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SAN ANTONIO – A team of financiers, including former Texas Longhorns standout Kevin Durant, appear to have fallen short of bringing a WNBA franchise to Central Texas.
According to a Feb. 10 USA Today Sports report, Durant, former Milwaukee Bucks owner Marc Lasry, former University of Texas women’s basketball star Fran Harris and entrepreneur Jenny Just were the ownership group who made a bid for the league to add an Austin franchise.
The new WNBA team would have expected to take the floor by 2028, the report stated.
However, according to a Sports Business Journal report published Sunday, the WNBA is leaning toward adding its 16th franchise in a familiar spot: Cleveland, Ohio.
The league has yet to announce a destination for its 16th franchise.
As of 2024, the WNBA has 14 teams. The league’s 15th franchise, the Golden State Valkyries based in San Francisco, California, will debut this summer.
Cleveland, whose team was nicknamed “Rockers,” had one of the eight original WNBA franchises when the league started in 1997. The Rockers folded in 2003 after its original owner said it would no longer operate the team and no new owner stepped forward.
A new Austin franchise would have been the closest WNBA franchise to San Antonio since the Stars — and previously the Silver Stars — called the Alamo City home from 2003 to 2017.
After the 2017 WNBA season, Spurs Sports & Entertainment sold the Stars to MGM Resorts International. The new owners relocated the team to Las Vegas and adopted Aces as its new nickname beginning with the 2018 WNBA season.
In 2022, the Aces hired former Stars point guard and former San Antonio Spurs assistant coach Becky Hammon as their head coach. Hammon led the Aces to back-to-back WNBA Championships in 2022 and 2023.
SBJ also reported that Austin was not the only Texas city to submit a bid as a WNBA expansion candidate.
Houston was also among the group of 13 cities — which include Austin, Charlotte, Cleveland, Denver, Detroit, Jacksonville, Kansas City, Miami, Milwaukee, Nashville, Philadelphia and St. Louis — to vie for a new franchise.
According to the SBJ report, Houston, whose four-time champion Comets were another original WNBA team in 1997, “is probably the most positioned” to be awarded the league’s 17th potential franchise later this decade.
The WNBA may be looking to top out at 18 franchises by 2029 or 2030, SBJ reported.
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