Investors in Hartford and Boston want to buy the Connecticut Sun franchise.
The Women’s National Basketball Association, which until about two years ago was a fringe sports entertainment grouping, is making no friends in either Connecticut or Massachusetts in the places the league needs to have friends. In the state house in Boston and in the state house in Hartford. The WNBA’s franchise owner in Uncasville, Connecticut apparently put its property, the Connecticut Sun, up for sale and apparently had a deal in place to sell the property to Boston interests who want to put the team in the Massachusetts capital in 2027. But the WNBA team owners, who seem to have been investing in a floundering proposition until about 18 months ago, decided to flex their collective muscle and say hey wait Boston is not on our approved list of franchise cities nor is Hartford. The people who control public money that can help a franchise in both Boston and Hartford are fuming.
The Mayor of Hartford thinks there is a group ready to buy the Sun franchise and move the team 43 miles to the north and west of Uncasville. “Half the WNBA cut their teeth on the hardwood right behind me playing either for or against the most storied basketball team in all of women’s basketball, the UConn Huskies,” Mayor Arunan Arulampalam said of the Hartford arena. “This is how the league shows their appreciation for that history? By saying to Connecticut, ‘You don’t get to have a team anymore?” In Boston, Massachusetts Governor Maura Healey has thrown down the gauntlet and aimed a statement intended to tell WNBA Commissioner Cathy Englebert to listen very carefully to her words. “The league has been saying this is a timing issue and Boston needs to wait, and I don’t believe that Boston should wait.” The WNBA probably should think about the financial consequences of getting politicians irate.
Evan Weiner’s books are available at iTunes – https://books.apple.com/us/author/evan-weiner/id595575191
Evan can be reached at evan_weiner@hotmail.com
Mayor Arunan Arulampalam
