The Sparks retired Parker\u2019s jersey<\/a> earlier this season.<\/p>\n\u201cIt\u2019s super special,\u201d Parker said ahead of Monday\u2019s game. \u201cI\u2019m grateful to join that crew and it\u2019ll be really cool to bring my grandkids back and be like, \u2018You know your grandma could hoop.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n
Monday\u2019s festivities highlighted the impact that Parker made in Chicago and in women\u2019s basketball. Celebrities like Jennifer Hudson and Common made courtside appearances for the game. Fans donned T-shirts decked out in depictions of Parker and offered up a standing ovation when she took the court at halftime with her wife Anna, daughter Lailaa and son Airr.<\/p>\n
Former teammate and current Phoenix Mercury star Kahleah Copper flew in on an off day to deliver a speech during the halftime ceremony.<\/p>\n
\u201cLegend, champ, game changer, icon, leader, GOAT \u2014 that\u2019s how I describe you,\u201d Copper said. \u201cYou gave this game everything. Your time. Your body. Your heart. You didn\u2019t just play the game. You set records, you broke barriers and you left a mark that stats can\u2019t fully compare. I\u2019m living proof.\u201d<\/p>\n
Few players impacted the style of play in the WNBA more than Parker, who revolutionized the concept of the stretch-4 in the women\u2019s game.<\/p>\n
![\"Chicago](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/CTC-Z-CT-SkyMercury4037_181077339.jpg\")
Chicago Sky player Candace Parker after winning the WNBA championship against the Phoenix Mercury on Sunday, Oct. 17, 2021, at Wintrust Arena in Chicago. (Stacey Wescott\/Chicago Tribune)<\/p>\n
Parker brought a unique blend to the court, throwing down dunks and slinging 3-pointers with a versatility that was well-matched for the league\u2019s shift toward the perimeter. Over a 16-year stretch in the league, she forged a new mold for power forwards that has since produced top stars like A\u2019ja Wilson, Breanna Stewart and Napheesa Collier.<\/p>\n
Most of Parker\u2019s career was defined by firsts \u2014 the first girl to dunk in a high school game in Illinois, the first woman to dunk in the NCAA tournament, the first WNBA player to win MVP and Rookie of the Year in the same season.<\/p>\n
Parker drew anticipation at every juncture of her career. When she announced her commitment to Tennessee in 2003, she became the first woman to have her college decision televised nationally. Four years later, she was an automatic No. 1 overall draft pick for the Los Angeles Sparks.<\/p>\n
Although Parker was destined for dominance on the court, the path toward basketball stardom was unclear as a young hooper in Naperville. Parker turned 10 years old in 1996, a pivotal year that marked the inaugural season of the WNBA. She didn\u2019t grow up going to Sky games because the franchise wasn\u2019t brought to Chicago until 2006, two years after Parker had left for Knoxville.<\/p>\n
Even in her senior year of high school, Parker wavered publicly on whether she would play professionally after college. The league was young. The sport was changing. For even the most elite players, the dream of becoming a professional women\u2019s basketball player was still just that \u2014 a dream.<\/p>\n
That didn\u2019t stop those around Parker from believing in her future. In her junior year of high school, Naperville Central basketball coach Andy Nussbaum played an April Fool\u2019s Day prank by announcing over the school PA system that Parker planned to forego her high school eligibility to sign with the New York Liberty. Nussbaum found the joke took a while to land because much of the student body accepted the statement as fully believable.<\/p>\n
For Parker, the output always matched the hype. She won a pair of state titles with Naperville Central before heading to Tennessee, where she won consecutive titles under Pat Summitt before giving up her final year of eligibility to prepare for the 2008 Olympics. In her first year as a professional, Parker won an Olympic gold medal, Rookie of the Year and MVP \u2014 all while pregnant with her daughter Lailaa, who was born in May 2009.<\/p>\n
![\"Candace](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/CTC-L-sky-aces-0825-1.jpg\")
Candace Parker towels sit on chairs before the Chicago Sky play the Las Vegas Aces at Wintrust Arena on Monday, Aug. 25, 2025, in Chicago. (Armando L. Sanchez\/Chicago Tribune)<\/p>\n
Over the next 12 years, Parker carved out a dominant role in Los Angeles despite longstanding dysfunction within the Sparks, finally leading the franchise to a title in 2016. She won Defensive Player of the Year in her final season with the Sparks in 2020, capping off a 13-year tenure with the team where she was drafted.<\/p>\n
Parker came to Chicago in 2021 with a mission: bring home a WNBA championship. Despite finishing the regular season with a .500 record, Parker helped to power the Sky to an underdog run as a No. 6 seed. The next year, Parker anchored a Sky team that finished with a franchise-best 26-10 regular season.<\/p>\n
Although she ultimately played fewer than 80 games in a Sky jersey, Parker\u2019s selection for jersey retirement reflects the impact she made by lifting the franchise to its first title. She averaged 13.2 points, 8.5 rebounds, 4.3 assists and 1.1 blocks over two seasons in Chicago, earning two All-Star selections and one All-WNBA first team selection.<\/p>\n
Parker finished her career in Las Vegas, where she won a third and final title in 2023 while sidelined with a foot injury. The lingering effects of that injury ultimately resulted in Parker\u2019s retirement after a year-long attempt to return to the game.<\/p>\n
This is a pivotal year in commemoration for the Sky, who retired the jersey of long-time sharpshooter Allie Quigley<\/a> last month. Parker and Quigley composed two pillars at the heart of the 2021 championship team. Point guard Courtney Vandersloot \u2014 who returned to the Sky this season \u2014 will unquestionably join the pair in the rafters upon her own retirement at some point in the future.<\/p>\nFor now, the jerseys of Quigley and Parker will symbolize mirrored legacies in the Sky\u2019s 20-year history \u2014 a pair of local stars who set a standard for success in Chicago women\u2019s hoops.<\/p>\n
Originally Published: August 25, 2025 at 8:58 PM CDT<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A legacy always stands stronger when it\u2019s cemented at home. Candace Parker proved that point four years ago…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":110550,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[73],"tags":[72497,3028,438,72496,99,434,13017,2088],"class_list":["post-110549","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-wnba","tag-2021-wnba-championship","tag-candace-parker","tag-chicago-sky","tag-jersey-number-retirement","tag-sports","tag-wnba","tag-wnba-basketball","tag-womens-basketball"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/110549","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=110549"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/110549\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/110550"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=110549"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=110549"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=110549"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}