When this WNBA season is over, the league will no longer have a presence in New England.
Earlier this spring, the Mohegan Tribe sold the Connecticut Sun to Texas-based billionaire Tilman Fertitta for a reported $300 million. Fertitta, the current U.S. Ambassador to Italy who also owns the NBA’s Houston Rockets, plans to move the team to Houston and revive a Comets franchise that won four titles.
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But WNBA commissioner Cathy Engelbert isn’t closing the door on a potential return to the New England for the league.
Speaking to a group of reporters in Portland, Oregon, on Thursday night before the Fire played the Las Vegas Aces, Engelbert said she could see a future where the WNBA would consider an expansion bid from a New England-based ownership group.
“Great fanbase,” Engelbert said of the Sun. “When you look at — I think they’re going to do a couple of games in Hartford this year, another game in Boston … New England is a great market for sports. So, yeah, do I foresee in the 2030s, if we were to do expansion again, them being part of the process, that region? Yes.”
Engelbert again drove home the point that the league did not receive a bid from any Boston ownership group during the WNBA’s last rounds of expansion, where Golden State, Toronto, Portland, Philadelphia, Cleveland and Detroit were awarded franchises.
The Mohegan Tribe first began exploring a sale of the Sun in early 2025 and were close to the finish line on selling the team on two separate occasions – the first to Boston Celtics’ minority owner Steve Pagliuca and the second to former Milwaukee Bucks owner Marc Lasry.
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But neither sale was approved by the WNBA. Pagliuca wanted to move the team to Boston. Lasry wanted to keep the team in Connecticut and play in Hartford.
Fertitta first publicly expressed an interest in bringing the WNBA back to Houston in 2024 and submitted a bid for an expansion franchise but was not chosen. The Comets were one of the WNBA’s original eight teams when the league launched in 1997. Under Naismith Hall of Fame coach Van Chancellor, the Comets won the first four WNBA championships, powered by three Women’s Basketball Hall of Fame players: Cynthia Cooper, Sheryl Swoopes and Tina Thompson.
The Sun, originally the Orlando Miracle, playing in Florida from 1999 to 2002 before relocating to Uncasville, Connecticut in 2003.
Engelbert also said during her comments to reporters she didn’t have an update into the league’s investigation into the Aces circumventing the salary cap, and the WNBA is planning to do a one-month check-in soon with the game council and officiating committee.
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This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: WNBA commissioner Cathy Engelbert says league could return to New England
