{"id":327905,"date":"2025-12-03T11:41:09","date_gmt":"2025-12-03T11:41:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/327905\/"},"modified":"2025-12-03T11:41:09","modified_gmt":"2025-12-03T11:41:09","slug":"former-alabama-star-stands-up-for-the-wnba","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/327905\/","title":{"rendered":"Former Alabama star stands up for the WNBA"},"content":{"rendered":"

Los Angeles Sparks guard Sarah Ashlee Barker<\/a> stood up to an Internet troll on the court for the WNBA, then told the women\u2019s basketball detractor<\/a>: \u201cIf you think I was hard, imagine, like, my teammates, who are literally the greatest of the great.\u201d<\/p>\n

The former Spain Park High School and Alabama<\/a> star was half of a one-on-one game for the content creators 4 Fun Guys, who brought in a social-media boaster who said<\/a>: \u201cI really don\u2019t think there\u2019s a single WNBA player who can beat me in basketball.\u201d<\/p>\n

Before their one-on-one game, Barker answered simply, \u201cNo,\u201d when asked if she thought her opponent stood a chance against her.<\/p>\n

Barker won the game 11-2 in the video posted on the WNBA Got Game YouTube Channel<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Barker joined the Sparks as the ninth pick in the 2025 WNBA Draft<\/a> on April 14. She averaged 3.1 points and 1.9 rebounds in 34 games, with eight starts, as a WNBA rookie. She reached her career high with 15 points in Los Angeles\u2019 final game of the season.<\/p>\n

This winter, Barker will play in Athletes Unlimited Pro Basketball Season 5. Athletes Unlimited Pro Basketball will play its 2026 season across four weeks at Nashville Municipal Auditorium starting on Feb. 4. Each week, four captains will draft 10-player teams. The champion of the league is not a team, but a player. Players earn individual points through statistics, quarter wins, game wins and Game MVP selections.<\/p>\n

On Monday, Barker made her debut as a color analyst on ESPN+\u2019s televised coverage of the undefeated Alabama women\u2019s basketball team\u2019s 79-65 victory over Kennesaw State.<\/p>\n

Barker won Alabama\u2019s Miss Basketball Award for the 2019-20 season, her final campaign for Spain Park High School in Hoover. Barker paced the Jaguars to the AHSAA Class 7A girls\u2019 basketball title that season. Spain Park also won the state championship in 2018. Barker averaged 23.2 points, 9.9 rebounds, 2.7 assists and 1.9 steals per game during her prep career.<\/p>\n

Barker spent two seasons with Georgia before playing the past three with Alabama. During the 2024-25 campaign, Barker averaged 18.2 points, 6.3 rebounds, 3.9 assists and 2.0 steals in 28 games.<\/p>\n

In her final game for Alabama, Barker scored a school-record 45 points<\/a> in a 111-108 double-overtime loss to Maryland on March 24 in the NCAA women\u2019s basketball tournament.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Los Angeles Sparks guard Sarah Ashlee Barker stood up to an Internet troll on the court for the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":327906,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[73],"tags":[4647,2839,3031,99,166723,21,434],"class_list":{"0":"post-327905","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-wnba","8":"tag-ca","9":"tag-indiana-fever","10":"tag-los-angeles","11":"tag-sports","12":"tag-the-los-angles-sparks","13":"tag-united-states","14":"tag-wnba"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/327905","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=327905"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/327905\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/327906"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=327905"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=327905"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=327905"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}