Before Unrivaled crowned the No. 2 seed Mist BC champion at Sephora Arena in Medley, Florida as the squad defeated the No. 1 seed Phantom BC 80-74, the 3×3 basketball league took over the Barclays Center in Brooklyn on March 2 for the semifinals in front of a sold-out crowd of 18,261. Watching from courtside were Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame first-ballot inductees Carmelo Anthony, Sue Bird, and Lisa Leslie.

In the opening contest, the No. 1 seed Phantom took down the No. 6 Vinyl 83-75, followed by the Mist overcoming a 16-point deficit to defeat the No. 5 Breeze 73-69. New York Liberty star Breanna Stewart scored a game-high 23 points for the Mist and Arike Ogunbowale added 21 on her 29th birthday.

“I wrote 29 things I was thankful for this morning, and it’s just like being able to play basketball for a living,” said Ogunbowale, who plays for the WNBA’s Dallas Wings and is a two-time WNBA All-Star Game MVP.

“Like people get off work and go play basketball as an extracurricular, but I wake up, and all I have to do is work out, play basketball, and I get paid a good amount of money, so it’s definitely a blessing to be able to wake up and play basketball and be healthy and play with this group.”

Stewart, a co-founder of Unrivaled, said the game being held at the Barclays had a special meaning for her because it’s the Liberty’s basketball residence.  

“This is my home,” she said. “This is where I want to be and to be able to celebrate that with all of the fans, with my Misties … You could feel the excitement whether it was cheering for us or for the Breeze. But we know down the stretch everybody was cheering for us. Being back at Barclays (Center)  was really exciting. It’s something that, once I knew it was happening, I was like, ‘My team has to be here.’ I want to be playing in this game.”

But Unrivaled playing their semifinals in Brooklyn was more than a doubleheader. It was a celebration of women’s basketball at the home of the 2024 WNBA champions. With the scheduled May 8 start of this year’s WNBA season in doubt as players and owners have yet to agree on a new collective bargaining agreement, it’s uncertain when women’s basketball will be played at Barclays Center again. But for one night in Brooklyn, Unrivaled reminded us how far women’s basketball has come.  

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