{"id":667860,"date":"2026-05-14T01:09:10","date_gmt":"2026-05-14T01:09:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/667860\/"},"modified":"2026-05-14T01:09:10","modified_gmt":"2026-05-14T01:09:10","slug":"the-wnba-is-already-facing-public-criticism-for-its-officiating-changes","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/667860\/","title":{"rendered":"The WNBA Is Already Facing Public Criticism For Its Officiating Changes"},"content":{"rendered":"

We’re not even a full week into the 2026 WNBA<\/a> season, but it’s fair to say the league has an officiating problem on its hands.<\/p>\n

WNBA commissioner Cathy Engelbert talked about wanting to make officiating changes during All-Star Weekend last July. Her plan was to address the inconsistent calls and excessive physicality that teams were complaining about.<\/p>\n

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Well, the WNBA’s officiating crews might be going overboard this season when it comes to penalizing physical teams. Amber Harding pointed out that teams are averaging 22.3 fouls per game.<\/p>\n

Minnesota Lynx<\/a> coach Cheryl Reeve had no problem sounding off on the league’s officiating.<\/p>\n

“What I\u2019m confused about, being on the task force, we talked about unnecessary physicality. We didn\u2019t say we want to call marginal fouls. We never brought that up,” Reeve said<\/a>. “It takes a little bit of time for sure to calibrate, both them and us. \u2026 Obviously, we\u2019ll continue to work with the league on getting right because we\u2019re not the only team sitting here wondering why everything is a foul.”<\/p>\n

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\"MayMay 10, 2026; Washington, District of Columbia, USA; Washington Mystics<\/a> guard Sonia Citron<\/a> (22) argues with referee Toni Patillo (76) against the New York Liberty<\/a> during overtime at CareFirst Arena. Mandatory Credit: Geoff Burke-Imagn Images\u00a9 Geoff Burke-Imagn Images&period;Players are hoping for immediate changes.<\/p>\n

New York Liberty star Breanna Stewart<\/a> recnetly voiced her displeasure with the way games are being officiated.<\/p>\n

“It disrupts everyone\u2019s flow,” Stewart said after last Sunday’s overtime win over the Washington Mystics. “This game was 2 hours and 41 minutes long. That\u2019s insane\u2026 I know it\u2019s going to take time of, like, figuring out what\u2019s the standard of what\u2019s going to be called, but there\u2019s calls that are being called that are unnecessary on both sides, and then there\u2019s no flow.”<\/p>\n

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There’s no question the WNBA wants to cut down on excessive contact during games, but it shouldn’t come at the risk of damaging the product.<\/p>\n

We’ll see if the WNBA can find a middle ground sooner rather than later.<\/p>\n

This story was originally published by The Spun<\/a> on May 13, 2026, where it first appeared in the WNBA<\/a> section. Add The Spun as a Preferred Source by clicking here.<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"We’re not even a full week into the 2026 WNBA season, but it’s fair to say the league…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":667861,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[629],"tags":[246297,4657,49,48,11628,10946,736,3457,16602,86054,4649,82,737,630],"class_list":["post-667860","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-wnba","tag-amber-harding","tag-breanna-stewart","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-cathy-engelbert","tag-cheryl-reeve","tag-minnesota-lynx","tag-new-york-liberty","tag-officiating","tag-physicality","tag-sonia-citron","tag-sports","tag-washington-mystics","tag-wnba"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/667860","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=667860"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/667860\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/667861"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=667860"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=667860"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=667860"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}