Basketball is not immune from the phenomenon, from former Florida Gators standout Joakim Noah and then Chicago Bull saying in a press conference, “I mean, I never heard anybody say, ‘I’m going to Cleveland on vacation.’ What’s so good about Cleveland?” to the most recent rendition of Indiana Fever guard Sophie Cunningham’s, “I don’t know how excited people are to be going to Detroit or Cleveland.”
Go back further to the 2024 Final Four in Cleveland, and WNBA star A’ja Wilson responded, “No, it is Cleveland,” with a smirk when asked by Sue Bird and Diana Taurasi if she was staying to watch South Carolina in the title game.
In other words, going after the city on America’s North Coast is nothing new.
Cunningham and others sometimes walk back comments, but even the clarification says the same thing when “nobody wants to go here” morphs into “I want to go to another city.”
Today, trusting the opinion of people without experience is as commonplace as cheap shots against Cleveland, but what about the ones who not only know the city well but also come from its borders?
Want even more women’s sports in your inbox?
Subscribe now to The IX Sports and receive our daily women’s sports newsletter covering soccer, tennis, basketball, golf, hockey and gymnastics from our incredible team of writers. That includes Basketball Wednesday from founder and editor Howard Megdal.
Readers of The IX Basketball now save 50% on their subscription to The IX.
Connecticut Sun guard Jacy Sheldon spent her high school and college years in the greater Columbus area. First at Dublin Coffman High School, then a five-year stint with the Ohio State Buckeyes. Before that, Jacy’s dad, Duane Sheldon, raised his family outside of a Cleveland suburb, Berea, where he coached Baldwin Wallace’s men’s basketball team for seven seasons.
“Cleveland for me is just my childhood,” Jacy said. “Even the house we grew up in, we had a bunch of forest behind our house. … We’d obviously go to Baldwin Wallace and go to all of his practices and shoot.”
When the rumors began swirling early in 2025 that Cleveland was on the precipice of returning to the WNBA — a reprise of seven seasons as the Cleveland Rockers in the inaugural years of the league — Sheldon’s friends and family reached out to her in droves. The guard had to defend against the rumors like she defends on the court.
“I remember people sent it to me, and I’m like, ‘That’s not legit. Don’t think too much into that,’” Sheldon said. “And then when they did make it official, I even had to go back and look. I’m like, ‘Are we sure this is for real this time?’”
Tune in to Locked On Women’s Basketball
Here at The IX Basketball, in addition to the 24/7/365 written content our staff provides, we also host the daily Locked On Women’s Basketball podcast. Join us Monday through Saturday each week as we discuss all things WNBA, collegiate basketball, basketball history and much more. Listen wherever you find podcasts or watch on YouTube.
On June 30, it was for real. Cleveland, alongside fellow returning city Detroit and first-time WNBA city Philadelphia, had their day in the spotlight when commissioner Cathy Engelbert made the league’s landmark announcement.
For Atlanta Dream forward Naz Hillmon — who was born in Cleveland, played high school basketball at Gilmour Academy before winning Big Ten Player of the Year in her time with the Michigan Wolverines — there is already a campaign trying to get her to leave the Dream three years early.
“There was a social media post about every player who … is from [one of] the new cities that’s coming,” Hillmon said. “A lot of people hinting on whether or not I would come back.”
Known as a hardworking, midwestern, rust belt-type of city, Cleveland’s reputation is reflected in Hillmon on the court as Atlanta’s ironwoman with a franchise record 128 consecutive appearances, now up to 131. Hillmon battles on the court inside, does not give up on plays and is working on her long shooting game for head coach Karl Smesko’s 3-point heavy offense.
Atlanta Dream forward Naz Hillmon (00) shoots a free throw during the WNBA game between the Atlanta Dream and the Connecticut Sun at Mohegan Sun Arena, Uncasville, Connecticut, USA on June 06, 2025. (Photo Credit: Chris Poss | The Next)
“We ride hard for our city in terms of our sports teams,” Hillmon said. “It’s really exciting to have women’s basketball being on that front and that platform.”
There are arguments, and jokes, about the fact that Cleveland had a team before and folded. Gordon Gund, who owned the Rockers until 2003 when he ceased operations, is not the new WNBA expansion owner, Dan Gilbert.
Gund was part of the Gateway project that brought an NBA arena out of Richfield, Ohio, and into downtown Cleveland, along with a move for Cleveland’s MLB team off Lake Erie and directly next to them, named Gund Arena.
Gilbert spent his money to revitalize the aging Gund Arena, now known as Rocket Arena, invested in the Cavaliers to bring the city a championship in 2016, its first since a Cleveland Browns title in 1964, and brought stability to the sport of hockey in the city with the 2016 title-winning Cleveland Monsters. The latter came after years of the Gunds renting out their arena to a rotating cast of hockey teams.
The two owners are not the same, like today’s support for the WNBA is not the same as it was in the early 2000s. Hillmon, who has family and friends drive from Cleveland to Indiana and Chicago when she is traveling with the Dream, is part of that growth and sees Cleveland’s renewed potential.
“I think it’s great to have more eyes on the league,” Hillmon said. “Now people don’t have to drive two or four hours from wherever to get to a basketball game.”
Order ‘Rare Gems’ and save 30%
Howard Megdal, founder and editor of The Next and The IX, released his latest book on May 7, 2024. This deeply reported story follows four connected generations of women’s basketball pioneers, from Elvera “Peps” Neuman to Cheryl Reeve and from Lindsay Whalen to Sylvia Fowles and Paige Bueckers.
If you enjoy his coverage of women’s basketball every Wednesday at The IX, you will love “Rare Gems: How Four Generations of Women Paved the Way for the WNBA.” Click the link below to order and enter MEGDAL30 at checkout.
Adding WNBA cities does not only benefit Cleveland, Detroit and Philadelphia. It impacts the players themselves, and Taylor Thierry is a great example of the benefit.
Born in Cleveland and the daughter of former Cleveland Browns defensive end John Thierry, Taylor was selected by Atlanta with the third-to-last pick in the 2025 WNBA Draft. Thierry is the latest 2025 pick to appear in a WNBA game this season. The guard/forward hybrid is the second player behind Sug Sutton in 2020 to appear in a game after going 36th or lower.
“Giving more players the opportunity to play at this level, you know, it’s hard,” Thierry said. “Staying on a team and a lot of great players don’t have the opportunity to play.”
A late third-round selection normally does not bode well for making a team, and then it’s a further climb to earn minutes. Thierry is on the second part of that story, working to get more time on the court, but as more teams enter, Thierry’s story will not be an exception.
Among those great players is former Maryland standout Shyanne Sellers, another Cleveland-area native, who competed against Thierry to earn a spot with two teams in the 2025 offseason before Atlanta cut the guard. With five more teams, Sellers and other players have the same chance as Thierry, Sutton and the handful of other late-round picks, or undrafted signings, who have made their mark in the WNBA.
The IX Basketball, a 24/7/365 women’s basketball newsroom powered by The Next
The IX Basketball: A basketball newsroom brought to you by The IX Sports. 24/7/365 women’s basketball coverage, written, edited and photographed by our young, diverse staff and dedicated to breaking news, analysis, historical deep dives and projections about the game we love.
Like it or not, Cleveland is part of that trajectory. When Gilbert and the Rock Entertainment Group paid a league record $250 million to secure the rights to the expansion team, it was the next step in the skyrocketing growth of the league. It showed that the league is not joking around.
“Just seeing where this league is growing and where it’s going and just, I think it’s going in the right direction,” Thierry said.
Cleveland already showed that it is a town that can handle the game. The city hosted the 2024 Final Four, which welcomed sold-out crowds to watch the South Carolina Gamecocks hoist the national championship trophy and Caitlin Clark play her last moments of college basketball. The city of Cleveland’s official X account was quick to remind Cunningham that Clark not only played there but enjoyed it, following the Fever guard’s first comments towards the two midwestern cities.
Sophie, your teammate doesn’t seem to think Cleveland is too bad!
We’re proud to have been chosen to host a WNBA team and any player who comes here will feel that legendary passion Cleveland sports fans show our teams! https://t.co/FVQ2NjkmdO pic.twitter.com/dVTCud6w7x
— City of Cleveland (@CityofCleveland) July 1, 2025
It is a small example of the fight that’s familiar to cities like Cleveland and Detroit, areas that were revitalized after industry left the populations behind. Sports are a piece of the puzzle in bringing Cleveland together, and now the WNBA is once again a piece of the conversation.
When Cleveland, Detroit and Philadelphia announced their successful expansion bids together, the phones of Sheldon, Hillmon and Thierry were abuzz with their own conversations. Family and friends from the Cleveland area, and other friends and fans they met along the way as they moved on to their college careers, poured in their excitement through texts, messages and calls.
“There’s been a lot of excitement just around the team in general,” Hillmon said about her own messages. “Some people bringing back memories of when the Rockers were around and kind of thinking about those stories.”
Back in 2003, when the Rockers ceased to be, Hillmon and Sheldon were three years old and Thierry was only a few months old. In the small chance that they went to a Rockers game, they were not old enough to remember it. Even so, their paths follow in the footsteps of the women who played in Gund Arena, wearing the black, silver and light blue of the Rockers.
Save 30% when you order “Becoming Caitlin Clark”
Howard Megdal’s newest book is here! “Becoming Caitlin Clark: The Unknown Origin Story of a Modern Basketball Superstar” captures both the historic nature of Clark’s rise and the critical context over the previous century that helped make it possible, including interviews with Clark, Lisa Bluder (who also wrote the foreword), C. Vivian Stringer, Jan Jensen, Molly Kazmer and many others.
Click the link below to order and enter MEGDAL30 at checkout.
In 2028, when Cleveland begins WNBA play, a new generation of sports fans in Northeast Ohio can support women’s basketball and strive to become like Hillmon, Sheldon, Thierry, Sellers and a growing list of players who called Cleveland home.
“Being a sports fan, as a kid, just growing up and cheering for the Cavs, the Indians and going to those games … and the Browns, my bad. I can’t forget the Browns,” Sheldon said. “I’m still a Cavs fan and Browns and Guardians fan today. I think just being able to support them and growing up in that atmosphere, a lot of people don’t know what it’s like unless you know, you’ve been to one of those games, but it truly is one of the best sports cities.”
“This is their year, right?” Sheldon said in a follow-up comment, hoping to make up for almost forgetting about the often-ridiculed NFL team of a well-known football town.
Well, maybe some jokes are valid.