Phoenix Mercury

The Phoenix Mercury are reportedly making a splash at the head coaching position.

Adrian Wojnarowski of ESPN reported that the team will hire Orlando Magic assistant Nate Tibbetts to be its next head coach. The deal will reportedly make him the highest paid coach in WNBA history.

Tibbetts has been with the Magic since the 2021-22 season and previously had tenures with the Cleveland Cavaliers and Portland Trail Blazers. Prior to this, he coached in the NBA G League.

This move comes after the Mercury hired Nick U'Ren as the general manager and announced plans to build a modern practice facility as a part of a $100 million investment from owner Matt Ishbia. When announcing that move, Ishbia mentioned a need to invest in people, and the pricey deal given to Tibbetts aligns with that commitment.

"We want to have one of the greatest sports organizations in the world," Ishbia said, per Brian Windhorst of ESPN. "And to do that you have to invest in the people."

While Phoenix is making some flashy moves, the team will be a rebuilding project for Tibbetts and company. The Mercury went 9-31 in 2023, finishing in last place in the WNBA. This was the franchise's lowest win total since 2012 and was the second time since 2007 that the team failed to reach the postseason.

For the first time since 2012, the WNBA playoffs will not feature the Phoenix Mercury.

The Mercury blew an early double-digit lead over the Dallas Wings Sunday as they conceded a 77-74 loss that eliminated them from 2023 playoff contention.

Phoenix had the opportunity to tie the game in the final seconds but was unable to complete the shot.

The loss snapped the longest active playoff appearance streak in the WNBA and the second-longest in league history, according to ESPN's Alexa Philippou. The Mercury have not missed the playoffs since drafting Brittney Griner with the No. 1 pick in 2013.

That streak almost ended last summer. Griner missed the entire 2022 season due to her detainment in Russia, and the Mercury finished the season 15-21. That record, their worst since 2012, allowed them to squeak by into the first round, where they were swept in two games by the Las Vegas Aces.

This season, the high-profile player losses were too difficult to overcome. The injury absences of Griner and superstar Diana Taurasi at the beginning of the season contributed to a league-worst 2-10 start.

Despite the midseason firing of head coach Vanessa Nygaard, the Mercury were unable to turn the season around. It did not help that Griner and Taurasi each have been held to 25 games, while six-time All-Star guard Skylar Diggins-Smith missed the entire campaign on maternity leave.

The longest active playoff streak in the WNBA now belongs to the Connecticut Sun, who have consistently been in the postseason picture since 2017, Philippou reported.

Brittney Griner expressed her gratitude toward the Phoenix Mercury organization and said she hopes more players continue being open about their well-being after the All-Star took a three-game hiatus to focus on her mental health.

"You see [athletes] really take a moment for themselves," Griner told reporters. "The more people do that and make it normal, it's OK. Before, no one dared even say it. You were looked upon as weak or not wanting to play or compete, which is completely the opposite mindset. ... Just the evolution of 'It's OK to take some time.' To speak out about it. There's a lot more resources now as well."

Griner finished with 22 points, six rebounds and four assists in Saturday's 97-91 loss to the Seattle Storm. It was her first game since July 25 as she stepped away from the team for nearly two weeks for undisclosed mental health reasons.

Griner, who spent nearly 10 months in a Russian prison after pleading guilty on drug charges last year, said her break was not planned.

"You can't plan for when you might need some time," Griner said. "I just want to shout out the Phoenix Mercury organization. From the jump, they were there for me, making sure I was good, letting me know that at any moment if I needed some time off, I could do that."

A nine-time WNBA All-Star, Griner is averaging 18.4 points, 6.6 rebounds and 2.1 assists per game this season. While her numbers are slightly down from her peak, Griner is matching her career best shooting 57.8 percent from the floor for a Mercury team that sits at a disappointing 7-20.

Griner and the Mercury will look to turn around their season Tuesday night when they host the Washington Mystics.

Diana Taurasi has hit another milestone in her already-Hall-of-Fame career.

The Phoenix Mercury star became the first player in WNBA history to surpass 10,000 career points when she dropped 42 on the Atlanta Dream in Thursday's 91-71 win.

"It was a cool night," she said after the game. "You couldn't have wrote this any better, for our fans and for our city."

Taurasi is the eighth player to score at least 40 points in a game this season. It's her highest-scoring game since putting up 44 points against the Seattle Storm on July 14, 2010.

The 10-time All-Star has been the WNBA's all-time leading scorer since June 18, 2017. Her 10,024 points after Thursday's game moved her 2,536 points ahead of second-place Tina Thompson (7,488).

For perspective, the gap between Taurasi and Thompson is about the same as the gap between Thompson and Maya Moore in 24th place (4,984 career points).

Even though she is the oldest player in the league this season, having turned 41 on June 11, Taurasi is showing no signs of slowing down. She's averaging her most points per game (17.4) since 2020 and ranks ninth in assists per game (4.9).

Taurasi's record-breaking performance also helped the Mercury end a four-game losing streak. The team's 91 points marked their third-highest single-game total of the season.

Center Brittney Griner will sit out the Phoenix Mercury's upcoming two-game road trip "to focus on her mental health," the team announced Saturday.

The Mercury did not say whether Griner is expected to return for the team's next home game Thursday.

The Mercury play the Chicago Sky Sunday before taking on the Indiana Fever Tuesday.

Griner returned to the United States in December after she was detained in Russia for almost 10 months. She had originally been sentenced to nine years in prison after Russian officials said they found cannabis oil in her luggage.

Following her return through a high-profile prisoner exchange, Griner has faced increased public scrutiny. She was reportedly publicly harassed at the Dallas airport while the Mercury team was traveling in June.

Griner has played in 20 of Phoenix's 30 games so far. She is averaging 18.2 points, 6.7 rebounds and 1.7 blocks per game and recently passed DeWanna Bonner for No. 2 on the franchise's all-time scoring list.

Despite Griner's record-setting performances, the Mercury's 6-17 record has left them in 10th place and out of the WNBA playoff picture.

Phoenix will hope to climb the standings with wins over eighth-place Chicago and 11th-place Indiana, and to see Griner back on the court as soon as she is ready.

The 2024 WNBA All-Star game will be hosted at the Footprint Center in Phoenix, according to an announcement from league commissioner Cathy Engelbert ahead of Saturday's 2023 iteration in Las Vegas.

Home of the Mercury, Phoenix has previously hosted the event twice, in 2000 and 2014.

"With Phoenix being one of our original franchises, now under new ownership, they are very excited," Engelbert told ESPN's M.A. Voepel. "The city is also hosting a women's Final Four coming up [2026], and I think they want to be a center of basketball. So the Mercury were very interested in having All-Star."

The Mercury are currently in their first season under new ownership with Mat Ishbia taking over the franchise as well as the Phoenix Suns last December. He's been extremely interested in helping bring the All-Star game back to the Valley.

As part of the efforts to make the event as good as it can be, he and other Phoenix officials have been monitoring how things have gone in Vegas this week.

"We're all here in Las Vegas seeing how [owner] Mark Davis and the Las Vegas Aces are putting on the All-Star Game and saying, 'What can we take from here to put into our event?'" Ishbia told Voepel. "And make it even better, not only for the people that show up for the game, but for the community. We're looking at all aspects of it to try to make this a great show.

"We're real big believers that Phoenix is a basketball destination, not only for women's and men's players but for fans. It's one of the best basketball hotspots in the country. And we're eager to showcase that."

With it being a part of the Olympic cycle, 2024 will be a particularly special event as the league's stars may potentially take on Team USA as they did back in 2021 ahead of the Tokyo games.

The All-Stars actually won that game 93-85 in a fun and entertaining matchup. The league is in talks with USA Basketball to make it happen again, per Engelbert.

"In an Olympic year, I think it is nice to give the national team another playing opportunity against some of the other best players in the world," Ishbia said. "Being an Olympic year elevates it even further. We're really excited about that opportunity, and thrilled that the commissioner chose us."

As longtime general manager Jim Pitman is set to retire at the end of this season, the Phoenix Mercury reportedly have made a decision on his successor.

According to ESPN's Adrian Wojnarowski, the Mercury have tabbed Golden State Warriors executive director of basketball operations Nick U'Ren as their next GM.

Pitman, who has spent the last decade in the position, will remain CFO of the Mercury and the Phoenix Suns. U'Ren will assume the GM duties when the Mercury end their 2023 campaign.

A Phoenix native, U'Ren "has spent the past decade steadily rising in responsibilities and rank with Golden State," per Wojnarowski. After spending time as head video coordinator with the Suns, U'Ren joined the Warriors as special assistant to the head coach/director of coaching operations under Steve Kerr.

He eventually transitioned to a front office role where he worked closely with former Warriors general manager Bob Myers and current GM Mike Dunleavy during their runs to four NBA championships.

The decision to hire U'Ren is the latest change for the Mercury, who are 4-14 this season. Vanessa Nygaard was fired last month after a 2-10 start and assistant Nikki Blue was promoted to interim head coach.

Phoenix is coming off a 78-72 win over the Los Angeles Sparks on Sunday. Brittney Griner, who was named to the All-Star Game this season, led the team with 29 points and 12 rebounds.

The Mercury will look to carry that momentum into Tuesday's matchup against the Las Vegas Aces, who lead the league with a 17-2 record.

Phoenix Mercury star Brittney Griner says the WNBA should have changed its travel policy well before she was harassed at an airport while flying commercially earlier this month.

Griner said Monday, via ESPN's M.A. Voepel:

'I'll say this. I think we should have already had the option to use a different airline, a more private airline, charter flights. It's a shame that it had to get to rock bottom, because I feel like waiting for something to happen and then making a change ... you don't know what that 'something's' gonna be. We've all seen what can happen in this world. And when you play the 'Let's-wait-and-see game,' you're really playing with fire. You're playing with people's lives.

So I'm glad that they finally got it together -- and, you know, are gonna allow us to do this. It's just a shame that it took so damn long, honestly.

Griner, who was detained in Russia in February 2022 before being exchanged in a prisoner swap between the United States and Russia in December, was harassed by a YouTube personality at Dallas Fort Worth International Airport on June 10.

The harassment reopened the conversation about how WNBA players travel for games.

WNBA teams typically fly commercial because it's cheaper, but the league is allowing teams to use a public chartering service called JSX for select flights this season, according to ESPN's Alexa Philippou.

Chartered flights are allowed for games played on back-to-back days and playoff games, according to Philippou.

Griner, however, was approved to use charter flights all season for her safety, sources told ESPN on June 16. The WNBA and the Mercury "collaborated on a travel plan to best protect Griner" prior to the 2023 campaign, Voepel added.

WNBA Commissioner Cathy Engelbert also said on ESPN's Outside the Lines that the Mercury were allowed to do anything they wanted in terms of Griner's travel because of the "unique situation" they are in.

WNBA teams have long been advocating for the use of charter flights for games, which are standard for the major men's professional sports leagues in North America, including the NBA, NFL, NHL and MLB.

It's unclear when or if the league will make the switch to allowing players to use charter flights for every game, but what it has implemented thus far is at least a start.

The Phoenix Mercury announced Sunday they fired head coach Vanessa Nygaard amid a 2-10 start to the 2023 WNBA season.

Nikki Blue will coach the team on an interim basis. Nygaard leaves with a 17-31 overall record during her season and a half in charge.

She was dealt an almost impossible hand before the 2022 season even tipped off.

No coach can plan for one of their best players to be wrongfully detained in a foreign country. Beyond Brittney Griner's value on the court, her plight weighed heavily on the minds of her teammates.

Then came drama of much lesser significance.

Tina Charles appeared in 16 games before pushing for her exit. Diana Taurasi and Skylar Diggins-Smith got into an argument on the bench during a game. Diggins-Smith appeared to call Nygaard a clown on social media after the coach emphasized how she thought Taurasi was snubbed for the 2022 All-Star Game, which many read as downplaying Diggins-Smith actually earning a sixth All-Star nod.

The pressure to win was squarely on Nygaard heading into Year 2, and the way this season has unfolded left the front office with little choice.

The Mercury have the WNBA's worst net rating (minus-13.0) by a fairly sizable margin, per WNBA.com. The Washington Mystics are 11th at minus-9.3.

Phoenix maintains a bottom-half offense despite Griner performing at an elite level. The veteran center is averaging 19.1 points and shooting 61.8 percent from the field.

The only surprise is that Mercury team governor Mat Ishbia waited this long to initiate a coaching change considering he hasn't been shy about wielding his influence on the Phoenix Suns since assuming control of that franchise.

The team's results could improve with a new voice in the locker room, but Nygaard isn't the sole reason for Phoenix's dreadful record.

The 41-year-old Taurasi is continuing to show her age. She's averaging 15 points per game with a true shooting percentage (50.1) that's on pace to be her worst over a full season, per Basketball Reference.

Diggins-Smith remains out of action after announcing last fall she was pregnant, and Moriah Jefferson simply doesn't possess the same kind of offensive ceiling in her place.

Phoenix doesn't have a lot in the way of perimeter defending. The Seattle Storm earned a 23-point win Saturday and shot 13-of-32 from three-point range in what was Nygaard's last game.

Under normal circumstances, you might expect Blue to finish out the year in an interim role before a full coaching search is launched. The Mercury's win-now timeline might lead general manager Jim Pitman to eventually tab a more experienced replacement in the hope of salvaging something from this year.

Following an incident last Saturday in which Phoenix Mercury star Brittney Griner and her teammates were harassed at Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport, the Mercury have adjusted their travel plans for the remainder of this season.

According to ESPN's Josh Weinfuss, "The most significant change to Griner's travel plans is the ability to fly charter for the Mercury's remaining road games."

The WNBA had said it gave Phoenix the ability to let Griner fly private all year, but Weinfuss noted that sources said this option was not available at the onset of this season. The Mercury now "might be able to use JSX public charter flights for the entire team on both standard and so-called 'created' routes, the latter of which other WNBA teams are not allowed to do."

While Weinfuss stated that the WNBA and the Mercury didn't confirm any travel details, league commissioner Cathy Engelbert said on Friday's episode of Outside the Lines that adjustments were made to Griner's travel and security plans.

"We're just working with Phoenix to make sure we have a good plan going forward," Engelbert said on OTL, "certainly for Brittney and for the rest of the Phoenix Mercury."

Last Saturday, Griner was confronted by a Blaze Media YouTube personality who recorded himself saying disparaging remarks about her nine-month detainment in Russia and posted it to social media. Engelbert said she texted Griner on Saturday after the incident, and Weinfuss noted that "there is urgency to avoid any similar issues the rest of the season."

Questions arose as to why Griner was flying commercial that day, but sources told Weinfuss it was likely due to the fact that JSX did not have a standard route from Dallas to Indianapolis.

"It shouldn't have been commercial," Terri Jackson, the executive director for the WNBA players' union, said on OTL on Friday, adding that she spoke to Griner during a WNBPA meeting with the Mercury on Thursday. "She said, 'We knew this was going to happen.' She said, 'Terri, I read the mail that comes to my locker. It's fan mail, but it's also a lot of hate mail.'"

Griner missed her first game of the season on Friday against the Washington Mystics due to a hip injury. The Mercury will return to action on Sunday in a road matchup against the New York Liberty.