intentional foul. The Purple Eagles jumped out to a 6-2 lead, and then it was 10-4. But Fairfield stayed in the game, even with Brown out, and despite poor shooting.

Even when Niagara pushed the lead up to double digits in the second quarter, Thibault-DuDonis didn’t call a timeout, despite having the opportunity.

“It’s tough to take a timeout against Niagara because their pressure is able to dig in a little bit more,” Thibault-DuDonis said. “But that’s something that this entire season, I’ve opted not to take a timeout when a team makes a run because of our pace, and the way we’re able to run it back at people.”

In the first half, Niagara forced 17 turnovers with their insane full court press and trap. Their aggressive hedges were able to get steal after steal, and the Stags were in their own head.

At the third quarter media timeout, co-captain Lauren Beach pulled the other captains, Brown and Izabela Nicoletti-Leite over to the side.

“She really gave us that fire,” Brown said of that conversation. “She gave us that energy to keep going, and as soon as she said that, that’s when we were just hitting our shots, we were getting defensive stops, and we were playing our game.”

In the second half, Brown took over the game. She scored 15 points on 4-8 shooting, attacking the rim at will and attempting eight free throws. She and L’Amoreaux were able to blow by Niagara’s exhausted guards and create space at the rim to score and dish.

“I think once we realized how we can drive and dish,” L’Amoreaux said. “Once we realized to jump stop, that’s how we can get the job done.”

The jump stops have been a point of emphasis for Thibault-DuDonis and staff since the first day of practice, and it allowed the Stag guards to survey the floor and draw fouls in the paint.

Brown gave Fairfield its first lead of the game with a layup with 1:50 to play, and then tacked on a free throw with 1:08. After Angel Parker tied the game at the line with 29 seconds left, Fairfield had the opportunity to hold for one last shot.

With the ball in her hands, the MAAC Player of the Year drove down the lane and was called for an offensive foul, her fifth, sending her out of the game.

*Fred Savage Princess Bride voice.*

Wait, that’s not how the story was supposed to go — she was supposed to win it at the buzzer, right? No, that’s not the story, because this Stags team showed grit and depth, and overtime was theirs.

Fairfield scored the first nine points of overtime and could sense victory with under a minute to play. When the buzzer sounded, it was a culmination of all of the work put in by this group, and 29 straight wins.

There is no more doubt in the eyes of the selection committee, the Fairfield Stags are going to the NCAA Tournament, and they’re not done yet.

“There’s not any other team in the country besides South Carolina that has gone on a 29 game win streak,” Thibault-DuDonis said. “We’re top 10 in a ton of defensive categories, top 25 in a ton of offensive categories, we’ve scheduled aspirationally, I think we’ve done everything we can to be in position for a 12 seed.”

But regardless of seeding or draw, Fairfield is dangerous, because winners win.

“This team is gonna be hungry and not satisfied,” Thibault-DuDonis said. “We’re ready to play whoever.”