Embattled WNBA commissioner Cathy Engelbert speaks out about bitter culture war amid growing protests and calls for her to quit

WNBA commissioner Cathy Engelbert has accused people of ‘trying to use the league to sow divisiveness’ after the recent culture war surrounding the league.

Headlines surrounding the growing women’s basketball league have largely centered around issues away from the court during its boom in popularity in recent years. The treatment of Caitlin Clark has long been a talking point, before her Indiana Fever teammate Sophie Cunningham sparked a firestorm surrounding the trans athletes debate last month.

Cunningham spoke out about ‘protecting young girls’ competing in women’s sports, but faced a huge backlash, including from opposing coaches, with Minnesota Lynx head coach Cheryl Reeve wearing a ‘Trans kids belong’ T-shirt when the two teams met.

The Fever guard has been met with boos at most games while protests and counter demonstrations supporting her have become commonplace at games around the country. At a recent game, fans wearing T-shirts supporting her stance were told to cover them up by league security in an incident the WNBA later admitted ‘shouldn’t have happened.’

Engelbert has faced huge criticism for her handling of the issue, which has seen the WNBA’s eligibility policy challenged by two former NBA players attempting to enter the 2027 WNBA Draft. 

Despite that effort, the league taskforce recently met to discuss trans eligibility and concluded: ‘There are no immediate eligibility matters affecting the WNBA, and we strongly denounce the bad-faith efforts to use these topics to demean or marginalize others.’

Engelbert has now spoken out over recent events and suggested the league is being tarnished by those with very little interest in the product. 

‘We’re being the center of political football for people who have never watched the WNBA, never have written about the WNBA or reported on the WNBA,’ Engelbert said. 

‘People are trying to use the league to sow divisiveness. There’s always going to be haters out there and we denounce it. The vitriol has got to stop against our players.

‘There’s always going to be haters out there and we denounce it. But that’s what happens when you have made it as a legitimate sports media and entertainment product.’

Engelbert’s comments come after Cunningham admitted that she would like to see a new commissioner introduced.  

‘You do have to have a person in power who is bold, who is confident, who wants the best for the players and not maybe for themselves all the time,’ Cunningham told USA TODAY. 

‘So I do feel like, as a whole, that could be a position that’s maybe open at the end of the year, but that’s not my call.

‘Cathy Engelbert’s done a lot of good things, but with where our league is trying to go, I feel like you just want someone who also wants that.’

She was accused of giving the league ‘the worst leadership’  by Lynx star Napheesa Collier last year, and four-time MVP A’ja Wilson has also called out her lack of interaction with the commissioner.

NBA commissioner Adam Silver, to whom Engelbert reports, also used the term ‘political football’ to describe the situation faced by the WNBA, particularly Clark, when he appeared at the CNBC x Boardroom summit in New York last month.  

Silver said: ‘I think that ultimately the issues around Caitlin Clark are not largely about officiating. And that particular incident is not about whether a foul should have been called at the time of the game or whether that was ultimately a flagrant non-review.

‘I’ve come to know Caitlin really well. She’s an incredible player and also an incredible person. And she wants to focus on being the best player she can. And she’s become a bit of a political football in this country, and I think that’s incredibly unfair to her. 

‘I don’t think that issue is ultimately about officiating. It’s become political ping pong with her. She’s a young woman who’s trying to improve her game, focus on being the best player she can. 

‘People are allowed to think whatever they can, and whatever they want about our league, but there’s so much to celebrate around the WNBA. I was part of the group that wrote the original business plan 30 years ago, and where women’s sports has come – we missed our numbers for many years in the WNBA, but then it turned the corner. 

‘You’re now seeing off the chart valuations of WNBA teams. Joe and Clara Tsai have done an incredible job here in New York with the Liberty. Caitlin came along, brought an entirely new audience – and it began when she was still in college – to the game: young girls, women, men, across the board, people who never had been paying attention to women’s basketball.

‘And then it became a rising tide. Because as we quickly all saw, it wasn’t just Caitlin. There’s enormous talent in this league.’