25 things to know about the WNBA now that a Philly team is on the horizon

If Philadelphia’s WNBA franchise stays on target and begins play in 2030 as planned, then its first draft pick out of college that year probably just finished 11th grade. Wonder who it’ll be.

So many things will happen — basketball leadership will be hired, an arena and facilities will be (fingers crossed) constructed, and a team name will be decided on — long before that young lady becomes a professional. In the meantime, here are 25 things to mark the arrival of the WNBA to Philadelphia.

1. The Philadelphia team will be the WNBA’s 18th franchise and join in the league’s 34th year. By comparison, in their 34th seasons, the NBA had 22 teams (1979-80), the NFL had 12 teams (1953), Major League Baseball had 16 teams (1936) and the NHL had six teams (1950-51).

2. The W currently has 13 teams divided into two conferences — six in the East, seven in the West. The league increased its schedule this year from 40 to 44 games and upped the length of its championship series from five games to seven.

3. As of midweek, New York (+145) was favored to repeat as champion followed by Minnesota (+240), followed by Indiana (+500). Minnesota, featuring league-leading scorer Napheesa Collier (24.4 ppg), had the best record at 14-2.

4. Indiana’s Caitlin Clark was averaging 18.2 points and was second in the league with 8.9 assists. Nike this week produced a sneaker line with Clark — at a cost of $190 a pair — which sold out in minutes.

5. The league has been criticized after incidents in which opposing players were excessively rough toward Clark, last season’s rookie of the year. Others, though, see it as part of the hazing period that superstar college players often must endure early in their pro careers regardless of sport. Rugged play is one thing. Cheap shots are another.

6. Average attendance was 6,615 in 2023 — the year before Clark came into the league — but jumped to 9,807 last season, a 48% increase. Entering the week, average attendance was 10,849 for the 2025 season, up 10% from 2024.

7. Philadelphia’s expansion fee is $250 million, definitely a hefty number but nowhere near the $1.2 billion the Utah franchise paid to join the NHL in 2024. Seems like basketball in Philly is a more natural fit than hockey in Provo, but that’s debatable.

» READ MORE: Cathy Engelbert’s hometown finally gets a WNBA team, and she finally admits she’s happy about it

8. Principal owner Josh Harris bought the 76ers in 2011 for $280 million (about $400 million today).

9. “Everyone has their ownership style,” Harris said at the news conference announcing Philadelphia’s WNBA franchise. “Mine is to hire incredible people and then hold them accountable … and then Philly holds all of us accountable.”

10. Only once in the 27 combined seasons Harris has owned the Sixers, New Jersey Devils, and Washington Commanders has his team made it as far as the conference championship round. Last season, the Commanders made it to the NFC title game before getting rolled by the Eagles.

11. A reminder that the Sixers were not Philadelphia’s first NBA franchise. The Warriors played here from 1946 to 1962 before moving to California. The Syracuse Nationals filled the vacuum by moving here for the 1963-64 season.

12. St. Joseph’s product Natasha Cloud is a nine-year veteran who is now with the New York Liberty. Former Villanova star Maddy Siegrist hasn’t played since June 11 because of a knee injury. She is expected back at some point this season, which for Dallas ends on Sept. 11.

13. Linda Page (Dobbins), Dawn Staley (Dobbins), and Shawnetta Stewart (University City) are widely considered the greatest girls’ high school players in Philadelphia history. But let’s not forget Audenreid’s Shayla Smith, who broke Stewart’s city scoring record for girls in February. Smith will play at Penn State in the fall.

14. Stewart played at Rutgers in 1997-2000 and finished 10th in scoring in school history, with 1,346 points. She was an honorable mention All-American in 2000 when she helped the Scarlet Knights reach the Final Four.

15. Philadelphia is one of five cities getting an WNBA franchise over the next five seasons. Toronto and Portland will begin play in 2026 with Cleveland rejoining in 2028 and Detroit rejoining in 2029.

16. The Cleveland Rockers were one of the league’s original eight teams, but they folded after the 2003 season. Detroit had a franchise from 1998 to 2009 but moved to Tulsa (2010-15) and then Dallas (2016-present).

17. Indiana guard Sophie Cunningham said she wished the league would have gotten into Miami, Nashville, or Kansas City instead of going back to cities that had previously failed.

18. “I’m not so sure what the thought process is there, but at the end of the day, you want to make sure that you’re not expanding our league too fast,” Cunningham said to reporters before a game on Tuesday. “I think that’s also another thing. It’s kind of a hard decision-making situation. But man, I don’t know how excited people are to be going to Detroit or [Cleveland].”

19. It’ll be interesting to see whether Staley gets involved. Staley grew up in North Philly, played at Dobbins, was a five-time WNBA All-Star as a player, won three Olympic gold medals, coached at Temple, and has won three national titles as South Carolina’s coach. She has cheesesteak grease running through her veins and leans frequently on her Philadelphia roots. As Inquirer sports writer Gina Mizell documented in May, Staley has said, “I don’t want to come back and coach, OK? I want ownership.”

» READ MORE: Dawn Staley again advocates for the WNBA in Philly, but not to be the coach: ‘I want ownership’

20. Linda Page’s name has come up a few times during the celebration of Philadelphia getting its first WNBA team. So let’s close with some quick history/trivia.

21. While at Dobbins, Page scored 100 points in a game against Mastbaum in 1981 to break the city scholastic record held by Wilt Chamberlain, who had 90 in a game for Overbrook in 1955. A month earlier, Page scored 87 points in a game, and her coach was excoriated for allowing her to run up such a huge number.

22. “The people who criticized me didn’t realize that Linda made our league known throughout the country, not to mention her and our school,” coach Tony Coma told the Daily News’ Ted Silary after Page scored 100. “They failed to see the forest for the trees. Linda Page is a one-in-a-million player. She’s a Wilt Chamberlain to the girls’ game. I don’t care what people think about me.”

23. Page averaged 48.2 points as a high school senior. Wilt averaged 44.5. “During the whole [100-point game],” she once recalled, “I was more or less unconscious. I can’t remember one detail. Can’t remember one move.”

24. Page, nicknamed “Hawkeye,” then had a terrific career at North Carolina State. She scored 2,307 points in three seasons and then played professionally in Europe. Page then worked in the criminal justice system, where she joked that mentoring troubled youngsters meant that “Hawkeye learned to give assists.”

25. Page died of a heart attack in 2011 at age 48. She still is all over the Atlantic Coast Conference record book, and still holds the mark for most points in an ACC tournament game (42) and most in a single ACC tournament. But alas, there was no viable professional league in this country for her to continue playing. Thanks to the advent of the WNBA in 1997 — and its rise in popularity, especially this decade — that should never happen again to such a star.