After the epic Game Five between the Aces and the Fever, I stopped for dinner and a drink at a gastropub inside Mandalay Bay. Vegas fans were still buzzing in the casino walkway. Inside, I was chatting with the bartender about how packed the Michelob Ultra Arena had been.
That’s when the woman sitting next to me chimed in:
“That’s all because of Caitlin Clark.”
I couldn’t let that pass.
“Well, no, the Aces were selling out long before Caitlin.”
She went quiet for a beat. Then she opened up.
“You know this was my first sporting event ever, and we came here just for this. I used to make fun of the boys for loving sports, but now I get it.”
From there, the script melted away. The Indiana Fever fan lit up about Vegas’s Chelsea Gray and A’ja Wilson. She loved watching the coaches prowl the sidelines, their passion and bluster on full display. She and her husband told me they were from near Fresno and were thinking about attending games in the state. The Valkyries were closer, obviously, but they had Southern California roots and might want to spend more time with my beloved Sparks.
“I’m 70 years old and I’m having so much fun,” she said.
Of course, she was having a great time. Despite her opening salvo, she respected the players, the atmosphere, and the community. That Fox-News-crafted passive-aggressive comment was a line that could have ended the conversation before it began if I’d let it.
The reality? You don’t spend time and money on the WNBA because of one player. You stay because the league is joyful, inclusive, and impossible not to love once you’re inside it.
So I offered a light corrective, not an attack. Just enough space for this new fan to reveal those true feelings. And once she did, we kept talking until the restaurant lights came on—about basketball, about California, even about AI.
I began this season worried that the newcomers were barbarians at the gate, eager to transform the vibes and culture of this league into something I wouldn’t recognize. By the end of my last game of the year, I’d found common ground with folks who, on the surface, embodied exactly what I feared.
Instead of us playing to type, though, we found shared joy because if you love this game, you love this game. You might be able to connect with your tribe online by celebrating Caitlin Clark and no one else, but after cheering in person with thousands of other fans, you’ll come to realize that this is your real community, and it’s better over here.
And if we get into conversation, I’ll politely remind you that the WNBA is for everybody.
