The WNBA is 15 years old today. I remember being at the first game in 1997. (For those doing the math: the league was founded in 1996, but play began in 1997.) That means some of the players were my son’s age (eight) or younger when the league began. Now I feel old.
Former WNBA president Val Ackerman offers her thoughts on the milestone at ESPNW. She tells us the noteable facts:
In its 14th season, the NBA’s average league-wide attendance was only 5,008 (the WNBA’s was 7,835), and it took the “brother league” 30 seasons to average more than 10,000 fans per game (10,179 in 1975-76, to be exact; the WNBA eclipsed that number in its second and third seasons).
More important than the numbers, of course, is Ackerman’s other observation on change over the past 15 years: “People have accepted—and treat as perfectly normal—the fact that women play basketball for a living.”
Also of note is the fact that three-time league MVP, Olympian, and lesbian mom Sheryl Swoopes—40 years young—is still playing. She started in the 1997 season, only six weeks after giving birth to her son. (I suppose if we lesbian moms want role models, we shouldn’t complain if some of them are overachievers. Fifteen years of WNBA may make me feel old, but I guess I don’t really have any excuse to let that slow me down.)
A rematch of the league’s inaugural game between the New York Liberty and the Los Angeles Sparks is on ESPN2 at 10 p.m. ET.