The WNBA: Pioneering Women's Professional Basketball

On June twenty first, nineteenth ninety seven, the very first WNBA game took place, where the Los Angeles Sparks hosted the New York Liberty, broadcast nationally by NBC, giving us the strongest women's professional basketball league we had ever seen. Today on Daily Sports History, this episode is brought to you by Our Weird World. Every week, I John Henson dive into weird, crazy and forgotten stories from the history books that you have probably never heard before. I try to put some humor into it, or maybe I just come off sounding like a dick. That's really up for you to decide. But join me every Monday, subscribe everywhere that you get your podcasts. Welcome to Daily Sports History. I'm Ethan Reese, your guide to a rapid deep dive into sports history every day. In today's trivia question to listen out for was who scored the first basket in a WNBA game. Now, women's basketball is roughly as old as basketball itself, as basketball was originally created in eighteen and women's basketball started in eighteen ninety two at the Smith College by Sandra Bearson, who was hired as a young Physical culture director basically physical education teacher which was what she learned by participating in the YMCAs in Massachusetts. But she made some subtle differences to the game as back then women weren't given the same opportunities as men. Yes, they wanted them to be active and participate, but not be quote unquote manly playing these manly sports. It was a different time in a different era. So in her game, she increased the number of players to being nine per team and had three different sections, had a guard, center, and forward area so you could not cross those lines. And they were only limited to three dribbles and could only hold onto the ball for three seconds, and there was no snatching or batting the ball away, basically making it a less contact sport. And the first intercollegiate women's basketball game was played between Stamford University and the University of California, Berkeley in eighteen ninety six, so it only took four years to sweep across the country, and roughly from that time to the nineteen seventies, they often referred to women's basketball as netball as it was kind of its own different sport, similar to how baseball and softball are very similar, but they are two different sports. But the first professional women's basketball team was the All American Redheads, which was formed in nineteen thirty six, who were very similar to the Harlem Globetrotters, as they wore a red, white and blue star studded uniform similar to the Globetrotters and barmstormed around the country. And another thing they did was they did not play by these netball rules that had been set in place, but they played the men's roles version of basketball. And this team lasted until nineteen eighty six, which is a long time and really helped grow the game for women, and schools also started to increase their usage of basketball for women, as in the nineteen fifties and sixties, universities across the country were adhering to an Equal Rights Amendment and started the Division of Girls and Women's in Sports, which later became the Association of Intercollegiate Athletics for Women. And in nineteen seventy one, the five player full court game that the men had been playing was finally adopted by the Women's Sports Foundation and had since been adopted by all forms of college basketball, and in nineteen seventy six, the Olympics officially allowed women's basketball into the Olympics and it has been played ever since. And the very first women's team to win a gold was Soviet Union, who beat the United States in the gold medal match. Now, the first attempt at a professional women's league in the United States was the Women's Pro Basketball League, which started in nineteen seventy eight and lasted for three seasons. In in nineteen eighty two, the NCAA held its very first women's college basketball tournament, which was won by Louisiana Tech. Then it took until nineteen ninety three when the next league was created, which was the WBA, the Women's Basketball Association, which was focused on teams in the Midwest and had twelve teams playing a fifteen game schedule, and they actually contacted the NBA to see if they would like to partner, and many think this is where the WNBA got started, as the WBA folded in the summer of nineteen ninety five and it was announced in nineteen ninety six that the WNBA would be started after this nineteen ninety six Summer Olympics, where the US women's team won gold for the third time. Now, when this league was formed and announced, they actually had three former college stars and stars of the Olympic team, Rebecca Lobo, Lisa Leslie and Sheryl Swoops and attendance in their press conference. And they were actually competing with it with another women's basketball league called the American Basketball League abbreviated to the ABL, which lasted a couple of seasons as they could not compete with the size and support that the WNBA had. Now, the WNBA started with eight teams, with the Charlotte Sting, Cleveland Rockers, Houston Comets, New York Liberty and the Eastern Conference and in the Western Conference they had the Los Angeles Sparks, the Phoenix Mercury, the Sacramento Monarchs, and the Utah Stars with tuosies and this would be the first league that was completely backed by another professional league, which helped it survive more than the other professional women's leagues that had come before it, and that's why the WNBA logo looked so similar to the NBA logo. However, it took fifteen months from when they first announced the league for the very first tip off to take place, as they had a long list of things to do first before they could sign a players or staff. They made an announcement that they had a partnership with NBC, ESPN and Lighttime TV to broadcast their games, which is something no other women's basketball league had done before and had the success doing. And on January sixth, nineteen ninety seven, the first sixteen players were assigned to teams. These were the veteran players that had been part of the US basketball team given and each team got two of these players. Then they had an Elite Draft where each team got a pick two more players, giving each team a roster four and the first pick in this draft. And then they held their very first draft where they drafted college and international players. In Tina Thompson was the first college player taken, as she was the leading scorer in the PAC twelve that year. And with the teams now built and now had a roster and staff and coaches now before the game took place, they made some changes to the rules. They had instead of a twenty four second game clock, they had a thirty second game clock, and their three pointer was only nineteen feet nine inches, which was a little bit closer than the men. And instead of playing four quarters like the NBA, they would play two twenty minute quarters that were similar to the collegiate game, and the rosters would have eleven players and would play with a college sized women's ball, which was smaller than the men's and they made a change to the ball also where it is orange and oatmeal white, making it similar to the ABA colored balls that we used now. The very first game took place on June twenty first, nineteen ninety seven, between the New York Liberty and the Los Angeles Sparks in Los Angeles, played in the Great Western Forum in Inglewood, California, in front of a crowd of over fourteen thousand, but they did have issues where they're planned National anthem singer Joseph Osbourne wasn't able to perform as he got stuck in traffic, so they had to use recording that they had on hand, and the president of the league, Val Ackerman, threw the ceremonial first jump ball. But when the game started, everyone wanted to be that first player get the very first goal scored. As you had multiple faces of the league in this game, and Rebecca Lobo for the Liberty and Lisa Leslie for the Sparks, he would think one of them would get the shining call, but it was actually veteran guard Penny Toller from cal State Long Beach who got the very first goal scored in a WNBA game, And this game was actually a little bit sloppy, but the Liberty took the lead shortly after that first basket and wouldn't look back. They led at halftime by seven points, thirty three to twenty six, and would go on to win the game sixty seven to six to fifty seven, giving them the first league giving them the first win in the WNBA history, being led by Rebecca Lobo's sixteen points, and that's despite Lisa Leslie on the Sparks also scoring sixteen points and having teen rebounds. But this wasn't the only game play that day, as the Houston Comments went on to beat the Cleveland Rockers and the Sacramento Monarchs went on to beat the Utah Stars. But this was a start to this league, and that year, the Houston Comments would go on to win the very first WNBA title, defeating the New York Liberty. And the league has continued to grow as they have expanded to twelve teams now and we've seen even more growth within even the last year with superstars coming out of college in Angel Reese and Caitlyn Clark, providing a spark for the league that has steadily grown year after year, and in nineteen ninety nine they became the first professional women's league to have collective bargaining agreement for women, which was a huge step for women's sports in general. And though women's sports has always taken a backseat many times to men's sport, it doesn't mean that they are bad sports. It doesn't mean they're bad athletes. It means they need to be given the opportunity. When given the opportunity, like in tennis, we see great success. Tennis is one of the few sports where men's and women's are usually almost on the same par Now, men still gets more viewership than women's tennis, it's much closer than any other sport, and they are paid the same. The winner of Wimbledon men or women's gets paid the same, and the endorsements that men's and women's tennis athletes get are very comparable. So if you are able to give women the opportunity that men are given, you're able to see women actually flourish, especially like in the WNBA. As it's a slow grind to grow a league, but we are seeing now the success and the hype that you can get when superstars enter the league, and sometimes you just need support that last like the WAA got from the NBA. And I want to thank you for joining us today for the Daily Sports History. If you like this, please go tell a friend. Word of mouth is the best way for us to continue to grow. And the more we grow, the more daily sports we can give you. And come back Monday for more Daily sports history. And did you catch the answer to today's trivia question who was the first who scored the first basket in a WNBA game? The answer was Penny Toller for the Los Angeles Sparks.