S.F.’s Chase Center will host the 2027 WNBA All-Star Game, the league announced Tuesday, continuing the meteoric rise of the Valkyries. After selling out every home game the team has ever played since 2025 — 42 straight and counting — the Valkyries’ ownership group of Joe Lacob and Peter Guber, along with team President Jess Smith, have been summarily rewarded with the league’s tentpole event. The Kia WNBA Shooting Stars and State Farm WNBA 3-Point Contest will be held at Chase Center Friday, July 30, with the All-Star Game the following day. The league’s sixth annual WNBA Live presented by AWS will be staged at Moscone Center.
WNBA Commissioner Cathy Engelbert, as part of the announcement, called the Bay Area’s support of the team “remarkable,” while Smith said, “Hosting AT&T WNBA All-Star in only our third season is an incredible honor and a reflection of everything this fanbase, this region, and this organization have built together.”
The franchise’s business metrics have been prodigious, with a total revenue in 2025 of $70M — tops in the league and more than double the second most profitable team, the Fever. The Valkyries reached $20M in sponsorship revenue last season, $200,000 in merch sales per home game and 10,000 season tickets sold, the most ever for a W expansion franchise. On Monday night, they clinched a postseason berth, becoming the first expansion team to reach the playoffs in its inaugural two seasons.
This after former Warriors owner Chris Cohan wanted no part of the WNBA in the early 2000s.
“So that’s why there was never a team in San Francisco all these years,” former WNBA president Val Ackerman said earlier this season when discussing the league’s 30th anniversary. “Even though we were like, ‘God, this seems like such a good market.’ It’s near Stanford, which has a really good women’s basketball program. They had a pro soccer team there. It seemed to be kind of this progressive women supporting demographic. And we couldn’t, couldn’t get it to go.”
Eventually, Lacob and Guber — who bought the Warriors in 2010 — paid a $50M expansion fee to secure the Valkyries, which began play in 2025. In addition to landing the 2027 WNBA All-Star Game, the Bay Area has hosted Super Bowl LX in 2026, the FIFA World Cup in 2026, NBA All-Star Weekend in 2025 and will host the MLB All-Star Game in 2028.