HOUSTON, Texas (KTRK) — If sellout crowds driven by Caitlin Clark, Angel Reese, and others were any indication, the WNBA is in a boom period regarding audience reach and recognition. And folks like Houston Rockets owner Tilman Fertitta are jumping onto the opportunity.
On Tuesday, Fertitta laid out his aspirations to bring an expansion franchise in the top women’s professional basketball league to Houston, where the WNBA once set up shop through a previous original team, the Comets, which folded in 2008 after the team couldn’t find an owner.
Inside the Rockets’ brand-new Memorial Hermann Training Center, Fertitta explained that Houston is among eight cities competing for the 16th franchise after the league awarded teams to the San Francisco Bay Area, Toronto, and Portland, Oregon. He said bringing a WNBA franchise to a sports-rich city like Houston is not automatic.
“Wouldn’t you know, (Houston’s bid is) happening right when everybody else wants one,” Fertitta said. “There’s eight cities vying for possibly one more franchise that they’re going to award in the next two to three years. Are we going to try and get it? Yes.”
Members of the Connecticut Sun team kneel during the playing of the national anthem before a WNBA game on Tuesday, Sept. 29, 2020, in Bradenton, Fla.
AP Photo/Phelan M. Ebenhack
Houston might have a competitive advantage because it holds a franchise in another top-level women’s professional sports league, the Houston Dash of the National Women’s Soccer League. In addition, the Memorial Hermann Training Center, the new practice home of the NBA’s Rockets, can be sold as an infrastructure point.
The new facility is 75,000 square feet and has two basketball courts.
Players will have four times the amount of space in their workout and rehab area. The players’ locker room is enormous and luxurious, and chefs are waiting to prepare meals for players and coaches in a full-service kitchen.
Reporters also asked Fertitta about his bid for a National Hockey League franchise in Houston. He said the “NHL would be great in Houston,” but hestressed at the “right price.”
Expansion fees might top $1 billion, and NHL commissioner Gary Bettman stressed that reports the league is in the process of expanding were “categorically wrong.”
SEE ALSO: Houston Rockets launch brand-new training facility ahead of 2024-25 NBA regular season
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