New York Liberty taking advantage of WNBA’s rise with the next generation
Photo by David Becker/NBAE via Getty Images
The New York Liberty as well as the WNBA wants to plant the seeds to keep women’s basketball going. The WNBA is having its moment but as our newest correspondent, Shara Talia Taylor explains, the New York Liberty wants to make sure, that moment lasts a long time.
The league has indeed had impressive crowd turnouts in 2024 as new players, led by Caitlin Clark and Angel Reese, entered the league to compete against the W’s established stars, while the New York Liberty has dominated in front of sold-out crowds at Barclays Center.
With talented stars like Olympic gold medalists Breanna Stewart and Sabrina Ionescu, New York’s team has shined during the 2024 season earning a 23-4 record going into Tuesday night’s game vs. the Dallas Wings.
As anyone who has followed this season knows, It doesn’t end there. Women’s basketball is experiencing something beyond a “moment,” It is part of a cultural shift, the rise of women’s sports. The Liberty. like the WNBA and women’s basketball in general, are quietly part of an effort to make sure it lasts over the long-term by encouraging girls to play the game.
Indeed, more young girls have started playing basketball in recent years according to national and local statistics. Now, with the Liberty playing an exciting — and successful — brand of basketball, management is trying tie the present to the future with its own community impact.
“Yes we’ve had amazing tremendous attendance increase year over year,” Keia Clarke, CEO of the New York Liberty, told NetsDaily during “The Brooklyn Dribble,” a Liberty fan festival last month at Brooklyn Bridge Park. “It continues to grow. New York has really showed up in support of the New York Liberty in a major way on the first half of the season. We hope to see the same in the second half and on to the playoffs.
“They are playing well, They’re winning. We were a finals contender last season, but I have to say the atmosphere. It’s pure enjoyment, pure fun. You can’t walk in the Barclays center and not feel happiness in rooting for your team, but also enjoying the vibe.”
The fan festival was part of that “vibe,” as are other efforts aimed at girls in the borough and beyond. The team has quietly been offering other fan and family friendly events, making players available, understanding the opportunities, selling the Liberty to the younger set.
“One of our main platform pieces in our community work is educating and teaching the youth how to play basketball especially young girls,” Clarke said.
They have hosted clinics throughout the year, but this summer they tried something new.
“We actually hosted our first week long summer camp specifically for girls at the Barclays Center this past year,” she said. “It was the first year we’ve done it since we’ve been in Brooklyn.”
Their new summer series sold out in just a couple of days.
Indeed, one of the top priorities of the Nets and Liberty is developing a young and organic fan base, boys and girls who are 8 to 10 years old. a fanbase they hope will grow with the teams. It is a top priority. It’s evident in a number of ways, starting with Barclays experience. As anyone who’s attended a Liberty home game knows, the crowd is younger than what you’d see at an NBA game ... and less staid. This year, the Libs are averaging 12,755 per game, nearly 10 times their attendance five years ago, before Joe and Clara Wu Tsai bought the team and moved them from the 90-year-old Westchester Center to Barclays.
Large crowds turned out this season to watch the Liberty compete against WNBA newcomers Caitlin Clark of the Indiana Fever and Angel Reese of the Chicago Sky. The two have been well known for their college competitive rivalry, like the Larry Bird and Magic Johnson of their generation.
The Liberty understand as well that they’re part of something that’s happening on the ground nationally as well as locally. According to data from the National Federation of State High School Associations (NFHS), an advocacy group that writes playing rules and monitors participation for high school sports, girls’ participation in high school basketball increased from 370,466 in 2021-2022 to 373,366 in 2022-2023. The years coincide with Reese and Clark college playing years at LSU and Iowa.
High school participation is but one measure. Younger girls are showing up at camps like the ones the Liberty have run, wanting to learn the game they see Clark, Reese and their local favorites like Stewart, Ionescu and Jonquel Jones excel at.
“We actually went to a Liberty game,” said Tarma Wyche, mother of Kyristen-Dior Wyche, a nine-year-old fan who was one of 17,758 who showed for the Chicago Sky game featuring Reese on July 11 which set a new attendance record (which has since been broken.) Kryristen arrived a Reese fan, but her mother said her loyalties shifted a bit when she got a look at the scene inside Barclays.
“My daughter is a big Chicago fan, but when we got to the actual arena she was fascinated by the Liberty. She just couldn’t get over them. I think her name was Briana Stewart. Fell in love with her and she’s been a fan now of the Liberty ever since.”
Kyristen said Reese is her favorite player and Stewart is her second favorite player.
“They were both playing hard,” she said about what she saw at the game. “Getting rebounds. Shooting.”
Kyristen is also an avatar for another aspect of the explosion in girls basketball locally. She participated in a basketball camp in Brooklyn with Five Star and the Women’s National Basketball Players Association (WNBPA),
In fact, both players unions are playing a role in bringing basketball to young girls. They believe training for basketball should start at the grassroots.
“People are starting at a younger age and training and players are getting more serious about their basketball development,” said Dan Gladstone National Basketball Players Association (NBPA) Senior Vice President of Business Development and Basketball Activation.
Gladstone said more and more girls were coming to their JDS Sports/Five-Star Basketball camp over the past few years and so they felt they could launch an all-girl camp, which they just had in New York with the WNBPA. Their camp with the WNBPA had 94 girl participants in 2023 and 100 in 2024.
“It’s seems like girls are playing a lot of different sports, but basketball popularity has spiked and you’ve just seen so much more travel team basketball, camp participation, participation at the high school level, at the professional level,” he said.
Kirstee Pena, watched as her daughter learned new basketball skills at the WNBA camp.
“I think grass roots are the most important,” she said. “Kids really don’t know their potential until you kind of let them see what they can do.”
She said her daughter hasn’t been to a Liberty game yet, but loves watching Ionescu’s highlight reels on social media.
“Seeing how she gets through the paint shoots from the outside,” she said. “She’s very versatile.”
It’s not just young kids. The Liberty and WNBA have reached teens as well. At Westchester’s nearby Mount Vernon High School, Coach and Assistant Principal Erica Naughton said she has seen the effect.
“A lot of our girls are picking up basketballs for the first time their freshman year,” said Naughton about her own team. “I get a little more interest, around the time of March Madness, at the beginning of the season when girls are getting ready.”
It’s not just the lure of the women’s games, whether Clark, Reese, the NCAA or the Libs that has brought girls out for the team. There’s a practical reason as well. The growth of women’s sports means more scholarships.
“Right now, we have 100% of our population qualifying for free or reduced lunch,” she said in April. “When our girls play basketball and they continue to play to the next level, it kind of opens up a door for them to get into college or go to college for free.”
Schools like Mount Vernon have also been the beneficiaries' of Liberty ticket promotions.
Even before this season, the Liberty had a strong fan base following their success in the 2023 season. The addition of Breanna Stewart, Jonquel Jones and Courtney Vandersloot, three of their starters in 2023, helped New York’s talent pool. Now, though, things have hit a different level because of the WNBA’s explosion. As noted, Reese brought, 17,558 fans to Barclays and Clark brought 17,735.
For Keia Clarke and the rest of the Liberty, the camps and other promotions have a beneficial effect on the business, but beyond that, there’s the effect on girls and young women’s confidence.
“It’s instructional,” she told ND. “It’s confidence building, but really just a chance to expose people and kids of all ages, from younger seven, eight, nine (and) all the way through their teen years, in loving the game of basketball.”
And there will be more events like the fan festival. Clarke said the goal was for the Liberty to bring their team and brand throughout Brooklyn and New York City. It sounds like the timing is perfect.
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