Napheesa Collier caps busy weekend with All-Star Game MVP Award in win over Team Clark
First, she made all the right picks for her roster. Then she answered all the labor questions. And finally, she showed everyone, even the WNBA's young guns, how to stay focused on basketball.
The five-time All-Star scored a record 36 points, grabbed nine rebounds and led the aptly named Team Collier past Team Clark 151-131 in the highest scoring All-Star Game in WNBA history. Naturally, Collier was selected the MVP.
She made 13 of 16 shots, four from the specially designed AT&T logo 4-point-line that seemed perfectly aligned for Caitlin Clark, the other team captain who didn't play because of a right groin injury. And it was all by design.
'I tried to make my team not have that many new players,' Collier said. 'I've played with a lot of them and so it was good to get back with them, play with, like you said, some of those new players I haven't played with before.'
But for Collier, this weekend in Indianapolis was about much more than a single game.
The vice president of the Women's National Basketball Players Association executive committee and a co-founder of the Unrivaled basketball league never got distracted by a demanding schedule that forced her to prioritize the WNBA's future over adding another award to her trophy case.
Collier spent Thursday afternoon negotiating a new collective bargaining agreement and Friday answering questions from a throng of reporters detailing the meeting. On Saturday, she shared the pregame stage with Clark for a news conference between the captains. And after the game, there were even more questions about the CBA.
'I feel like I haven't been able to forget it (Thursday's meeting) because people won't let us, which is amazing,' Collier said. 'Just the awareness we've raised this weekend, you guys asking these questions, the fans doing the chants, that, like, gave me chills.'
But Collier also helped fuel the effort.
She, like the other All-Stars, wore a T-shirt that read 'Pay us what you owe us' during pregame warmups.
Then she reinforced the message with a historic game.
Collier broke the All-Star Game's individual scoring record while her team scored a record 82 first-half points. Another of Collier's picks, Seattle guard Skylar Diggins, became the first player with an All-Star triple-double in the same venue she led Notre Dame to the national championship game more than a decade ago.
And Collier even connected with rookie Paige Bueckers, both former UConn stars, for a basket. The captain couldn't have scripted it any better.
'We set a lot of records,' Collier said. 'Skylar had a triple-double, which is insane. It was just so fun. We had a great time.'
___
AP WNBA: https://apnews.com/hub/wnba-basketball
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Yahoo
26 minutes ago
- Yahoo
Shohei Ohtani's two-run home run (34)
Shohei Ohtani hits a two-run home run to left field, his 34th of the season, extending the Dodgers' lead to 3-0 in the 3rd inning
Yahoo
26 minutes ago
- Yahoo
JC Tretter resigns from NFL Players Association
First, Lloyd Howell. Now, JC Tretter. In a lengthy interview that was posted earlier this hour, Tretter tells Jonathan Jones of that Tretter is resigning from the NFL Players Association. The former union president had returned last year, as the NFLPA's chief strategy officer. "Over the last couple days, it has gotten very, very hard for my family," Tretter said. "And that's something I can't deal with. So, the short bullet points are: I have no interest in being [executive director]. I have no interest in being considered; I've let the executive committee know that. I'm also going to leave the NFLPA in the coming days because I don't have anything left to give the organization." But Tretter was a candidate to become the interim executive director. And Pablo Torre's reporting pointed to a broader strategy by Tretter to eventually succeed Lloyd Howell as the full-time, non-interim leader of the union. "I want to get my story out there, and I don't want it to look like this was sour grapes or I didn't get the job and I wanted the job," Tretter said. "All I want to do is tell my story and then go be with my family." He did indeed get his story out there. It comes off as a one-way effort from Tretter to provide his version on anything and everything, with little if any pointed questions or followup. "I'm not resigning because what I've been accused of is true," Tretter said. "I'm not resigning in disgrace. I'm resigning because this has gone too far for me and my family, and I've sucked it up for six weeks. And I felt like I've been kind of left in the wind taking shots for the best of the organization. . . . "I got to the point this morning where I woke up and I realized, like, I am going to keep dying on this fucking sword forever of, I'll never, ever be able to do what's best for me. And I will always pick what's best for the organization. And in the end, what's the organization done for me? Like, nothing. "I've been a bullet shield for six weeks for them where everything that's been controversial, it just all dumps down on me, and I've had nothing to fucking do with it. And that's when I was like, I'm done taking bullets for the [organization] on stuff I wasn't a part of and did not do." Or course, he did badmouth Russell Wilson after he failed to get a fully-guaranteed deal. (Tretter says he called Wilson a "fucking loser" in a text message to former NFLPA executive director DeMaurice Smith.) Also, Tretter suggested that disgruntled players should fake injuries, sparking a grievance the NFLPA lost in a slam-dunk ruling. So his hands aren't entirely clean. Even without the application of any elbow grease as to the various positions he took in his comments to CBS. Either way, now ends Tretter's time with the union. Since the NFLPA didn't previously have a chief strategy officer, it may not replace him. For now, the primary challenge becomes hiring an interim executive director.
Yahoo
26 minutes ago
- Yahoo
Guardians aren't interested in change after President Trump calls for them, Commanders to go back to old offensive nicknames
The Cleveland Guardians sound very good with their decision to rebrand, even after President Donald Trump randomly called for them to revert back to the old 'Indians' nickname on Sunday. Trump made a long post on Truth Social on Sunday calling for both the Guardians and the NFL's Washington Commanders to revert back to their old team names. He even threatened to block the Commanders' impending move back to D.C. and their new stadium if they failed to do so. While not mentioning Trump by name, Guardians president Chris Antonetti made it clear they aren't interested in moving backward on Sunday. 'I understand there are very different perspectives on the decision we made a few years ago, but it's a decision we made and we've gotten the opportunity to build the brand as the Guardians over the last four years and we're excited about the future that's in front of us,' he said, via The Athletic. The Commanders have not addressed Trump's post. The Guardians officially changed their team name ahead of the 2022 season, shortly after they stopped using the old 'Chief Wahoo' logo, which many saw as racist and offensive toward Native Americans. The Commanders retired their old 'Redskins' nickname in 2020. They went by the Washington Football Team briefly before landing on the Commanders. Their old nickname, which had been in use since 1933, was widely seen as an offensive slur and drew plenty of criticism in its final years of use. 'For obvious reasons,' Commanders owner Josh Harris said in August, that can't return. 'I think [Commanders] is now embraced by our team, by our culture, by our coaching staff,' he said earlier this year, via ESPN. 'So we're going with that.' Though it's unclear if the threat of blocking their stadium deal, real or not, will sway the Commanders, both Harris and Antonetti seem very content with their franchises' new names.
