Lynx's Napheesa Collier Talks Unrivaled, WNBA Finals, Bueckers, More in B/R Interview
The WNBA and women's basketball as a whole has skyrocketed in popularity the past few years, and there is no time like the present to take advantage of that by starting a new, innovative league.
Enter Napheesa Collier and Breanna Stewart.
While the Minnesota Lynx and New York Liberty stars just faced each other in the WNBA Finals, the former UConn teammates partnered together again to co-found Unrivaled. The new 3-on-3 league starts on Jan. 17 and will run for eight weeks with games airing on TNT Sports, truTV and Max.
"It's been great," Collier told Bleacher Report when discussing once again teaming up with Stewart. "Coming together for something that's bigger than us has been amazing as well. I think we both see the vision, even with women's sports already exploding, that it can grow even more.
"We've just taken that opportunity, and it's been very cool working with Stewie the past couple years on this and building it and seeing it come to fruition from the ground up. It's been super rewarding."
The creation of Unrivaled gives players an alternative to playing overseas during the WNBA offseason and allows them to receive equity in the league.
Collier has discussed how important that financial aspect of the league is for the players, and she even revealed in October that Unrivaled expanded to 36 roster spots with six players on each of the six teams because it "outperformed our financial projections."
Thus far, 33 of the 36 roster spots have been filled for the teams, which are Laces BC, Lunar Owls BC, Mist BC, Phantom BC, Rose BC and Vinyl BC. Collier is on Lunar Owls BC with Skylar Diggins-Smith, Natasha Cloud and others, while Stewart is on Mist BC with Jewell Loyd, DiJonai Carrington and others.
Other headline players include Alyssa Thomas, Brittney Griner, Jackie Young, Kahleah Copper, Angel Reese, Aaliyah Boston and Arike Ogunbowale, and fans will have the chance to get to know all of them better throughout the season.
"Besides the competition on the floor, which everyone knows is going to be really good, I think everyone is going to be pleasantly surprised by the content and the access they'll get to the athletes," Collier said. "We're doing such a deep dive into the athletes' personalities and podcasts and behind-the-scenes looks and a docuseries. Fans should be very interested to see that side of us, too."
One player who will not participate in the first year of the league is Caitlin Clark, but the Indiana Fever star was certainly a driving force in the expanding popularity of women's basketball this past year.
She was the headliner of a notable rookie class that also included Cameron Brink, Angel Reese, Kamilla Cardoso and others. And all she did in that first season was take home Rookie of the Year and break the WNBA single-season assist record while leading the Fever to the playoffs for the first time since the 2016 campaign.
Sports Business Journal noted Clark played in 19 of the record 22 regular-season games that drew more than one million viewers.
"It was really cool," Collier said when discussing the attention Clark and the other young players drew to the WNBA this past season. "It's a testament to how much the sport is exploding, just having that fandom and the trickle-down effect it had with everyone in the league. You might come for one player but you fall in love with a team or other players.
"To see that expanding to people in the stands and ticket sales and TV deals, just the trickle-down effect of it, is incredible. It's really fun to see the explosion happening in real time because usually change happens slowly. I've been in the league only six seasons, but it's so different from my first year. It's fun to see these changes happening."
With the league firmly in the spotlight in 2024, Collier had arguably the best season of her career.
She finished second in MVP voting behind A'ja Wilson while averaging 20.4 points, 9.7 rebounds, 3.4 assists, 1.9 steals and 1.4 blocks per game. She also added her first Defensive Player of the Year award to a resume that already included the 2019 Rookie of the Year, three All-WNBA selections, four All-Star nods and three All-Defensive selections.
"It was really cool," Collier said of being named the Defensive Player of the Year. "Defense really is just effort and how hard you're working instead of just talent. So to have that recognition felt really good, especially since it was a goal of mine going into the season."
She fell just one win short of her ultimate on-court goal, though.
The Lynx reached the WNBA Finals for the first time in Collier's career and faced the daunting challenge of going against the loaded Liberty with Stewart, Sabrina Ionescu and Jonquel Jones, among others.
Yet they were largely up to the challenge and came storming back from a double-digit deficit in the fourth quarter to win in overtime in Game 1 before bouncing back from Ionescu's winning three-pointer in Game 3 to force a decisive contest with a Game 4 victory.
The final game of one of the most memorable series in WNBA history fittingly went into overtime but only after Stewart hit two free throws to tie it after a controversial foul call. New York won in the extra period but also enjoyed a 25-8 advantage in free-throw attempts and benefitted from Collier fouling out.
Minnesota head coach Cheryl Reeve told reporters "that s--t was stolen from us," and Collier seemed to have some pointed photo choices on an Instagram post.
But she has since turned the page and describes just missing out on the title as a "huge" motivating factor heading into the 2025 campaign.
"To be so close gives you a taste of what could have been," Collier said. "I'm really excited for next year. We have a lot of the same players coming back, so expanding in a second year together should be huge. We were able to go that far with playing together for the first time, and it's no secret how well we all like each other and get along. So another year added on top of that is going to be really great for us."
As if reaching the WNBA Finals, winning the Defensive Player of the Year, finishing second in MVP voting and co-founding an entire league wasn't enough, Collier also helped the United States women's basketball team take home gold at the 2024 Paris Olympics.
She started all six games in Paris, including the thrilling 67-66 victory over France to clinch the gold medal. Collier finished with seven points and 11 rebounds as a force on the boards in the final, which helped her secure a second gold after she was also part of the team that won in Tokyo.
"It was really special," she said. "The best part was having my family there since the first one was during COVID when nobody was there. This time around, being able to have friends and family plus my daughter there was really special. I have the pictures hanging all around my house of my family during it. It's something I'll never forget."
Another thing she won't forget is the opportunity she had to go back to UConn as one of the many headline names in attendance when Geno Auriemma became the winningest coach in NCAA Division I history.
Auriemma broke Tara VanDerveer's record with his 1,217th win on Nov. 20 with a 85-41 victory over Fairleigh Dickinson. There was an entire ceremony for the Huskies coach who built a resume that includes 11 national titles, 23 Final Four appearances, 30 conference regular-season crowns, 28 conference tournament titles and eight Naismith Coach of the Year awards.
Collier, who played four seasons at UConn from 2015-19, was one of the most notable names from the program in attendance. So were Rebecca Lobo, Sue Bird, Diana Taurasi, Maya Moore and many more.
"It says a lot," she said of so many former Huskies returning for the moment. "It shows how many lives they have touched. We had people there in their 60s to the 18-year-olds on his current team. There were so many generations of women, and we got to hear all their stories about how they were shaped into the athletes and people they are.
"It's unfathomable to me to impact so many lives in that way where they're coming back 40 years later to celebrate you. It was really cool to be even a small part of that. I was really honored, and I'm really proud of what they've been able to build. Forty years, doing the same thing where you're trying to create better situations for athletes and young girls, is really admirable."
Paige Bueckers played well in that game with 16 points, nine rebounds, five assists and two steals, which felt right since she is next in line for UConn legend status as someone who has already been named an Associated Press Player of the Year, Wooden Award winner, Naismith Award winner and two-time Big East Player of the Year winner.
Bueckers may be the No. 1 pick in the 2025 WNBA draft, and there are plenty of former Huskies she can turn to when looking for advice on how to navigate the next stage of her career.
Collier, who won a championship and was a three-time All-American at UConn before she was the No. 6 overall pick of the 2019 WNBA draft, is surely one of those people.
"Soak it all in," Collier said when asked what advice she offered Bueckers. "It is a whirlwind going from being in college to being a pro. She was talking about how she's really excited to not do schoolwork anymore. I told her that part is great, especially in the beginning.
"We talked about that and what her rookie year is going to look like and our CBA negotiations. I was just trying to tell her everything that comes with professional life and the freedom that comes with that. It made me remember what I felt like at that time, and I'm really excited for the future for her."
That future will include Unrivaled, as Bueckers already signed up to play in the league after her career at UConn ends.
It is only fitting there will eventually be another Huskies star in a league that was co-founded by two of the program's biggest legends.
