{"id":43818,"date":"2025-08-04T04:49:08","date_gmt":"2025-08-04T04:49:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/43818\/"},"modified":"2025-08-04T04:49:08","modified_gmt":"2025-08-04T04:49:08","slug":"sale-of-sun-move-to-boston-now-in-wnbas-hands","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/43818\/","title":{"rendered":"Sale of Sun, move to Boston now in WNBA\u2019s hands"},"content":{"rendered":"

As reported in the Globe Saturday<\/a>, a group led by Pagliuca has reached a deal to buy the Connecticut Sun from the Mohegan Tribe for a record $325 million and move the team to Boston. The franchise wouldn\u2019t play in its new home until the 2027 season. Pagliuca also would contribute $100 million for a new practice facility in Boston for the team.<\/p>\n

\u201cCentral to our proposal is enabling the Sun to play in larger capacity arenas in New England,\u201d Pagliuca wrote. \u201cWe believe our record-setting offer and deep commitment to growing the WNBA in the region that is home to the most passionate basketball fans in the nation will significantly benefit the league, the team, and all its fans.\u201d<\/p>\n

Get Starting Point<\/p>\n

A guide through the most important stories of the morning, delivered Monday through Friday.<\/p>\n

The sale is pending approval of the league and its Board of Governors.<\/p>\n

\u201cOur offer is subject to obtaining the required league approvals, as is the case for all such transactions,\u201d Pagliuca wrote. \u201cThis approval has not been obtained thus far, and we cannot proceed without it. We will respect, cooperate with, and abide by all league rules and decisions on these matters.\u201d<\/p>\n

The league put out a statement Saturday, saying that moving a team was at the discretion of the WNBA and not individual franchises.<\/p>\n

\u201cRelocation decisions are made by the WNBA Board of Governors and not by individual teams,\u201d the league said in a statement.<\/p>\n

One source told the Globe the WNBA would rather save Boston as a potential expansion city in 2033. The league has already announced expansion<\/a> to Portland (Ore.), Toronto, Cleveland, Detroit, and Philadelphia over the next five years.<\/p>\n

There was also more news Sunday night that added a new wrinkle to the equation. The Hartford Courant<\/a> reported an investment group led by billionaire Marc Lasry, a former owner of the Milwaukee Bucks, is attempting to compete with Boston\u2019s offer to keep the team in Connecticut with a home at PeoplesBank Arena in Hartford. The Hartford group\u2019s bid also exceeds $300 million and includes plans to construct a new dedicated practice facility for the team. <\/p>\n

The Mohegan Tribe had a period of exclusivity to sell to the Boston group which has since expired, so both offers reportedly remain on the table.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"As reported in the Globe Saturday, a group led by Pagliuca has reached a deal to buy the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":43819,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[629],"tags":[49,48,5939,82,630],"class_list":["post-43818","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-wnba","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-celtics","tag-sports","tag-wnba"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/43818","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=43818"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/43818\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/43819"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=43818"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=43818"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=43818"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}