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Leagues and Governing Bodies

Past players' perspective

Rebecca Lobo, Dawn Staley and Cynthia Cooper-Dyke were on the court for some of the WNBA’s earliest years, and they maintain connections to the league and sport today.

Lobo was part of the New York Liberty for the league’s inaugural, 1997 season. A national champion while at UConn (1995), Lobo played four seasons in New York followed by later seasons in Houston and Connecticut. In 2004, she joined ESPN as a WNBA and women’s college basketball analyst and reporter.

Cooper-Dyke also was part of the WNBA’s 1997 debut, starring for the Houston Comets. She led the Comets to four consecutive championships (1997-2000) and was named the WNBA Finals MVP each time. She was the league’s MVP in 1997 and 1998, as well. Since 2013, she’s been the head coach at her alma mater, USC.

Staley’s career spanned 1999 through 2006, and she was selected to the WNBA’s All-Decade Team in 2006. Since 2008, she’s been the head coach at South Carolina.

The trio recently shared their thoughts on the WNBA’s past, present and future.

Lobo went from a career on the court to one as an analyst, working for ESPN.
Photo by: GETTY IMAGES; ESPN IMAGES
Rebecca Lobo

The league has grown tremendously. The talent level on the floor has gotten much better. Players 1 through 11 or 12 tend to be bigger, faster, stronger and more skilled. It has been fun to watch the talent grow. …

The league is no longer a novelty. That is both a positive and a negative. The negative is that people won’t tune in to a game or go to a game just because it is new or fresh. The positive — and it’s a huge positive — is that the league has proven that it is viable. It has been able to continue to grow throughout the past 20 years. …

The foundation of the league is strong. The play on the court speaks for itself. I’ve always believed that if you can find a way to get a basketball fan into the building for a game, they will come back for more. Now that I have my own [three] daughters, I realize how important it is to get girls connected to the players and teams. I will spend my time and entertainment dollar on what my children want to do. My 11-year-old has started asking to go to WNBA games. As a result, I will buy tickets this summer and take her to games.

The more the league can connect to basketball fans and parents of athletes, the better. I don’t think the league should spend an ounce of energy trying to convert people who criticize the women’s game. They won’t be converted, and we don’t need them.

I think there are enough people out there who can enjoy the game, and have an open mind, and they should be the target audience.

Cooper-Dyke won four titles in Houston and now coaches at USC.
Photo by: AP IMAGES; GETTY IMAGES
Cynthia Cooper-Dyke

The talent pool is much younger now. Kids have had a chance to see us play and see us realize a dream to play professional basketball in the United States. So now, kids are starting much younger and they’re dreaming about playing professional basketball in America. …

When I started with the WNBA, I had a feeling, a dream, a wish, a desire that we could see it at age 20, 40, 60 — as long as our big brothers, the NBA, stayed on board with us, and as long as we did our part. We brought the talent, brought the game to the fans. I felt like we could have some longevity, but I also felt a sense of it was my duty to perform in front of the fans. We were laying the foundation for future generations. …

We used to market the WNBA differently and more aggressively. The WNBA is only 20 years old, so it’s still a very young league. We still need to educate people on what we bring to the table. The other thing is, the NBA: They never quite let go of their veterans. They always incorporate them in different ways, whether it’s coaching, administration, commercials, events. They bring together both the legacy and the current kind of hot player that’s taking over the excitement of the league. [For the WNBA,] that doesn’t have to be just me. It could be Lisa Leslie, Tina Thompson, Sheryl Swoopes, Teresa Weatherspoon. … A lot of fans still remember us and still want to see us as a part of the growth of the league. … You want to do specific marketing to your core fans, but there are a lot of fans out there that still need education. That’s where marketing and grassroots programs come into play.

Staley played in Charlotte and now coaches at South Carolina.
Photo by: AP IMAGES; GETTY IMAGES
Dawn Staley

The league is filled with a lot of talent. The fruits of its labor over the last 20 years [have] reached the peak of why it exists. Twenty years ago, the WNBA was a carrot dangled in front of little girls who are now realizing their dreams. That’s what it set out to do. Now, the ones that are in it have to do a better job of taking care of it. How they do that is learn its history, understand that it’s not what everybody had even though it’s all that they’ve had. Twenty-five or 30 years ago, athletes didn’t have that to aspire to, so we have to make sure that they’re looking at the WNBA as a whole and not just at themselves as individuals. …

The novelty has worn off. Everybody understands that the WNBA is played in the summer, so everyone has adjusted to supporting it in that way. We’re competing with vacation time and family time, and people have put into their schedules attending games, which is good — but it’s not at a place where it continues to grow. The novelty has worn off, so we have to figure out how it can continue to grow: get attendance up, get more companies sponsoring teams and the league. That’s where the lasting growth must take place.

— Mark Mensheha

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