More women's basketball is on its way.
Athletes Unlimited — the innovative network of player-driven women's professional sports leagues that brought softball, volleyball, and lacrosse to the masses — is kicking off its inaugural basketball season in January 2022.
"People are excited about more women's basketball," Athletes Unlimited founder and CEO Jon Patricof told Insider. "More opportunities for players, more engagement opportunities for fans, and just ... growing the game."
—Athletes Unlimited (@AUProSports) October 12, 2021
The league will complement the WNBA, which kicks off during the summer months and plays into the fall. WNBA players often take their talents overseas during the league's offseason to supplement their incomes, heading to destinations like Russia, China, and Turkey immediately upon the season's end and often staying right up until the following WNBA season begins.
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Now, Athletes Unlimited's new league offers athletes the chance to stay home and make money in the United States instead of playing for teams abroad. Plus, AU's five-week-long condensed season offers stars plenty of time to recover — a luxury they often have not been afforded in the past.
For WNBA champion and Washington Mystics guard Natasha Cloud — the first player to sign on to Athletes Unlimited basketball — that rest period is instrumental to AU's appeal.
"With going overseas, women are playing year-round," Cloud said during a media availability Tuesday afternoon. "That's wear and tear on your body. That's wear and tear on the longevity of your career as well."
—Athletes Unlimited (@AUProSports) October 12, 2021
"To be able to have those few months off, get back into working out, then have five weeks of AU, it not only offsets that financial responsibility that we take on for our families and to provide, but also... it's protecting our bodies, protecting the longevity of our careers," she added. "I think it's a perfect match for the [WNBA]. To be able to keep players home and make sure they're getting adequate care and treatment, that they're still working out and playing at a high level against competition, it benefits the investment of the W."
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Athletes Unlimited's unique athlete-centered model also offers a markedly different product from the more traditional approach to basketball the WNBA has taken for 25 seasons and counting. In each Athletes Unlimited league, players earn points based on both team wins and individual performance.
The player leaderboard changes in real-time, and at the end of each week, the top four point earners become the captains of reshuffled squads for the following week's games. Basketball, where individual stat lines and runs drive much of the discourse, "could very well be the best fit for our innovative scoring system," according to Patricof.
"It's worked incredibly well in softball, volleyball, lacrosse ... and we now have four seasons of validation of how this system of combining team points and individual points works," he continued. "We always thought from the beginning that basketball is an ideal sport because of how well-known the statistical categories are. So for us, this is going to be very much the basketball that people know and love, and the rules will fundamentally stay the same. But the scoring system, which rewards team performance above all else, will infuse this aspect of individual points."
"We think it's just going to be a really great fit for the way we operate," he added.
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Athletes Unlimited already has a trio of players signed on for the 2022 season. In addition to Cloud, WNBA veterans Sydney Colson and Ty Young will be part of the inaugural Athletes Unlimited basketball class.
The 44 players partaking in the 2022 season are comprised of current WNBA players, international stars, and former college standouts who couldn't find a foothold on a WNBA roster.
—Athletes Unlimited (@AUProSports) October 12, 2021
And as with AU's other sports leagues, participating athletes will be — and already have been — instrumental to decision-making efforts ahead of the basketball season. Players are empowered to control everything from uniforms and accommodations to roster formation and league rules. And without team owners in the mix, the athletes split league profits.
Athletes Unlimited will announce the 41 players joining Cloud, Colson, and Young for its inaugural basketball season in the coming weeks. The league also has yet to name a venue for the 2022 campaign.
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But even this early on, Patricof is encouraged by what he's seen.
"It's incredible just to see the excitement," he said. "We were working on this for months, obviously, and to see the excitement. It's exactly the reaction we were hoping for."
