By Amy Tennery
NEW YORK (Reuters) – Top talent from the WNBA will be on display when the novel 3×3 basketball league Unrivaled tips off on Friday in Miami, meeting the demand from players for more options to play stateside amid surging interest in the women’s game.
Players in the top-flight WNBA have long flocked to leagues in Turkey, Russia, China and beyond during the winter off season to supplement their salaries which are much lower than their male counterparts.
But Unrivaled has emerged as an appealing alternative, players told reporters ahead of the debut season, with a reported average salary of $222,222 for the eight-week season and amenities that include on-site childcare.
“With the WNBA not being at the level where we want yet, I will go for the compensation. But I will also go for the best setup for me to thrive as a basketball player and get better,” said the German-American two-time All-Star Satou Sabally.
“And as of now, that is Unrivaled – hands down.”
The six-team, 36-player league gives another option for players who want to keep their competitive edge for the six-month-long WNBA off-season without traveling abroad, said Unrivaled President Alex Bazzell.
“These players want to compete, they want to build their games,” he told Reuters. “It’s really just providing more comfort and making sure that they have all the ample pieces around them to maximize their time as professional women.”
As the husband of Unrivaled co-founder Napheesa Collier, a four-time All-Star with the Minnesota Lynx, Bazzell has seen firsthand the challenges: Collier previously played for clubs in France and Turkey, and in 2022 gave birth to their first child.
“It touches on some of the own problems that we were living through,” he said.
“But really it was looking at just trying to problem solve holistically for the rest of the athletes instead of sitting here and complaining about the way things are, why not build a solution for the way things should be?”
The league, which picked up technology and presenting partner Samsung ahead of the debut season, set conservative goals for its opening season, settling on an 850-capacity facility that suits the smaller 3×3 format.
Bazzell said 99% of the games were sold out a week before tipoff.
The league, which also counts twice WNBA MVP Breanna Stewart as co-founder, is launching at the “perfect moment,” Bazzell said, with ratings soaring in the top-flight WNBA last season.
‘A DIFFERENT LOOK’
The issue of playing overseas made headlines three years ago when the 10-times All-Star Brittney Griner was jailed in Russia for several months on drug charges – for carrying medicinal cannabis – on her way to play for UMMC Ekaterinburg.
This off-season she will compete with Unrivaled club Phantom BC, with her wife and infant son flying out to watch her play.
“They’re trying to give us a different look and a different feel on how we can bring everybody together in one spot and it be ran in a way where it’s beneficial for us on the court, off the court,” Griner, who plays for the WNBA’s Phoenix Mercury, told reporters.
“They’re really pouring in a lot. And that’s what kind of excited me the most, honestly. And I just had to be a part of this.”
(Reporting by Amy Tennery in New York, editing by Pritha Sarkar)
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