Brondello began her WNBA coaching tenure in 2010 with the San Antonio Silver Stars, now the Las Vegas Aces. She won her first league title with the Phoenix Mercury in 2014 and coached there through 2021. She joined New York the following year and posted a 107-53 record in four seasons. The Liberty also won their first WNBA title under her leadership.

Brondello also has extensive international coaching experience, leading the Australian women’s national team for the past four Olympic cycles, winning two bronze medals and one silver medal.

Once the Portland Fire announced their head coaching decision earlier this week, hiring Cleveland Cavaliers assistant Alex Sarama, Brondello was expected to take one of the remaining jobs in Toronto, Dallas, or Seattle. Each of the three present a very different situation, with a unique set of challenges and unique positives.

The Seattle Storm will likely retain a lot of their star power in the WNBA’s upcoming free agency. With veterans like Nneka Ogwumike, Skylar Diggins, and Gabby Williams, along with their young talents in Ezi Magbegor and Dom Malonga, the Storm are farther along in the process than other coachless teams. Brondello could have gone there and expected a decent playoff run right away, but there would also be significant pressure to produce results quickly.

In Dallas, things are a little less sure when it comes to the playoffs and even the roster. While you have Paige Bueckers locked in for the foreseeable future, as well as another lottery pick incoming in 2026, their free agency could go in a variety of ways. While there likely won’t be as much pressure for their next head coach to lead this roster to postseason success, the organization will likely want to see significant improvement from last year.

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Then there is the Toronto Tempo. In the cons column, the Tempo likely won’t be competing for a championship in the next few seasons as they build their expansion team. Golden State surely proved that the process can be fast-tracked, but their historic season will be difficult to replicate.

While that may be a con for a coach like Brondello, who has gone to the playoffs more often than not in her career, it can also be seen as a benefit without a definitive benchmark to measure against as the Tempo find their footing. In turn, that shift of focus brings some stability as well with the Tempo not likely to make a rash coaching change in their first season.

While each of these teams likely wanted Brondello for their own reasons, Toronto’s situation is again unique. As the first and only international market in the WNBA, their needs are different. In an exclusive interview with The IX Basketball earlier in the summer, Tempo General Manager Monica Wright Rogers said she thought “our head coach needs to understand that you’re going to be championing what this country [Canada] cares about.” She continued to say that the coach they picked will need to be a community ambassador, someone who can navigate the international basketball community that the Tempo will be a part of, and also help the players on the team be able to connect with the community.

While Wright Rogers certainly could not have known that Brondello would end up being available when the season ended, the Australian coach fits that description quite well.

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Having their coach picked means the Tempo can now move on to focusing on the next phase of team building: players. Unless anything changes due to the ongoing CBA negotiations, the Tempo and Fire should have an expansion draft in the coming months. After that, they will join the rest of the league in free agency. Having Brondello on staff may even help them attract a free agent or two in a very wide-open market.

Ahead of the expansion draft, Toronto is focusing heavily on data analytics and scouting when planning its first roster. Assistant general manager and SVP of basketball strategy for the Tempo, Eli Horowitz, told The IX in an interview that “We want to build a basketball strategy department that encompasses scouting, analytics, and all that goes into that side of the business.” They have announced the hires of Lauren Manis as their data analyst and Mark Schindler as their manager of scouting, continuing to build a robust analytics department.

Having someone experienced like Brondello in the coaching spot will only help them in that mission to put strategy at the forefront. After coaching for over a decade, and seeing players both on the WNBA side and the international side, Brondello is well acquainted with the league’s top talent. Getting someone with a pedigree like Brondello was considered by the organization to be best-case scenario for Toronto.

While the team has yet to announce her hire officially, she will likely be introduced in the coming weeks. There may be some delay though, due to the World Series excitement in and around Toronto.