{"id":859735,"date":"2026-09-25T03:42:14","date_gmt":"2026-09-25T03:42:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/859735\/"},"modified":"2026-09-25T03:42:14","modified_gmt":"2026-09-25T03:42:14","slug":"two-iconic-wnba-chapters-come-to-a-close","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/859735\/","title":{"rendered":"Two iconic WNBA chapters come to a close"},"content":{"rendered":"

The GIST: A thrilling 330 regular-season games later, the WNBA first-round matchups are officially set. While you wait for that aforementioned playoff preview and start planning your women\u2019s basketball bracket<\/a>, let\u2019s reminisce about two iconic chapters that are coming to a close.<\/p>\n

\u2600\ufe0f The Connecticut Sun\u2019s grand finale: The Nutmeg State has been synonymous with women\u2019s hoops since, well, forever. Some of the best the W had to offer \u2014 Tina Charles, Jonquel Jones, and Alyssa Thomas among others \u2014 called Connecticut home during their careers, a legacy that will live on long after last night\u2019s season finale<\/a>: The franchise will relocate to Houston and rebrand as the Comets in 2027.<\/p>\n

The Sun authored a myriad of historic WNBA firsts<\/a> during their 23-year existence, anchored in a community that truly embraced the franchise. The sun may be setting on this iteration of women\u2019s basketball in New England, but it\u2019s only a matter of time<\/a> before it rises again.<\/p>\n

\ud83d\udc51 Nneka Ogwumike retires after 15 seasons: No one\u2019s impacted the WNBA quite like Ogwumike. As president of the players\u2019 union, the 36-year-old was instrumental in negotiating two landmark CBAs over her decade-long tenure. She\u2019s always been a leader, an advocate, and a mentor \u2014 and truly beloved<\/a> by her peers because of it.<\/p>\n

And she was equally as impressive on the court. The 2012 No. 1 draft pick is one of the W\u2019s most accomplished players, stacking a championship, points, and accolades over her 15-year career. Ogumike\u2019s \u201cgrateful\u201d for all of it<\/a> \u2014 us too, madam president.What\u2019s next? The only certainty is that she\u2019ll play in Project B, the global five-on-five league that debuts in January. After that, who knows where her leadership acumen will take her, but we hear the WNBA front office has an opening<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The GIST: A thrilling 330 regular-season games later, the WNBA first-round matchups are officially set. While you wait…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":859736,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[73],"tags":[99,434],"class_list":["post-859735","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-wnba","tag-sports","tag-wnba"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/859735","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=859735"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/859735\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/859736"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=859735"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=859735"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=859735"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}