{"id":221536,"date":"2025-10-18T05:49:07","date_gmt":"2025-10-18T05:49:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/221536\/"},"modified":"2025-10-18T05:49:07","modified_gmt":"2025-10-18T05:49:07","slug":"wnbas-portland-fire-hire-alex-sarama-as-first-head-coach","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/221536\/","title":{"rendered":"WNBA&#8217;s Portland Fire hire Alex Sarama as first head coach"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><img decoding=\"async\" style=\"position:absolute;top:0;left:0;right:0;bottom:0;width:100%;height:100%;z-index:2\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/10\/85308042007-gty-2226068566.jpg\"\/><img decoding=\"async\" class=\"vidplayicon\" src=\"https:\/\/www.gannett-cdn.com\/appservices\/universal-web\/universal\/icons\/icon-play-alt-white.svg\" alt=\"play\" style=\"height:40px;margin:auto 18px auto 27px;width:40px\"\/><\/p>\n<p>CBA negotiations in WNBA offseason<\/p>\n<p>With CBA negotiations still going on, Sam Cardona-Norberg breaks down what to expect as the deadline approaches on October 31st.<\/p>\n<p>Sports Pulse<\/p>\n<p>The Portland Fire, one of two WNBA expansion teams scheduled to launch for the 2026 season, have hired Alex Sarama as head coach. The hiring was leaked on social media earlier this week before being made official on Friday.<\/p>\n<p>Sarama, who was assistant coach for the Cleveland Cavaliers, subscribes to an innovative training system \u2013 CLA (constraints-led approach) \u2013 popular in European basketball and will bring it to the WNBA. Sarama authored the book \u201cTransforming Basketball\u201d about the theory.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe opportunity to build something from the ground up is unique,\u201d Sarama said in a statement released by the team. \u201cAt the Fire, we\u2019re not just creating a team \u2014 we\u2019re redefining how the game is taught and played, through an approach centered around adaptability and supported by evidence-informed methodologies.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cFans can expect a dynamic, up-tempo style of play.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Sarama also coached the London Lions, Paris Basketball and the RipCity Remix.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cAlex represents the next generation of coaching,\u201d Fire general manager Vanja \u010cernivec said. \u201cHe\u2019s not just teaching the game, he\u2019s transforming it. His approach to player development, grounded in evidence-based science, research and creativity, aligns with our vision to make Portland a global hub for innovation in women\u2019s sports.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The Fire and Toronto Tempo will join the WNBA in expansion next season. Cleveland (2028), Detroit (2029) and Philadelphia (2030) will bring the league to 18 teams.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"CBA negotiations in WNBA offseason With CBA negotiations still going on, Sam Cardona-Norberg breaks down what to expect&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":221537,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[629],"tags":[461,49,48,7579,44,5317,1333,1345,14748,1334,82,29437,865,9210,1335,630,4134,4143],"class_list":["post-221536","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-wnba","tag-basketball","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-coaching","tag-news","tag-or","tag-overall","tag-overall-positive","tag-portland","tag-positive","tag-sports","tag-sports-coaching-u0026-training","tag-sports-news","tag-training","tag-u0026","tag-wnba","tag-womens","tag-womens-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/221536","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=221536"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/221536\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/221537"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=221536"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=221536"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=221536"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}