Sophie Cunningham calls out WNBA officiating following ejection

Sophie Cunningham was ejected during a Minnesota Lynx-Phoenix Mercury matchup, and the sequence following it is totally wild.

On Wednesday, the Mercury were down considerably to the the Lynx as time ticked off the clock during the fourth quarter. Sophie was tussling with Minnesota guard Courtney Williams on a possession and seemingly did not like that a foul wasn’t called on Williams. So, she chirped at a nearby ref and immediately received a technical foul.

Moments later, Sophie was driving to the basket when she scored a tough bucket on Napheesa Collier. She screamed, “And one!” after a foul was called. Still, there were some extracurricular words exchanged with Phee — leading to another technical foul — and Sophie was promptly ejected.

Sophie Cunningham gets a tech for yelling at the referee and on the next possession, gets a second tech for taunting or talking trash to Napheesa Collier and Bridget Carleton pic.twitter.com/8cyPgoXbCM

— CJ Fogler account may or may not be notable (@cjzero) August 29, 2024

Sophie Cunningham has been ejected after receiving 2 technical fouls

This is the 2nd one that led to the ejection#WNBA pic.twitter.com/6NkLLNcj0W

— WNBA Universe (@wnbauniverse) August 29, 2024

Following her double techs, Sophie laughed at the turn of events, pumped up the home crowd and seemingly said, “[Expletive] yeah” twice before leaving the court.

Postgame, she was asked about her first-ever WNBA ejection. This is what she shared with the media when asked about the moment:

“There’s just so much we can’t control as players, and maybe I could have controlled my emotions a bit more. But, honestly, I didn’t want to. I think sometimes a team needs that…”

“I think it’s a good question for the player’s association to maybe see [about] the ref situation and how we can be better moving forward as a group. We get fined for a lot of stuff, but I think they need to be held accountable, too.”

#Mercury Sophie Cunningham gives her perspective of her ejection, officiating lately, & trying to get her squad & the crowd fired up:@Sports360AZ https://t.co/xNokWqliiV pic.twitter.com/t6tNWf8ra3

— Eliav Gabay (@eliavgabay) August 29, 2024