Houston Rockets owner Tilman Fertitta
All to know so far about Houston’s new WNBA team originally appeared on The Sporting News. Add The Sporting News as a Preferred Source by clicking here.
On March 27, it was announced that the WNBA’s Connecticut Sun franchise was being sold to the Fertitta family — the owners of the NBA’s Houston Rockets — in a deal that will secure a WNBA team for Houston, Texas.
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The sale is reportedly closing for $300 million, which is a record price for a WNBA team and one that does not include a relocation fee. WNBA Commissioner Cathy Engelbert previously indicated Houston and owner Tilman Fertitta as “up next” and “the one we have our eye on.” The Sun have been owned by the Mohegan Tribe since 2003 and were the league’s first non-NBA owners and the first Native American tribe to own a professional sports team. One final season will be played in Uncasville, Connecticut for the Sun in 2026 before relocating to the Texas city in 2027.
Per ESPN, an official announcement is expected for Monday as the ultimate sale and relocation are still pending approval of the WNBA’s Board of Governors.
Sources are also indicating that the franchise is expected to be named the “Houston Comets,” an inkling back to when the team was part of the league from 1997 to 2008 and won four consecutive championships from 1997 to 2000.
Houston Comets to return to Texas following Fertitta deal
PaperCity Magazine first reported the sale of the Sun to the Fertittas.
The Connecticut Sun had made the playoffs for eight consecutive years before entering a rebuild in 2025, advancing to the Finals four times in their history but still falling shy of winning a championship.
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Following the relocation, the team is expected to play at the Toyota Center, home of the Fertitta’s Houston Rockets.
The original “Houston Comets” were led by Cynthia Cooper, Sheryl Swoopes and Tina Thompson won the league’s previously mentioned first four championships and were known the first WNBA dynasty.
Engelbert and the WNBA announced expansion to Cleveland (2028), Detroit (2029) and Philadelphia (2030) in June of 2025. It was then she named Houston as likely the next city to reach an agreement with the league.
“There are a variety of cities that obviously bid, and one of those I wanted to shout out — because they have such a strong history in this league and their great ownership group — is Houston,” Engelbert said at the time. “The Houston Comets were just an amazing one, the first four inaugural championships in the WNBA. So I would say that’s the one, obviously, we have our eye on. [Owner] Tilman [Feritta’s] been a great supporter of the WNBA, and we’ll stay tuned on that.”
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In August of 2025, the Mohegan Tribe agreed to sell the Sun franchise to then-Boston Celtics minority owner Steve Pagliuca for $325 million. As part of the deal, the franchise would have been relocated to Boston. After league pushback, however, the sale did not go through in light of decisions needing to be met by the WNBA Board of Governors.
A WNBA team had not been sold since 2021, when Larry Gottesdiener led a group that bought the Atlanta Dream.
The original Houston Comets were put up for sale in 2008 due to financial struggles. League players such as Angel Reese, Caitlin Clark and Paige Bueckers have recently caused a massive spike in WNBA success and fanfare.
Bueckers currently plays for the WNBA’s current only Texas team — the Dallas Wings. Texas sports fans into the WNBA will now have two options for teams to support, beginning in 2027.
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The 2026 WNBA season will go on as scheduled after the league and the Women’s National Basketball Players Association came to terms on a historic new collective bargaining agreement which have created positive and permanent changes for the WNBA landscape — such as increasing the average player salary to be over $580,000. Opening night is set for May 8, and the regular season will run through Sept. 24.
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