{"id":372376,"date":"2026-10-13T22:20:28","date_gmt":"2026-10-13T22:20:28","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/372376\/"},"modified":"2026-10-13T22:20:28","modified_gmt":"2026-10-13T22:20:28","slug":"wnba-finds-solution-to-dreams-3500-seat-arena-finals-debacle","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/372376\/","title":{"rendered":"WNBA finds solution to Dream’s 3,500-seat arena finals debacle"},"content":{"rendered":"

Atlanta\u2019s WNBA Finals dream<\/a> was answered.<\/p>\n

Game 3 and Game 4 of the WNBA Finals between the No. 2 Valkyries and No. 4 Dream<\/a> will be played at State Farm Arena, the league announced Tuesday after making adjustments to the schedule.<\/p>\n

Based on the original slate of games, the Dream\u2019s hopes of playing at the big arena, which has a capacity of 17,000, did not seem feasible due to conflicts<\/a> with a Sombr concert on Oct. 22 and a regular-season game for the NBA\u2019s Hawks on Oct. 24.<\/p>\n

\"TheThe Atlanta Dream celebrate after defeating the New York Liberty in game three of the SemiFinals of the WNBA Playoffs at Barclays Center on Friday, October 9, 2026, in New York. Getty Images<\/p>\n

The WNBA stated Game 3 has been moved a day earlier to Wednesday, Oct. 21 at 8 p.m. ET, and Game 4 on Saturday will be moved to a 1 p.m. ET tip-off rather than its initial start of 3:30 p.m. ET.<\/p>\n

To accommodate the Dream, the Hawks agreed to push back the start time of their matchup against the Rockets by a half hour for a new tip-off time of 8:30 p.m. ET.<\/p>\n

The announcement saves the Dream from likely having to host at its regular home of Gateway Center Arena in College Park that only holds 3,500 fans in their first Finals berth since 2013.<\/p>\n

Atlanta also looked into other venue options if they had no luck securing State Farm Arena, including Georgia Tech\u2019s basketball arena, McCamish Pavilion, which holds 8,600 fans.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is what the players and the fans deserve,\u201d Dream majority owner Larry Gottesdiener said in a statement.\u00a0\u201cWe are grateful to all of the stakeholders who worked together to resolve the conflicts and make this happen.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"Wide-angleA general view of State Farm Arena is seen during the second quarter of a game between the Atlanta Dream and the Las Vegas Aces in Atlanta, Georgia, on Sunday, May 17, 2026. Getty Images<\/p>\n

If the best-of-seven series goes beyond five games, the Dream still will have a conflict in hosting Game 6 on Oct. 29. The Hawks are set to host the Cavaliers that night for a 7 p.m. tip-off.<\/p>\n

The initial reports about venue conflict came just days after the Dream announced that they would be playing all home games at State Farm Arena in 2027.<\/p>\n

Atlanta played nine total games at the arena this season, including six regular-season games and all three of their home playoff matchups.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe are grateful for the efforts made by numerous stakeholders, including the Dream, the Valkyries, the Hawks, State Farm Arena, and NBC Sports and USA Sports,\u201d said WNBA commissioner Cathy Engelbert in a statement. \u201cThe change of venue dramatically expands the seating capacity and ensures that the Dream will be able to provide an extraordinary atmosphere for the first WNBA Finals game to be played in the Atlanta market since 2013. We are pleased that thousands more fans across the Southeast region will have the opportunity to experience the ultimate WNBA action \u2013 the WNBA Finals \u2013 in person.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Finals are set to start on Saturday at 3:30 p.m. ET at Chase Center in San Francisco.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Atlanta\u2019s WNBA Finals dream was answered. Game 3 and Game 4 of the WNBA Finals between the No.…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":372377,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[68626,68628,9,11,10,49,51,50,319,11452,27057],"class_list":["post-372376","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-new-york","tag-atlanta-dream","tag-golden-state-valkyries","tag-new-york","tag-new-york-headlines","tag-new-york-news","tag-new-york-state","tag-new-york-state-headlines","tag-new-york-state-news","tag-sports","tag-wnba","tag-wnba-playoffs"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/372376","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=372376"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/372376\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/372377"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=372376"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=372376"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=372376"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}