WNBA Wraparound: Caitlin Clark debuts, charter flights begin and a new team awarded to Toronto

The much-anticipated 2024 WNBA season begins tomorrow, and with it, so begins a new weekly FanSided column centered on the W — WNBA Wraparound.

Every Monday morning, we’ll review three notable highlights from the previous week, feature two games you have to tune into and dive into one larger story worth monitoring league-wide. 

3 highlights from last week around the WNBA

In the first week of preseason action, we witnessed the preseason debuts of Caitlin Clark, Angel Reese, Cameron Brink, and other rookies — all while being reminded that the league’s best players right now aren’t yet the ones who were drafted last month. At the same time, two exciting announcements shed light on the progress the league has made — a new team is coming to Toronto, and players will (eventually) no longer be flying commercial. 

1. Arike Ogunbowale spoils Caitlin Clark’s preseason debut: Clark’s first game with the Indiana Fever came in a three-point loss to the Dallas Wings — she finished with 21 points on 6-of-15 shooting, along with 3 rebounds, 2 assists, and 2 steals. While the national attention was on the number one draft pick, it was the Wing’s Arike Ogunbowale who hit the game-winning 3-pointer to cap off a 19-point performance. 

Ogunbowale, entering her sixth year in Dallas, is a career 20.2-point scorer and one of many stars across the league who haven’t quite gotten their due despite stuffing the stat sheet. Now, with more fans tuning into the league, exciting players like Ogunbowale who have been doing it at a high level for a very long time now should start getting the praise they deserve. 

2. The WNBA is coming to Toronto: After years of increasingly loud calls for more teams in the WNBA, it’s finally happening — Toronto has been granted an expansion franchise, set to formally join the league in 2026, according to CBC Sports. The league currently has 12 teams, with Golden State slated to become the 13th in 2025. Toronto will make it 14 teams in 2026. 

Expansion means that more elite and popular college players will have a chance to play in the league. Since each team only has 12 players, the league as a whole only has about 144 players – less than half of the players in the NBA. That has meant that a significant portion of high-profile prospects (such as LSU’s Alexis Morris and South Carolina’s Brea Beal) are waived soon after the draft. Expansion is a step toward having more roster spots in the league – all while bringing women’s professional basketball to new cities (and in this case, a new country). 

3. The WNBA is beginning charter flights: The league announced that a league-wide charter program will be phased in this season. That means that teams will eventually no longer fly commercially, a major priority for players given that the profile of the league and its stars has grown significantly in recent years. Last year, Brittney Griner, who was detained in Russia for 10 months, was harassed at an airport in Dallas, bringing more eyeballs to the fact players were still flying commercial. Now, with high-profile rookies like Caitlin Clark and Angel Reese joining the WNBA, calls for charter flights only intensified. Commissioner Cathy Engelbert announced on Thursday that a charter program with Delta Air Lines will begin in the 2024 season. 

“We have been hard at work to transform the business and build a sustainable economic model to support charter flights for the long term,” Engelbert said in an official statement. “While we still have a lot of work to do to continue to execute our strategic plan, we feel confident that the time is now to institute a full charter program to demonstrate our commitment to leading with a player-first agenda.”

2 WNBA games to tune into as the WNBA season officially begins on Tuesday

Indiana Fever @ Connecticut Sun – Tuesday, May 14 at 8 p.m. 

Caitlin Clark makes her professional debut at the Mohegan Sun in Uncasville, Connecticut, against a Sun team headlined by Alyssa Thomas, the WNBA’s all-time triple-double leader. Thomas is joined by DeWanna Bonner and Brionna Jones, two former All-Stars looking to make a championship run this year. The Sun finished with the league’s third-best record last season.

Meanwhile, Clark and the Fever will look to start their season on the right foot with a win on the road. National attention is on Clark, but don’t overlook the rest of this Fever roster. Aliyah Boston is last year’s Rookie of the Year and one of the game’s most dominant post players. Fever forward, Nalyssa Smith, who scored at least 20 points in both preseason games, will be another name to monitor in this one. 

Los Angeles Sparks @ Las Vegas Aces – Saturday, May 18 at 3 p.m. 

The two-time defending champs host the new-look Sparks on Saturday afternoon. The Aces are led by A’ja Wilson, the two-time league MVP who Nike just announced will get a signature shoe. They also boast some of the league’s top guards, including Kelsey Plum, Chelsea Gray, and Jackie Young. Each of the starting guards averaged at least 15 points last season, with Plum leading the way with 18.7 points per game. Plum held the women’s NCAA all-time scoring record until Clark broke that record this past Spring.

The Sparks are in a rebuilding year but have two of the league’s top rookies – Stanford’s Cameron Brinks, the top defensive prospect in the draft, and Tennessee’s Rickea Jackson. 

1 WNBA story to monitor this week: How do the rookies adjust? 

In two preseason games, Caitlin Clark averaged 16.5 points on 37 percent shooting — a small sample size, but a reminder that it’s likely not going to be dominance from the get-go for Clark. Cameron Brink, the No. 2 pick, is going to have to stay out of foul trouble but should get some run on a rebuilding Sparks team. In 30 minutes across two preseason games, Brink scored 18 points on 7-of-11 shooting, grabbed 7 rebounds, and swatted two shots. The Sparks also won both preseason games this year. 

Kamila Cardoso, who was drafted third by the Chicago Sky, is out for a couple of weeks with a shoulder injury, but the Sky will get to debut Angel Reese, who they selected with the No. 7 pick. Reese has looked dominant so far in the preseason — averaging 13 points, 7 rebounds, and 2 steals in two games. 

Clark, Brink, and Reese are just three of the rookies who will be launching their professional careers this week — the Sparks’ Rickea Jackson and Washington Mystics’ Aaliyah Edwards will be two other rookies to watch.