By Thomas Schlachter
(CNN) — With confetti falling from the rafters, a boisterous Brooklyn crowd bellowing and the victorious New York Liberty celebrating, the curtain fell on the 2024 WNBA season.
But this was no ordinary year for women’s hoops.
From record-breaking rookies to never-before-seen viewing figures culminating in a pulsating, back-and-forth finals that went the distance, the 2024 season is one that will shape the future of the sport.
‘The perfect storm’
The latest edition of the WNBA season had all the hallmarks for booming success, with all the pieces falling into place almost serendipitously.
“It was this perfect storm of the league growing exponentially, and then you hit this season where the college game really gave the WNBA a boost,” veteran WNBA analyst LaChina Robinson told CNN Sport.
Rookies such as Caitlin Clark and Angel Reese had forged incredible fanbases from their time playing at the collegiate level and were now able to perform alongside and against WNBA stars who had become household names and brands.
An increase in investment, combined with the on-court excellence, was also an important catalyst that helped ride the ever-growing wave of interest in the league, the analyst said.
“The product has always been great, but it’s taken the decision-makers from a number of standpoints to say, ‘You know what, we’re going to bet on women, and we’re going to invest in women’s sports in the ways that we invest in men’s sports,’” Robinson said. “And that goes for brands, that goes for, even, ownership.”
These investments include providing WNBA fans with increased coverage of the league. Fans now have the opportunity to watch a variety of games on a variety of different outlets – a far cry from years gone by.
Covering the WNBA since 2008, Robinson has been able to see the league grow firsthand. She can remember being among a handful of experts following the league when starting her media career to now seeing packed press boxes across the W.
Robinson recounts covering the 2015 WNBA Finals – also featuring the Minnesota Lynx, who agonizingly lost this year’s Finals to the Liberty – and remembers an arena with empty seats dotted around the lower bowl. Fast forward to this year and that was certainly not the case.
“Did I see this kind of change happening, maybe this quickly, if you will? Sure, I believed in it, but to actually be living in it right now is really just, I don’t know, it’s really hard to put into words,” Robinson says.
“I’m just grateful for the people who were courageous enough and bold enough to sit in those brand and marketing meetings and say we believe in women’s sports. We not only think that this is great for sports and great for women, but this is a smart investment.
“I credit the strength and the resilience of players going back 28 years that were pushing for everything that they deserve.”
Current WNBA players are equally as grateful for those who came before them and laid the foundations for the league.
“There’s people that came before (the 2024 rookie class) that allowed this to happen because there’s no viewership without the people that came before me and them,” three-time WNBA champion and two-time Olympic gold medalist Chelsea Gray told CNN in August.
Phoenix Mercury rookie Charisma Osborne shares a similar sentiment with CNN Sport.
“Just seeing from (my teammates’) perspective how much things have changed and how much the game has grown, the WNBA has grown, has been super cool … from chartered flights to having our own practice facilities.”
Teams are now beginning to invest and move to their own state of the art practice facilities. In 2023, the Aces became the first ever WNBA team to relocate to an exclusive facility when they moved into their new 64,000-square-foot home in Nevada.
“It was definitely really interesting to hear their perspective and I think it just gave me the perspective to be extremely grateful for how far the league has come,” Osborne says.
Record-breaking numbers, on and off the court
This year has seen more eyeballs on the WNBA than ever before. Attendance was up 48% from 2023, sellouts increased by 242% and more people tuned into the average nationally televised WNBA game this season (657,000) than in any season in the 21st century.
And with viewership skyrocketing, records on the court began to also tumble.
“Honestly, for the players, that’s the easy part,” Robinson says of stars performing with added expectations in sold-out arenas. “They’ve delivered for so long and been delivering at a high level in terms of the play on the floor, I think they invite the moment.”
Osborne was blown away by the attention surrounding the WNBA during her first season in the league.
“Just seeing so much talk about the WNBA in terms of social media – just on ESPN or whatever sports networks there were – it was really cool to see all of that, especially coming from college straight to the WNBA,” the rookie out of UCLA said.
One of the reasons for the added attention around the league this season was the hype surrounding the 2024 draft class.
Clark and Reese came into the WNBA with expectations at an all-time high. The pair had dominated at the collegiate level and fans were waiting to see if this could translate to the WNBA.
As the number of records falling increased, so did the scrutiny surrounding the pair.
Clark and Reese had begun to be billed as adversaries and this was a narrative throughout their rookie campaign. The June 23 game between Clark’s Indiana Fever and Reese’s Chicago Sky was the most viewed game on ESPN in 23 years with 2.3 million viewers tuning in to the matchup, per the network.
But the pair lived up to the weighty expectations – if not surpassed them.
Clark took home the Rookie of the Year award and was named to the All-WNBA first team – the first rookie to do so since 2008. The Fever superstar also set rookie season records for both points and three-pointers made and became the first rookie to get a triple-double. As well as scoring, Clark also set the all-time WNBA league record for assists in a single season and the most dimes in a single game.
Reese missed the end of her rookie season through injury, but while healthy, the Sky star imposed her dominance on the court on an almost nightly basis. The 22-year-old set the single-season all-time mark in rebounds – before A’ja Wilson surpassed her while she was out – led the league in rebounds per game (averaging 13.1) and set a record with 15 consecutive double-doubles.
Osborne credited these phenoms and the rest of her rookie class with helping grow women’s basketball throughout the season.
“It’s been super amazing to see how much attention that this class has brought to the game and, obviously, there’s a lot of new fans because of this class.”
Next season will see an equally coveted draft class enter the league. Fronted by UConn’s irrepressibly talented Paige Bueckers, WNBA fans will be greeted to a draft featuring players who can already be classed as household names.
Not only did the rookies deliver in 2024, but veteran stars of the league also lived up to the billing – none more so than Wilson.
The now three-time MVP winner had a season for the ages. The Aces star broke the single-season scoring records for points per game and total points as she dominated on offense. Not satisfied with that, Wilson also broke Reese’s aforementioned record for total rebounds.
“We’ve never seen a player hitting the marks that she’s hitting right now,” Robinson said about Wilson’s historic performances.
“We can talk about the great 27 years of basketball that have come before it, but if anything, her performance this year speaks to the fact that the game is continuing to elevate beyond what we ever thought.”
With players breaking records on an almost nightly basis, it is no wonder merchandise sales increased by 601% from the previous season.
The next generation
Robinson says that an increase in visibility on social media has elevated the potential of the WNBA and that the next generation of women’s basketball players are now able to see their role models on a consistent basis.
“The women that are coming into the league now, they’ve had the WNBA their whole lives. And not only have they had the WNBA their whole lives, but they’ve had it right in their hands where they could watch YouTube highlights, where they can watch games on digital, where they could go in the backyard and pretend to be Maya Moore,” said Robinson.
For Osborne, this rings true. The rookie has been able to learn from WNBA icons she grew up watching – such as Diana Taurasi and Brittney Griner – and can now call them work colleagues.
“It’s kind of crazy to even say that those people are my teammates,” Osborne explains. “It’s kind of nice to have people that lead by example, so that when you have to do that, you know exactly what you should be doing.”
Osborne now hopes to also be able to help inspire the next generation.
“It’s kind of surreal. You grow up and you’re like, ‘Oh, that could be me one day,’ and then next thing you know it’s that day and it’s you.
“Hopefully, all of us are continuing to inspire young girls – we were once them. Hopefully, we’ll be able to keep inspiring them to come into the league and continue to support and join. It’s super exciting and kind of crazy to say that.”
The league is set to expand from 12 to 15 teams – with rumors of more circulating – and will only provide more opportunities for young girls looking to watch and play basketball going forward.
The Golden State Valkyries are set to join the league in 2025 and Gray, a Bay Area native, can barely contain her excitement at the upcoming expansion.
“We have a team coming to the Bay Area … this is what I’ve been hoping and waiting for since I was a young girl,” she said. “And so now, somebody that looks like me or is growing up in that area is now able to grow up with a WNBA team right in their backyard.”
Not only does the WNBA have an important future on the court, but Robinson believes its place off the court is equally as significant.
“The WNBA has always been on the right side of history,” Robinson explains. “When you look at the track record of this league, they’ve always been in support of human and civil rights and unafraid to speak on those topics unapologetically.
“The WNBA has always been a safe place for any and everyone, come one and come all, no matter what shape, what size, what background, what culture.”
With the league set for expansion, numbers continuing to rise and the profile of players only getting bigger, the WNBA’s influence on and off the court doesn’t look to be slowing down anytime soon.
“I just feel like this league is exemplary of what women are, what they can be, their strength, their power, their influence,” Robinson concludes.
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