When Houston was left out of the WNBA’s latest round of expansion in June, league commissioner Cathy Engelbert praised Houston Rockets owner Tilman Fertitta as “a great supporter of the WNBA” and said the league will “stay tuned” on possibly bring a franchise back to the city that birthed the Houston Comets, the WNBA’s first great franchise.

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Now, ESPN reports that Fertitta is having “substantive talks” about buying the Connecticut Sun and moving the team to Houston.

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The Sun has been a franchise in flux with the Boston Globe reporting in August that the owners of the Boston Celtics planned to buy the team for $325 million and move it to Boston. The Hartford Courant also reported that Marc Lasry, who formerly owned the Milwaukee Bucks, was interested in making a bid for the team and would move it to Hartford. However, the WNBA will not allow teams to relocate without input from the league, which effectively blocked those potential deals.

Enter Houston.

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ESPN cites a source that says Rockets ownership has increased its offer to buy the team, but the negotiations are still open to other bidders.

The Connecticut Sun, which has been owned by the Mohegan tribe since 2003 when it purchased the Orlando Miracle for $10 million and moved the franchise, had been one of the WNBA’s most successful teams, making a run of eight straight postseason appearances before losing its entire starting lineup and finishing 11-33 this season.

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Fertitta and the Rockets were in the running for an expansion team, but the league opted to go with Cleveland, Detroit and Philadelphia instead, with all three ownership groups paying a $250 million expansion fee.

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The Comets were one of the original WNBA franchises and won the league’s first four titles led by Naismith Basketball Hall of Famers Cynthia Cooper, Sheryl Swoopes and Tina Thompson. However, then-Rockets owner Les Alexander sold the team to Hilton Koch for $10 million in 2007. Two years later, Koch put the team up for sale for $10 million but couldn’t find a buyer. The team was disbanded in 2009.

Talks to buy a WNBA team comes at an interesting time for the league. While the WNBA has never been more popular, it is locked in a battle with the players as both sides try to negotiate a new collective bargaining agreement. On Thursday, the players association, which is led by former Houston high school star Nneka Ogwumike, announced that its members have voted to authorize a strike “when necessary” if a deal can’t be reached. After some extensions, the current collective bargaining agreement ends Jan. 9.

This article originally published at Rockets, Tilman Fertitta in talks to buy WNBA’s Connecticut Sun, move team to Houston, report says.