Liberty Legends On & Off the Hardwood
“Hold that follow-through!” “Better, but you really got to snap your wrist.” “Put your hand in the cookie jar!” Anyone who’s ever trained for basketball has heard these phrases in some capacity. But back in the early 2000s, I was hearing them for the first time from a New York Liberty legend. Lucky for me, she was also a fellow gym member of the 92nd St Y on the Upper East Side: Teresa Weatherspoon (NYL: 1997-2003).
Weatherspoon would often play in the open gym runs at the Y with the men, and she’d more than hold her own on both ends of the court. She was constantly leading her teams, and talking trash to everyone else. As a young kid, just starting to fall in love with the game, I was captivated by her game and her energy.
I would hang out on the side hoops, and shoot from in close, working on my touch and my form. I wasn’t strong enough to be shooting from far out anyways, and the risk of having the ball bounce into the pickup game was not worth it. In between games, Weatherspoon would offer up some advice on how to improve my shot, and to this day, I still use those tips with my own game.
Over the years, I would hear about other great guards for the Liberty like Becky Hammon and Cappie Pondexter doing their thing at the World’s Most Famous Arena, but the exposure to the women’s game just wasn’t as strong enough to pull me in. As an avid basketball fan, I’d know the household names in the WNBA, like Candace Parker, Diana Taurasi and Sue Bird but I wasn’t invested in the Liberty like I was with the other hoops team that shared Madison Square Garden.
Fast forward to college, and the exposure from media outlets like ESPN and Bleacher Report had picked up for the “W”, and I began to notice not only how great these women are on the court with their skills, but off the court with their commitment to service and fighting social injustices. At the same time, the Liberty were being sold by James Dolan (a true blessing to not have to be owned by JD), and bought by the Brooklyn Nets and their new owner, Joe Tsai (yet another blessing that they were able to stay local). Suddenly one of the original W franchises had a new home: (their one year stint in Westchester was yet another gaffe by Dolan) the state-of-the-art Barclays Center.
In 2018, the Liberty drafted Kia Nurse, a sharpshooter (out of the University of Connecticut), and in 2019, they landed a top-three pick and selected Asia Durr, a high-scoring lefty guard out of Louisville. The squad was still inexperienced, and they had a difficult season, mostly due to injuries, and ended up with the #1 pick for the 2020 Draft.
By the time the 2019-20 college basketball season had rolled around, every basketball fan knew the name: Sabrina Ionescu, the star guard at the University of Oregon. She had returned to college for her senior year to chase that elusive national title, the only award or accolade missing from her decorated resumé. Not only was I a fan of her game, but now I knew she was a lock to be playing in my city, so her games for the Ducks became appointment viewing. She ended up becoming the NCAA all-time leader in career triple-doubles, regardless of gender, as well as the only college player to ever score 2000+ points, snag a 1000+ rebounds, and dish a 1000+ assists. Ionescu even delivered a moving eulogy at Kobe and Gianna Bryant’s memorial service at the Staples Center in February 2020 — Kobe was not only an idol but a friend and mentor to her, and she had taken Gianna under her wing. It’s clear in Ionescu’s fierce play that she embodies the Mamba Mentality as well as any professional hooper in the world.
She is now the face of the NY franchise, and she represents a new beginning for the Liberty. The team’s debut season in Brooklyn will have to wait until 2021, as they are playing the 2020 season in the Wubble in Florida. But the Big Apple was the perfect landing spot for the sport’s newest star, and I’m so thrilled for her to have the chance to take the Liberty to new heights, both on the court, and in terms of respect and appreciation in this city.
All these years later, I’m prouder than ever to be a Liberty fan, and I love hearing from friends that they are tuning into the “W” as well. The future is ridiculously bright for coach Walt Hopkins and his young group, and as long as Ionescu and company remember to hold their follow-through, snap , it’s quite possible that the Barclays Center will be raising a banner soon for the Liberty’s first championship in franchise history.
