WNBA All-Star Host Committee, Chicago Park District team up to unveil city’s 1st ‘Line ‘Em Up’ basketball court at Hamilton Park

CHICAGO (WLS) — The WNBA All-Star Host Committee and Chicago Park District are teaming up to unveil Chicago’s first WNBA “Line ‘Em Up” community basketball court painted with the WNBA’s fire orange 3-point line.

The fire orange line is more than a mark. It’s a statement of access, reminding girls across Chicago that they belong on the basketball court.

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“This is new to me, like I never seen one on public court,” high school student Beautiful Pearson said.

“That’s fire. So, you know, if you hit from the 3, over and over again, you are on fire,” said Michael Lindsey, with the Chicago Park District.

The bright fire-orange WNBA 3-point line now painted at Hamilton Park in Englewood is rare, but the Chicago Sky hope it won’t be for long.

“We didn’t have the lines, yeah. Sometimes, we didn’t even have basketball nets,” former Chicago Sky player Linnae Harper said.

Growing up on Chicago’s South Side, former Sky guard Harper says she used to write in her journal that one day she’d play professional basketball, at a time when pathways in the sport were mostly built for boys.

“Growing up, I only played with all boys. I was the only girl on my team,” Harper said.

Now, more than two decades later, the Whitney Young grad is seeing something she never had as a kid: a WNBA 3-point line on a public court.

“If I can make a shot from the WNBA line at that age, then I can make it anywhere in life,” Harper said.

It’s all part of the WNBA’s “Line ‘Em Up” campaign, a push to make women’s professional courts visible in neighborhoods across the country.

“When you often go out and play at the courts that are around your house or in your neighborhoods, you have a 3-point line that’s for the high schoolers or the NBA men’s professional sport. But what about the women?” Chicago Sky co-owner Nadia Rawlinson said.

While there are tens of thousands of park courts across the country, the league says less than 1 percent currently have a WNBA 3-point line.

In Chicago alone, the park district says more than 3,700 girls participate in its basketball programs.

“Not only is gonna help your game, like, tactically, like the inspiration, the feeling of like this is for me. Like, I matter; like, I can do this,” former Chicago Sky player Allie Quigley said.

And while the WNBA and the players’ union continue negotiations ahead of the upcoming season, the Sky says this moment is about something bigger: building the next generation of leaders.

“It’s not just to be a star athlete; it’s not just to be a WNBA player. But it’s to be a leader. It’s to be a CEO. It’s to be a boss, and this is your chance to show it just first here on the court,” Rawlison said.

The fire orange line is just the first of the hundreds to come that the Chicago Sky is planning across park district courts.