← No Offseason: The Athletic Women's Basketball Show
No Offseason: The Athletic Women's Basketball Show
Will Unrivaled Reach New Heights In Year 2?
00:56:51
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- [00:00]
Commercial Narrator
It's that time of year again for taxes. We all know the stress of the old way of filing. You send your documents off and then absolute radio silence. You're stuck refreshing your inbox and sending awkward just checking in texts, wondering if they've even started. But with TurboTax Expert full service I know my TurboTax Expert takes taxes fully off my plate and updates me every step of the way so I don't have to worry. That way I can get back to the things that matter to me, like going on vacation in the spring or enjoying the NFL off season. So stop chasing updates. It's time to switch to the modern tax filing Solution with Intuit TurboTax. The best part? You can get experts progress right on your phone while you go about your day. So go for a run or grab a coffee. You'll know your dedicated expert is handling it, looking for every last deduction to get you the best possible outcome and every dollar you deserve. File with confidence. Visit turbotax.com, only available with TurboTax Full Service Experts real time updates only in iOS mobile app when everything is moving all at once, your workforce, your tech stack, your business, you don't need more tools. You need one solution.
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Ben Pickman
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Zena Kaeda
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Start now at paylocity.com 1 we're in.
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Sadly not on holiday, but we've got.
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Visit euromonitor.com where everywhere you need to be.
- [01:58]
Zena Kaeda
Foreign.
- [02:13]
Ben Pickman
Hello everyone and welcome to no Off Season. I'm Zena Kaeda.
- [02:18]
Sabrina Merchant
I'm Sabrina Merchant.
- [02:19]
Zena Kaeda
And I'm Ben Pickman.
- [02:21]
Ben Pickman
And it's been too long. Welcome back, guys. I'm so happy we are having another episode of no Off Season. And today on the show we're going into another league of basketball that's kicked off unrivaled, officially tipped off yesterday and we're previewing year two. There are new faces, there are expanded teams and an added night of competition. We're going to break down who is poised to shine and gain momentum. Show us who's Been working and growing in the off season and just how success is defined in the league's second season. Plus, we're going to look at what this season looks like without one of Unrivaled's foundational pieces. I'm sure you guys saw the news. We'll break that down. Let's get into it. First, we gotta do a quick check in around the country because conference play is in full swing. Should I say full chaos? Okay. Things have looked a little bit different than before we took our winter break and we want to share some of our takeaways from the past couple of weeks. In women's college hoops, we've seen a couple of undefeated teams go down. Sabrina, they took their first loss and you've had your eye on some of these matchups over the last few weeks. So what are your takeaways?
- [03:27]
Sabrina Merchant
Well, yeah, let's talk about those undefeateds first of all. Right. At the end of last year, 2025, I wrote about the 12 undefeated teams remaining in college basketball. And that was one week ago. And now we have four undefeated teams remaining in college basketball. So it has been quite a week. Of course, some of those undefeateds, you know, part of the process was looking at their schedules, figuring out who they'd beaten, why exactly. It was they were undefeated to begin with and spoiler alert, because they hadn't really fled anyone, but there were quite a few upsets that did end up happening over this past week. And so, you know, I think we can get into those. The one that really stood out to me was TCU versus Utah because TCU really seemed like they had a lot of structural advantages against Utah. You know, the big and tall thing really plays well against Utah.
- [04:08]
Ben Pickman
Right.
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Sabrina Merchant
And yet just one thing that stood out to me was how not deep TCU is. You know, I think about all the players who defined the Horned Frogs over the last couple years as donut Princes, Hayley Van Litz, Madison Connors of the world. And I look at that team and there's maybe four players I trust and not a lot beyond that. And that was something that really, you know, stood out in that game against the Utes.
- [04:30]
Ben Pickman
Yeah, for me, what stood out? Utah can shoot threes. Yeah, right. It was, it was very impressive. And TCU just got beat in the half court a lot by those actions that got wide open. Threes, very clean threes for Utah. But it was. That's a really good point. TCU might be searching from to death again. This isn't the first year we saw this last year as well. A little bit. So very interesting, Ben. A little bit crazy that we're down to four undefeated teams, but any wins or losses that stood out to you in the last few weeks?
- [05:05]
Zena Kaeda
I mean, I think we should Highlight Vanderbilt beating LSU. That was LSU's second straight loss. They had lost down at the buzzer to Kentucky a couple nights earlier and then fell to Vandy at Vandy over the weekend. And look, Vandy was one of those teams that I think there were some questions about what they were going to be entering this year, just how good they were actually going to be in relation to the rest of the sec. I think they were picked to finish towards the bottom half of the conference in the like preseason coaches poll. And they like some of the other undefeated teams at the end of 2025, there were some questions about, well, they haven't really beat anyone or they didn't have a signature win. And they certainly come away from this LSU victory with a signature win. Like, I know we can talk about LSU and how they played a very soft schedule, but credit to Vanderbilt for, you know, eking out a very, very competitive, tightly contested game. Michaela Blakes, you know, is the star of the Commodore. She is certainly a name to know for people who are just plugging into women's college basketball. This year. She scores 32 in that win and that's against a very talented LSU team that has a number of like some of the best defensive guards or most athletic guards in the country to try and slow her down. If you look at Vandy, one of the thing that's most impressive for them, they were an elite offensive team last year. They were top 20 overall in offensive rating, but defensively they were like outside the top 100. I think they were 140th overall in terms of defensive rating. They've climbed to inside the top 20. And a big reason why is they're much improved around the rim. If you look at the percentage of shots that they block last year it was around 6%, 7% of opposing field goal attempts they block. This year that's closer to 15%. And it's not just one player kind of doing all the shot blocking. They have three players on their roster who are averaging more than one block shot per game.
- [06:49]
Sabrina Merchant
Oh, you think about all the talent Vanderbilt lost over the off season, Camille Pierre, Ayanna Moore and all of that offensive firepower. Well, Sasha Washington didn't play last season and her being back has been a huge boon to their rebounding. The defense that you talked about, Ben Aubrey, Galvin, a freshman that we really didn't have much hype for coming into the season has just been fantastic. Her playmaking, last I checked, she was averaging, you know, just south of seven assists per game during the regular season. So it's, it's been a very impressive start for Vanderbilt and to, to cement that with that type of win over lsu. Even if it was, you know, a little bit of a questionable call at the end that stepping out of bounds, they still were up by three at that point. So I think you'd still put Vanderbilt in strong position to win that game regardless.
- [07:29]
Ben Pickman
And I don't know how much we can take these losses and freak out about lsu, but I do think that there was something to be said about when LSU is forced to guard in the half court, things look a little difficult, especially when they're not able to turn the ball over and get their offense going the other way.
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Zena Kaeda
Ben well, exactly. And Kim Mulkey talked about like her team not having the right amount of toughness right now entering the start of SEC play. And she seemingly also talked about like she basically said something along the lines of it's a good thing we didn't play very hard competition in the non conference because we've started conference play and look how we have fared. And I think you can poke some holes in that argument. Maybe they should have played some tougher competition to prepare them for the start of SEC conference play. But we've certainly seen like, you know, we talked about it on this show. What is lsu? How good are they? I mean seemingly week after week, for the first month, month and a half, two months of the season, they were sitting pretty comfortably inside the top five of the AP poll, top six of the AP poll, what have you. They hadn't really beat anyone, like no signature wins. You know, they had beat Duke by 16 earlier in the year. I guess that was kind of their best win. But that was. And we had some questions about Duke because of the slow start they had gotten off to. And now suddenly, you know, LSLU drops these two games. It doesn't exactly get easier for them either. They play Georgia, who just a week ago was ranked inside the top 25. They were an undefeated team. They played Texas at the end of this week. Believe on Sunday is that game. Then they play Oklahoma next. Oklahoma now has climbed to fifth in the AP poll. I want to say it's their highest AP ranking in like decades.
- [09:02]
Sabrina Merchant
2009, right?
- [09:04]
Zena Kaeda
Or okay, so just 2009, but still this is a much improved Oklahoma. So second easier for LSU. You got to imagine they're going to get one of them. But, you know, doesn't get easier in the sec. We'll have more to say on that.
- [09:16]
Ben Pickman
It doesn't. It doesn't. And you talk about the fact the SEC is big and LSU also got exposed with their rebounding. They weren't offensive rebounding like they typically do. Like they were against these type, these smaller teams. They weren't turning folks over. They weren't running in transition. Like it, they were slowed down and that dried up their offense. And that is not going to be okay going up against these SEC teams that are big and they like to battle. Now, it's interesting you mentioned that, Ben, the comment that Kimoki mentioned about the teams that they play and how these losses are, I guess revealing something to LSU about things that need to get better. Because it sounds very similar to the comments that Audi Crooks made after Iowa State had their loss recently. And Sabrina Adi was saying, basically, hey, it's good that we lost this game because basically her shooting the shots that she missed, the rebounds that she missed, if they had won the game, it wouldn't have mattered. Right. When you lose a game, all those things get exposed. And I particularly love this quote. You don't want to be a monster in January, you want to be a monster in March. And talk to me a little bit about, you know, Iowa State was one of those teams that was rolling. They also had a little bit of the LSU moniker of playing some teams that aren't the most competitive. But, but we started seeing them going up against some teams. They were able to get a big win out over Iowa. We thought, okay, maybe they'll be fine. But this game showed us a little bit more. What'd you think about that one?
- [10:44]
Sabrina Merchant
Yeah, I think, you know, big picture, it just shows that this, like you said, this is not the time of the year when you want to be peaking. This is not the time of year when you.
- [10:52]
Ben Pickman
Right, right.
- [10:53]
Sabrina Merchant
Like you said about what out said, this is not the time of year that you want to be peaking or playing your best basketball. But it also sort of reveals that, like, this is the time of year where we start to learn about these teams because during December, a lot of the matchups weren't super high profile. You know, I talk about this, how difficult it is to even find like the three best games to highlight at some points over the course of the week in those power rankings that I write. And now it's like every single Thursday, Sunday, Monday, Tuesday, like there is A game that is marquee, that is going to teach us something about these teams. And it's no longer like Vanderbilt beating up on our lady of Perpetual Christ or something like that. Like, there are real games happening every single night. And this is the important time, right? This is when you start to learn, like, is our rebounding good enough? Is our one on one defense good enough? Where do we have deficits that need to be addressed? And yeah, it's cool that there were 12 teams that were undefeated, but I think, you know, Nebraska losing twice, Iowa State losing, you know, LSU losing twice. Like, this is a lot more interesting for our purposes than the games that we were seeing in December.
- [11:51]
Ben Pickman
Agree.
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Zena Kaeda
Well, and I think one of the other things that stuck out to me from these last two weeks was like, not to even just big picture, there were so many blowouts, right? Like, even teams that we thought were competitive got blown out, right? Ole Miss is a good example of a team that takes Texas down to the wire on Sunday. They lose by just three, but Michigan State beat them by what, like 16, 17 points. We saw a team like North Carolina, well, they beat Cal and then they lose to Stanford. Or a good example is usc. They beat Nebraska, rather, who was previously unranked by seven. And then they get total, you know, breaks beaten off of them by UCLA. They lose by 30 plus. Like, there were so many results like that up and down the top 25 of the poll. It was really hard to gauge this week. I assume you had this kind of struggle too, Sabrina, like, who to rank where, like, how many? Who do you slide up? Who do you drop down? Because when you got past some of the top four, top five, I mean, almost every. I mean, for the top 10, only four teams in last week's top 10 went undefeated still or did not lose, rather, you know, from Christmas to now when we're recording this. And then there was just so much other. Like, this team gets a good win, but they also pick up their first loss or they pick up their second loss and blow out fashion. There was just a lot of that. That. To your point, Sabrina, like, we're now starting to learn and it was really the first time we're getting a data point. So it's like, how much do you react to that data point we have just received, right?
- [13:21]
Sabrina Merchant
And with all that data, I mean, I still feel like I don't know a lot about most of these teams, right? Like, I know UConn's good, I know Texas is good. I know the teams that have Only lost to UConn in Texas are probably pretty good, but beyond that, it's very hard to determine like where the fault lines are, like, who I can really think of as a hosting team because if you ask me, like the difference between, you know, Washington, which started the this week unranked but then picked up an excellent win over Michigan, or like Iowa, which had been ranked much higher. But then it's just there's so many differing data points that we're getting that it's great to be getting all of this data finally. But also being able to parse it out is a much harder challenge than it was for the poll three, four weeks ago.
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Ben Pickman
I'll say this just to close this out. Speaking of Washington and that win over Michigan, I realized I didn't share any of these actual game scores.
- [14:12]
Sabrina Merchant
There's been like a thousand since. There's been millions of.
- [14:15]
Ben Pickman
Exactly. It is worth saying that I would say their loss was to Baylor. 72. 70. I want to first call out, shout out. Finally, Baylor double downs, hard double downs on Audi Crooks. Still, she had over 25 points. Like, let's just be real. She. She still was very, very, very good. Got a double double. But the double downs happened and Iowa State was not shooting well. And I was like, yes, I love this. Let's see if other teams do this. Another thing, I'll call out Washington and their UCLA backpacks. I was ripping out my hair watching that game, trying to figure out Michigan. It's the same. It's the same play. They're going to pass it to the wing and the guard that just passed it is going to backpick off a big. And they got that play over and over and over again. So, yeah, anyone who's playing Washington for the rest of the year, I just said, you're scout, figure it out. Like, come on, guys, it's a little too easy. Okay. It was a lot to catch up on. We're still going to get ourselves acclimated, of course, as we get back into the new year. But conference play is here, the chaos is here, the competition is here. And that is what's so important for NCAA women's basketball. But now we have another chaotic league to talk about. We got to talk about unrivaled on the other side of this break. So don't go anywhere.
- [15:36]
Commercial Narrator
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- [17:52]
Ben Pickman
Okay, so at the time that we're recording this, I'm literally I've got a TV on in the background and the laces are taken on the vinyl. I just watched the the mist take over the hive to open up the unrivaled season. So clearly year two of unrivaled is underway. And sadly, we learned that before this season tipped off one of its founding members. Last year's mvp, Nafisa Collier is out for the season due to injuries to both ankles. And I remember reading this on New Year's on January 1, she announced on Instagram that she would be getting surgery and she stated, I have fought hard over the last few months to be back with my Owls and was devastated to be told by my team of doctors that surgery was the best path forward. I will still be cheering on my teammates every step of the way and I will continue to work relentlessly with the rest of the players and our staff to push our sport forward and raise the bar for women's basketball. And I had a teammate in college that got double ankle surgery. It's intense, it's hard work. And of course you're thinking about it from the unrivaled perspective. You're also thinking about it from a WNBA perspective because the season is supposed to come. We'll see what happens with the CBA.
- [19:03]
Sabrina Merchant
But Ben, deadline on January 9th.
- [19:05]
Ben Pickman
Definitely. Yeah, exactly. Definitely not on January 9th. But Ben, Sabrina, can you take us back to, you know, what injuries were contributing to the pain that she's been dealing with over the last few months leading to this surgery decision and what's her expected timeline? That's what everyone wants to know. How can soon can we see Nafisa Collier take the court again?
- [19:26]
Zena Kaeda
Sure. So as you mentioned on New Year's Day, unrivaled announcer Nafisa Collier, the co founder of the league, the Lunar Owl star, the Minnesota Link Star, would miss the entirety of the upcoming unrivaled season with, you know, these ankle injuries. She is going to need surgery on both of her ankles and that surgery is expected to occur this week according to a source briefed on the situation told me the league said that her expected recovery is four to six months. So she's not only going to miss the start of the unrivaled season, but if you look at the far end of that range, six months, that takes you to, you know, the start or the early stages of the WNBA season. And so you have to think back to last WNBA season Xena, about when did these injuries occur and what why is it taken so long to get surgery? Because Nafisa Collier sprained her right ankle, if you remember, during the all important August 2nd game between the Minnesota Links and the Las Vegas Aces. This was the game in which the Links beat the Aces by more than 50 points. I want to say what, 53 was the final margin? Something like that. And Fee goes down late in the third quarter. The game's already in hand obviously, but she goes down. She suffers this right ankle injury. She sits from then until August 24th when she makes her return. She continues to play the rest of the regular season, almost all of the postseason. And seemingly there were, you know, issues with her right ankle that lingered and now she's going to need surgery to repair those torn ligaments in her right ankle. Then of course, if you remember game three of Minnesota's WNBA semifinals lost to the Phoenix Mercury in the closing seconds of that game, when you have the, you know, contentious play with Alyssa Thomas that leads to Cheryl Reeve being upset and our performance of the year. If you think back to our year.
- [21:06]
Sabrina Merchant
End awards episode of the year.
- [21:07]
Zena Kaeda
Sorry, I should say my performance of the year. Let me take ownership for the takes I've made. Nafisa Collier suffers ligament tears in her left ankle and a muscle tear in her left shin during the closing seconds there. Now what is so interesting here is that, you know, in mid December I actually asked Fee on an unrivaled zoom, did she need surgery and was she expecting to play at the start of this season. And to that she said that she did not need surgery on her left ankle and that she hoped that through rehab she would be ready by January 5th to play, you know, in Unrivals opener. That seemingly obviously is not the case. Right. That in the weeks between then and now, her medical team, including staff from both Unrivaled and the Lynx, determined she needs these multiple procedures and additional exams during Unrivaled preseason determine that, you know, she's going to need the surgery. So that's kind of the Nafisa Collier situation. She's still going to be around the league. She's still going to be in the building very often as a co founder. I think her presence will still be felt. Alex Bizzell, the lead co founder or lead president rather, and her husband said that, you know, you can expect to maybe hear on some broadcasts. I think we'll see her in social content. She's going to be around, but she's obviously not going to be on the court.
- [22:14]
Ben Pickman
And Sabrina, we know that the Lunar Owl not having Nafisa Collier definitely impacts their season to start out immediately. But you know, how much do you think Lunar Owls will be able to bounce back from literally not having their MVP as a part of this team?
- [22:29]
Sabrina Merchant
It's a very different Lunar Owls roster than the one we saw a year ago. You know, you think about that starting lineup of Skylar Diggins, Nafisa Collier and Alicia Gray. They were only able to protect two of those players. Alicia Gray already doing great things for the Mist alongside Unrivaled co founder Brianna Stewart in that first game.
- [22:45]
Ben Pickman
She's just jumping from founder to founder, there she is.
- [22:47]
Sabrina Merchant
It's a really good format for Elisha Gray. I think things have been going well for her. But yeah, the Lunar Isles is just. It's an incredibly different roster. No more Courtney Williams, you know, no more Shakira Austin. So Temifag Benle, you know, big for Big, I suppose, coming in for Nafisa Collier, but a very different type of player than Fee. Not carrying the scoring load or the creation load that Anfisa Collier was assuming a year ago when, as you said, she was the inaugural unrivaled mvp. You know, I look at that and I don't, I don't think of Lunar Owls really as a contender anymore. And we'll get into like, how we see all these eight teams stacking up over the course of the season, but, like, it's just a real bummer because we didn't get to see a fully healthy Nafisa Collier end WNBA season because of, you know, what happened in the Phoenix game and really, honestly what happened in that Las Vegas game that sort of set her on a path where she didn't finish the season strong enough to win MVP with the wnba and now for her to miss out on another full season of professional basketball and then hamper the wwe, because if we hit that six month recovery period, like we're talking about July, that Nafisa comes back and like, that's halfway through, optimistically, a WNBA season. So that's just you think about a player at the peak of her power is one of the very best in the world. Like, you know, top three, top five, however you want to put it, top two even. Like, it just sucks that we don't get to see her or that we don't get to see her when she is again playing as well as she has ever played basketball. So, yeah, just. Just a real bummer. I mean, I think Alex Bissell said it the same way, like in the lead up to Unrivaled's full day of basketball on January 5th, that like, she's really bummed. It's a bummer that we don't have her. But it's very deep league, a lot of star power. And you know this, anytime there's an injury, it leaves an opening for somebody else to assume that role of like, you know, not necessarily the face of the league, but, like, who can, who can produce in a way that, like, we start to forget that Fi is.
- [24:32]
Ben Pickman
Not playing in a way that they can pop right, and add a little bit of brand recognition to their, their game. Well, we wish Fee a speedy and healthy and safe recovery. I am personally like the only positive that is coming out of this is I would be very curious to hear Nafisa Collier on broadcast. I'd love to hear her takeaways and you know how she breaks the game down. A very strong.
- [24:55]
Sabrina Merchant
She can't defend her one on one title either, right? Oh, there you go. A lot of missing out for Fee.
- [25:00]
Ben Pickman
But she's got the insight as to how to be successful in this league and so hopefully we do get to hear from her throughout this season. But let's talk about the players who are out on the floor, these teams that are taking the court. You already alluded to it, Sabrina. A lot of teams look very different because they could only protect two players going into this season. So not only do you have some names on new teams donning new jerseys, which I think we have some comments and thoughts on some of these jerseys as well that you might be able to share, but we also have new faces. We've got some new rookies that are coming into the league. Rookies for unrivaled and I think is different from an experience perspective because they're just like brand new rookies, as in they've never played in the league, but we've got rookies from the WNBA that are now playing in unrivaled as well. So let's get all into it. There's so much going on. The league has expanded from six teams to eight. The regular season now has 56 games and that seems like a lot. But it's also there's an expanded schedule to be able to fit them all in. They have a fourth night of weekly games and they are making their first ever tour stop outside of its usual base in quote, unquote Doral, Miami.
- [26:08]
Zena Kaeda
So no, no, no, no. Quote, quote, unquote Miami complex. Actually Dorals. You know, we should make that correction.
- [26:14]
Sabrina Merchant
Medley.
- [26:15]
Zena Kaeda
Yeah, it's medley. Florida medley. It's the same.
- [26:18]
Ben Pickman
Yeah, it's the same, but yes. Okay, thank you. So it's Miami, y'. All. They turn it up in quote, unquote, Miami. Thank you, Ben. So I talked a little bit about that, Ben, about just like how things are growing, what else is coming about. There's a player pool, little bit of opportunity for even more names to get involved.
- [26:35]
Zena Kaeda
Yeah. So as part of the expansion, you know, they added two more teams. Right. So right off the bat that's 12 more players. And then they've added six developmental player spots. And so those are players that are designed to Kind of be injury relief players throughout the season. They are primarily young players in their WNBA career. So that's Haley Van Lith, Haley Jones, Isaiah James, Mikayla Timpson, Emily Ansler and Leticia Ami. Here you know, players that are all, you know, first, second, third year. So in the W. And there are players who will basically be on call because last year, if you remember, injuries were one of the kind of problems that I think players talked about. The wear and tear on player bodies, the fatigue caused by the format and by the scheduling. Right. And so here's a group of players that are now on call so that someone like Nas Hillman or Natisha Hydman doesn't have to fly in from China and basically immediately suit up and play in an unrivaled game. The schedule schedule also has eliminated back to back. So they're going to play on four nights of the week this year, Friday, Saturday, Sunday and Monday again on TNT and TruTV and I guess streaming on Max. That is not a sponsored plug, but Max wants to sponsor the show.
- [27:43]
Ben Pickman
Thank you.
- [27:43]
Zena Kaeda
You can sponsor that. But so that is where they're streaming and there's no back to back. So that is again another change that the league has tried to make in thinking about player health and player well being. There's other growth more broadly. Right. So they've not only expanded the player pool but as in an effort to further the commitment to player experience, they've added an additional practice gym, they've added an additional weight room. Each team has their own dedicated trainer and development coach. Right. Last year those were some shared services between, I want to say two teams. Now every team has one of those. So those are just some of the broad changes from year one to year two. Again, a lot of this is stemming from player feedback and that is something that Fee talked about that still this is a league that is by players, for players. They're proud of that fact. They talk about it all the time. The player feedback informs all the changes they've made. And those are just some of the new developments that have taken shape this year as they enter year two.
- [28:39]
Ben Pickman
Okay. All right, so let's go ahead and get into it because we know year one had everyone buzzing. It was fun, it was exciting. It was a little bit of something to feed your WNBA appetite from a player perspective at least and a personality and storyline perspective during the off season. And they want to grow on that. Of course, Nafeesa Collier and Brianna Stewart continuing to iterate and address the things that were issues from years the Year prior and also the things that they want to continue to build upon. The sponsorship is still there. We saw the social media has already been popping. These teams admins are competing against each other for audience attention. And I'm loving already all the engagement. Sabrina, talk a little bit to me about, like the Unrivaled and just how, for lack of a better word, unrivaled they are at really tapping into the social media aspect of the audience and creating personalities not only for the league, but for each team, which in itself brings in more people and wanting to watch and be along for the ride throughout this year too.
- [29:48]
Sabrina Merchant
Yeah, I think the social experience of Unrivaled from a fan perspective had to have been the number one success story of season one. Just the way they unraveled, unveiled all of the players. Like you said, the branding for the teams, the fact that, like, they already had a fan name, you know, for the fans of each team. Right. Like if you were like a soulmate of the laces. Right. Or like turning up the volume for the vinyl. Like, the fact that all of this existed already so soon, I thought was really impressive. Just the way it built. I do think that, like, the way the league works, like, they need to build more in, like, the viewership side and the basketball part of it. Like, I think about the way I experienced Unrivaled last year and obviously it was a phenomenal, you know, just social experience. And I mean, I think about when I opened my Instagram two days ago and every single post was just, bg is on unrivaled and Sony Citron is on unrivaled. And it was like 54 of these and probably too much, but that was almost, I think, the only way I engaged with Unrival as the season proceeded last year. I think about how hot it started and how Fun Lunar Isles vs Mist was on opening night and the novelty of the format and then the injuries start to hit and it really hits into the bulk of the college season. And the finals of the season are being played on the same night as selection Sunday. And I'm hoping that, like, there's a way that Unrivaled can continue to pique my interest from a basketball perspective as the season goes along this year because obviously there's a tremendous amount of hype around it and, like, it's the way it intersected with WNBA free agency was a lot of fun, but I'm interested to see, you know, how the basketball product really takes center stage this year in a way that I think it didn't last year 1.
- [31:22]
Ben Pickman
Sabrina, I just want to say I agree with you. I do think that there were. There were highs and lows throughout the season and there were pops, right? Like the one on one tournament was a pop throughout the unrivaled season. And it was like totally like we were, we were locked in for that. But there was conflicting weekends with NBA games. If you're a fan of both leagues, there were definitely conflicting weekends when it came to NCAA games as well. And you just felt like it was. It became harder to try and like really lock in with unrivaled. And that makes me think, Ben, one of the things that they did incredibly well and really set a standard going into what some of these WNBA teams did during the summer was the sponsorships. Their deals were crazy, right? In terms of being able to get a sponsorship, excuse me, a TV deal with TNT and HBO Max and all the things that you just, they laid out beautifully and your sponsor plug just a second ago. But being able to get the Sephora reps and all these different things that they did was just like, ooh, very shiny, very new, very marquee. I feel like there's something to that and how they can try and integrate themselves with things that are already going on so that people can keep being bought into the basketball product. Like, for example, this year, the one on one tournaments finally is on February 14, which is the weekend of NBA All Star. But it's also the weekend of a lot of. In the middle of conference play for some of these big tournaments. They're making a stop outside of Miami. Is there a way that they could kind of link up with one of these NCAA teams or maybe like a. I don't know, something that we. They could work with a conference or something that makes you want to pay attention to not only unrival, but also whatever basketball product you're also following throughout the winter season.
- [33:11]
Zena Kaeda
Well, I first was Gonna say Xena, February 14, also Valentine's Day. So I don't know about how you're gonna spend your Valentine's Day, but maybe it's watching the unrival one on one tournament.
- [33:21]
Ben Pickman
Really that's what came to mind. Yeah, good point, Great point. But yes, either way, to my point of there's other things going on. What can unrival do to kind of partner into the current schedule to make people remember there's basketball games and they're meaningful?
- [33:37]
Zena Kaeda
Yeah, I mean, I think a lot of people are interested in the basketball because it serves as a checkpoint for kind of their favorite player. Right. Or their favorite players. You know, it's a good opportunity to see Brianna Stewart recover from an injury. It's a good opportunity to see Paige Beckers or Dominique Malanga or Skyler Diggins or Kelsey Plum name your, you know, player of choice, right? So many of the biggest names in the sport, even with Nafisa Collier's injury with, even with Caitlin Clark and Asia Wilson and Sabrina Ines going, Angel Reese not participating, almost everyone else, you know, of some of the biggest names are participating in this league, right. So that's number one. I think one of the questions though is how do you get someone to care about the Mist or the Lunar Owls or the Breeze, like and the actual results of those games and not just kind of the energy and the aura around the team that is, you know, created on social. Right. Because I do think, as Sabrina said.
- [34:35]
Sabrina Merchant
There'S so much turnover, right Ben?
- [34:37]
Zena Kaeda
Right, exactly. And so I think there's clearly energy and engagement around the social content on a team by team basis. But it will be interesting to see if that translates to consistency across viewership, right. Of people watching the games. I think last year they actually did find that there was very, there was not a drop off team to team or a significant drop off from like the most watched team to the least watched team in terms of viewership. I want to say it was just a couple thousand viewers between highest and lowest. And so what that tells me is a lot of people were tuning in to watch just unrivaled because they wanted to watch the league. Now we should also say in terms of viewership, right, it was around 220,000 last year across TNT and TruTV and simulcast on HBO. That is very consistent with the NWSL's viewership this past year on ESPN and across the ESPN networks. That was 228 was the average viewer viewership. It's a little less what unrivaled had in terms of viewership than the NHL regular season games that are broadcast on hbo. Alex Bizzell told me that he is proud of, you know, the engagement that they have. And he used the word ecstatic when thinking about their TV media rights deal with TNT and said that, look, TNT is clearly happy with or happy enough with that viewership number because they invested more money as part of a capital raise this off season, this unrivaled off season and also agreed to broadcast another night right. Of games. And so if they were not happy with how year one went, then why would they continue to invest more and take on another night? I think that's a really fair point. I do still think, though, there is obviously room for growth. Now, we shouldn't necessarily compare unrival to the WNBA's viewership, but, you know, they would also say it's not far off from where the W was five, six, seven years ago. And they would add that if you look at TNT's broader sports package right now. So TNT having lost the NBA to NBC and Amazon, Paige Beckers is probably the second most popular athlete that the TNT sports ecosystem will put on its airwaves. The number one being Shohei Ohtani of the Los Angeles Dodgers, because TNT also has some baseball games. But other than Shohei, who's a global phenomenon, Paige is probably number two. Right. So she's a big draw for the networks and I think they're excited for the appeal of that. All of that being said, there is still the question of do the basketball games matter? How important is viewership to the success? And like, what does growth really look like in this landscape? And how do you kind of take it more seriously from a basketball product, as Sabrina mentioned?
- [37:15]
Ben Pickman
See, I'm throwing out ideas here and I feel like there's opportunity for. Because, okay, think about it. In the wnba, you have these women play and build these storylines from their college, their collegiate careers first, and then they translate into the wnba. I'm wondering, is there something to, you know, I look at the Lunar Owls, you got Skylar Diggins, you got Marina Bravery. Like, could the Lunar Owls tap into the Notre Dame fan base? Right? Like, is there a way that they could find a way to get folks to be not just focused on unrivaled, but have some sort of affinity and affiliation and loyalty to a team, even if it's just for the season, just to be able to get some of that momentum and some rivalry, because that's really what is the buoy for storylines in sports is having that tension, having that rivalry. And I feel as if that's the part we don't quite have in Unrivaled. It's a lot of familiarity and family, familial ties. Right. We saw the crossovers of how folks were helping each other get a little WNBA off season of recruitment. Right. It's a lot of family ties down there. Where's the tension? Where's the competition? How do you build that?
- [38:32]
Zena Kaeda
Well, one of the tension points of tension right now is between Unrivaled and Project B. And to answer your question, you know, I think the league does do a pretty good job of creating those ties between, say, you know, your Notre Dame fans or your WNBA fans and, you know, fans of a team and then the unrivaled team and kind of having that cross pollination. What Unrivaled would say is that basketball brands still are built in the United States, right, and centered around American competition, whether that's college, as you mapped out Xena or the wnba. And Unrivaled very much continues to brand, build and build on top of that in a domestic league. So when you think about Project B, and we have seen a few players, Kelsey Mitchell and Melissa Thomas, who are participating in Unrivaled right now, already announced that they're signing with Project Battle. They acknowledge, or Alex did, at least to me, that it is a competitor. But it hasn't caused panic because number one, there's proof in the pudding of what in their mind Unrivaled can be and is, and two, that the ecosystem in the US still feeds. All those other things you talked about, right. So that despite players, some players going to take money overseas and participate in this foreign league that may or may not ever tip off its first scheme, so much still evolves, like in this American ecosystem in terms of, like building brands, building rivalries, you know, rising tides in the ecosystem, all of that. So, you know, there is a tension, certainly, but they don't seem overly, I don't know, stressed about it at this point for at least some of those reasons.
- [40:07]
Ben Pickman
I think that's fair. There's, you know, building the tension. Maybe that's just what I want. I want a little bit of grit between the teams. But I thought earlier when you said Project B was the tension, I thought you really were gonna say the wnba. We know the CBA thing is still looming. And of course, people have had questions about Brianna Stewart, if he's a Collier, being a part of those conversations, as well as founders of Unrivaled. Where does all of that land in this conversation for Unrivaled?
- [40:38]
Zena Kaeda
Well, it's funny and maybe Sabrina, you have a thought on this. After, like last year we were writing about Unrivaled as this hub for free agency because all these teams, you know, could. All these players could recruit each other and theoretically have conversations in the hallways, in the training rooms, on the practice court, whatever, and start to build familiarity with each other. Now I think there's a question of, with this looming collective bargaining agreement just like hovering over the landscape and so many players down in, you know, unrivaled. Well, what does that mean for the talks? Does that mean that players are going to be more likely to come together and push each other to agree to a deal, does it mean that they are more likely to push their executive committee? Who again, if we remember what happened at the end of December, now the EC has control for the players union to just authorize a strike and vote for the players to strike. Do the players push the executive committee members to take that vote and strike and have a work stoppage? Like, it's a really unique time and I don't think we exactly know which way it's going to swing. Right. Does it lead to a deal or does it lead to more of a stoppage? But I mean, Sabrina, like, what else am I missing about that tension point, that pain point?
- [41:46]
Sabrina Merchant
Well, yeah, I mean, just thinking about, does this increase the solidarity of the WNBA union because all of the players are together, or does the absence of some key stakeholders, like, sort of highlight, you know, what different fissures there are in the union? Like, you know, Asia Wilson's not here, Caitlin Clark's not here. A lot of the younger players aren't here. You know, the ones who choose to play internationally, obviously not at unrivaled. So I'm wondering, like, does that change any of the dynamics as being at unrivaled with its, you know, investment into player experience, sort of highlight the disparities and like, really lead them to lean in on what they're fighting for? Right. Because what unrivaled has proven as a proof of concept, I mean, if they do choose to authorize a strike, like, is it going to be weird that like, no WNBA executives can really come visit them because they can't talk to them anymore? Like, does that change the demographics of just who is participating in the fan experience at unrivaled? I think that's just funny to think about. Like, you know, Ben, you were pointing out to me while we were watching the first game, like, you could see all of the Phoenix Mercury.
- [42:41]
Zena Kaeda
You're all exposed. You are all exposed. Agents, GMs, coaches who listen to this show. We are watching you on the broadcast.
- [42:50]
Sabrina Merchant
We will not missed bench. Right? And like you, if there's a strike or a lockout, like, they can't talk to anybody on the bench anymore. Right? So it's just interesting to see like this really visual representation of what the negotiations could look like in a way that the players were all hidden in 2020, right when this was happen. They're so present now and there are.
- [43:08]
Zena Kaeda
Questions and like, this is one I genuinely don't know the answer to. I mean, Sabrina makes the point about, like, GMs and. And head coaches who are watching from the sidelines while they, in theory, in a work stoppage, couldn't have contact with WNBA players. My question is Zach o', Brien, the head coach of the Mist? Well, he's also an assistant coach on the Sparks, right? Yeah, they're, you know, Nola Henry, theoretically, you know, a WNBA assistant, or Renica Hodges, currently an assistant on the side.
- [43:35]
Ben Pickman
Brina Wakoma in Chicago.
- [43:37]
Zena Kaeda
Right. With Chicago. And then there's trainers and player development coaches. Like, it's more than just some of these coaches. Are they allowed to have contact? Is that a way to, you know, is that legal? Can you skirt the rules? Are people looking the other way? Can you not just talk about the w like it's worse? I don't know.
- [43:55]
Ben Pickman
Like I said, familiarity.
- [43:57]
Sabrina Merchant
Someone like in the rules committee from the WNBA just sitting there watching the cameras.
- [44:02]
Zena Kaeda
We're like, we're like watching of a.
- [44:05]
Ben Pickman
Room with arms tied. Just cross. No, can't bring that up. Stick to the tape. Stick to the tape. Yeah. No, it's going to be really awkward. It's just like one weird summit that's happening where you. Certain people can go in certain rooms, especially if a strike is called. But we shall see. But as of now, we can only talk about the basketball. So let's swing on over to that part of things. I want to hear what you guys think about these newly vamped teams. Like, this is. This is looking a little different this year. We're watching, I mean, right now, Recording Aces, Vinyl playing. I'm looking at the Laces. Laces, Laces. I said aces. Dang. Talk about familiarity. Not the Aces.
- [44:45]
Sabrina Merchant
Jackie Young, baby.
- [44:46]
Ben Pickman
The laces. Right, the laces are playing. And speaking of Jackie Young. Jackie Young, Sykes, Brittany Sykes and Alyssa Thomas. I'm just like, ooh, laces, defense, back. But interestingly, not the same. Like floor spreaders, I think that they were last year. There's been. There's a lot of those type of things throughout all of these seasons or these teams in this season where you see a little bit of what was happening last year, but because of new faces, their MO has changed. So let's go through these teams and. And see what we think. Where do you guys want to start?
- [45:19]
Sabrina Merchant
Well, I am constitutionally predisposed to like the breeze because their logo has palm trees like the Sparks. They have two current Sparks. They have one former spark. They have a former spark as their head coach in Noel Quinn, and they have a player who I rooted for the Sparks to draft for an entire Year before, they didn't win the lottery. So there is a lot to like if you're a Sparks fan rooting for the Breeze. I think. Yeah, I think they might be a little too young to figure it out in this year of unrivaled. But I'm not ruling it out by any means because Paige is, you know, already an all WNBA player. You put her with bigs who can finish like Cameron Brinklike, Dominique Malanga. I mean, we all watch the videos of her lobbing the ball, dying over our winter break, let's say. So that's a team I really have my eye on because there is a lot of talent, even if it's young, and a lot of familiarity with one another.
- [46:04]
Ben Pickman
Very much giving a pick your poison, whether you want to guard Paige Beckers, you want to try and go inside. Cam Brink, we saw her shooting the outside shot as well. So the pick and pop is there too. Yeah, that team is a lot of fun. I love the Breeze. I'm going to say they're on my high list as well, even though folks are saying they're a little young. I'm not gonna lie though, after I just saw that miss game against the Hive. The Mist looks solid and having Veronica Burton be the ball handler for that team while Alicia Gray gets a handle offside. Alana Smith looks still as dominant defensively as she did during the WNBA season. You've got a big score and Ari Ogubawale missed. I don't want to.
- [46:47]
Sabrina Merchant
You didn't even mention Stewie's.
- [46:48]
Ben Pickman
You know, I mean, yeah, and we know Stewie. Of course we know Stewie. And then like, like Lia Rue is a new face on that team as well, and she had some really tough finishes over Monique Billings on the Hive as well in that first game. But I'm liking the Mist as well. I don't know, Ben, any teams that are standing out for you that you're like, hold on, hold on, hold on. Y' all are missing out on some of these teams, including the new ones between the Hive and the Phantom.
- [47:13]
Sabrina Merchant
Phantom, Mine and New team Breeze are the new team.
- [47:15]
Zena Kaeda
Breeze are the other. And the Breeze, I was going to shout out the most veteran or I guess the team with the most returners, that is Rose. They are the defending champions of the league last year. They have Chelsea Gray, Kalia Kopra, Azrae Stevens, Lexi Hall. Those are four of the six returning players from Rose last year. They have a returning coach, Enola Henry, you know, who's again familiar with some of those players from The W and also in the unrivaled context. And they've added Suge Sutton and Shakira Austin of the Washington Mystics. So continuity could be very important in terms of that team coming together. I think there's also some continuity on the Vinyl team. Ryan Howard, a member of that team last year, Ray Burrell, a member of that team last year, and Derick Hamby, a member of that team. Vinyl, again, coached by Teresa Weatherspoon, Courtney Williams, Erica Wheeler and Brittney Griner round out that team. You know, another very, very good team in terms of injuries. And then, you know, we can talk about another one of the expansion teams. Phantom is another one that has already been impacted by injuries. That's a team. Kelsey Plum, she's new to unrivaled. She is playing this year. Aaliyah Boston, Dana Evans, Natasha Cloud, Kiki Iriafen, and it was supposed to be Satu Sabali, but Sabali is out indefinitely as she continues to recover from the concussion she suffered during the WNB final. So Tip Hayes, Tiffany Hayes is the replacement player there. So that's another team certainly to watch. Maybe not as good as it was initially thought to be on draft day, but still Plum Boston, Cloud area Fenn is a really interesting group of four players is kind of the core of that group.
- [48:46]
Ben Pickman
The Plum Boston duo to me sounds scary. Like between Plum scoring and then Cloud's defense and her also her ability to organize and. And you know, Aaliyah Boston did her thing last year and unrivaled and obviously in the W as well. So that. That trio in general scares me. I feel like if I don't know what.
- [49:06]
Sabrina Merchant
I just wish they had any wing sized players. Like it's all very much guards and bigs.
- [49:11]
Ben Pickman
Bigs, yeah, that's a good point. Dana Evans and Kelsey are very small. Tiffany's the closest you're going to get. Tip Hayes is the closest you're going to get to some size.
- [49:20]
Sabrina Merchant
But you're asking some more of an on ball guard.
- [49:22]
Ben Pickman
Yeah, exactly, exactly. That's very true. So, so we, we'll see what happens with this one. The good news is, is that because of the revamp of these rosters, you are now experiencing a whole different experience. Even if you were a fan of this team last year. Uh, I think the Rose group, Ben, as you mentioned, is probably the closest you're going to get to the continuity. But it's just going to be fun seeing this, you know, rearrangement and how this all finishes out. Um, you guys picking a team yet.
- [49:51]
Sabrina Merchant
I feel like I already gave mine away.
- [49:53]
Ben Pickman
Oh yeah, you're.
- [49:53]
Zena Kaeda
You're choosing Breeze a title pick or a or to watch.
- [49:57]
Ben Pickman
I'm thinking team to watch.
- [49:58]
Zena Kaeda
For now I'm just going to watch it all scene. I hate to be that. I hate to be that person. But no, there's Ben is the average.
- [50:05]
Sabrina Merchant
Unrivaled fan that makes no distinction between.
- [50:07]
Zena Kaeda
Which teams are on. Exactly.
- [50:09]
Ben Pickman
There you go. That's okay though. That's okay. I mean I was on the Breeze bandwagon as well. Sabrina. I just love that young crew as well. But I'm adding the mist to it because Veronica Burton just watching her already elevate her game and being the organizer on that team, I'm looking for that them. Okay. And on the other side of this break, we are going to round out our unrivaled conversation by choosing a few awards including I am going to make these two pick a team to win the whole thing.
- [50:43]
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- [52:58]
Ben Pickman
All right, guys, awards time. Mvp. Defensive Player of the Year. Free Throw challenge. The one on one challenge, and the title of unrivaled season two. We're going to break all this down, but before we get into those, we gotta understand this free throw challenge, this is new this year, Ben and I hear it's going to help put a little bit more money into some unrivaled players pockets.
- [53:24]
Zena Kaeda
That's right, Zena. You know, the league has definitely tried so many different ways to pay players large amounts of monies for their performance, right? And so we saw that in the one on one tournament last year, which, you know, has a six figure purse to the winning player. This is a free throw challenge where they're awarding $50,000 to the player with the highest free throw percentage over the first five games of the season. So from January 5th to the 19th, that player will win the prize. And to qualify, I guess we should say you can't just go one of one. Sorry. For all the players who go one of one, players must appear in at least three games and attempt a minimum of six free throws. So that is how you are getting that extra money. You got to shoot some free throws, you got to play in some games.
- [54:07]
Ben Pickman
Man, if I would have known as a young girl in North Carolina at that, free throws could have got me $50,000 one day, I would have tried harder. I really would have. Okay, let's get into it, y'. All. First award up mvp. Now, the reigning mvp, Nafisa Collier, is no longer an option here. She is sidelined for the unrivaled season. So the question now is, who can take her spot? What do y' all think? Quick round Robin. Ben, you go first.
- [54:39]
Zena Kaeda
I'm gonna take Alicia Gray of Mist and of the Atlanta Dream.
- [54:45]
Ben Pickman
I like that. Sabrina.
- [54:47]
Sabrina Merchant
I mean, technically she's a free agent from the Atlanta Dream, but that's fine. I'm gonna take Chelsea Gray Of Rose.
- [54:53]
Ben Pickman
Ooh, Finals mvp, right? Mm. There you go. Finals MVP last season. I am with you, Ben. I am taking Alicia Gray. What? Yeah, I'm taking Alicia Gray. That's. We're not breaking all this down.
- [55:10]
Sabrina Merchant
We're a real prisoner of the moment with a miss right now.
- [55:13]
Ben Pickman
I am. I really am. I mean, she dropped quite a couple of points in that first game, but anyways. All right, let's keep it going. Defensive player of the year. I'll go first. Just so you make sure I'm not just copying what Ben is saying. I am going to take Alyssa Thomas.
- [55:29]
Zena Kaeda
I'm going to go with Ezzy Magmagore of the Hive, the other expansion team.
- [55:33]
Ben Pickman
There you go.
- [55:34]
Sabrina Merchant
I feel like bigs are just so overrated when it comes to defensive player of the year. It's going to pick a wing also from the laces, actually. I'm taking Jackie Young.
- [55:41]
Ben Pickman
Oh, yeah. That's a good. That's a good one. That's a good one. I like it. Okay, let's keep it rolling. And we're going to go to the free throw challenge. Serena, you kick us off.
- [55:50]
Sabrina Merchant
I'll go first. The way I thought about this was because free throws and unrivaled are only one at a time. I looked at the list of the players in the WNBA who took the most and ones over the course of last season. So Asia Wilson is number one on the list. She's not available to be picked here, but Dear Hamby. Also second on that list, but not a very good free throw shooter. So I went with a third player on that list, Paige Beckers.
- [56:11]
Ben Pickman
Oh, that's great. That's a really good choice. Okay, I like that. Ben, who you choosing?
- [56:16]
Zena Kaeda
That is great logic by Sabrina. The way I looked at it was looking at some of the best free throw shooters just in the WNBA overall. And I was initially spooked because Arike Gumbawale and Jackie Young, they are at the top, towards the top of that list. And guess what? On their very first games, they missed free throws. And so that doesn't exactly bode well for picking them in this competition. So I'm going to go with a player who maybe not as elite of a free throw shooter as the other names I mentioned, but who's going to probably get to the line and you know, there's no reason she can't make some. And that's Kelsey Mitchell. I think she'll get some opportunity. And she's an 80% free throw shooter. 80 plus for her career in the W. So Seems reasonable enough.
- [56:59]
Ben Pickman
Oh, now so we weren't doing logic for any of the other ones and now we want to introduce logic here.
- [57:04]
Sabrina Merchant
And I'm just like, you don't have introduce logic. I just said what I did.
- [57:07]
Ben Pickman
Yeah, no, that's fair. That's fair. It just prompted Ben to then say what he did and now I'm like, I need to check this person's free throw.
- [57:15]
Sabrina Merchant
See, I thought Zena Streak was gonna be pretty obvious here. I'm surprised it's taken her this long.
- [57:19]
Ben Pickman
Well, mine was obvious. It was Veronica Burton.
- [57:21]
Sabrina Merchant
Like let's deal with it. That's fine. She's a 90% free throw shirt. Historically insane if free throw.
- [57:27]
Ben Pickman
But. But now I'm thinking like, how many times is she gonna get the line?
- [57:29]
Zena Kaeda
You only. Hey, you only need six. You only need six.
- [57:31]
Sabrina Merchant
She went three for three in game one, so.
- [57:34]
Ben Pickman
Well, that helps me. Okay, there we go. Uh, let's keep it moving to our one on one challenge. Now this is a little bit more difficult because one, we don't know who's going to actually opt in to play and I, I'm going to go ahead and just kick mine off. I think Rekia Jackson's got this year size scoring. That's what you need.
- [57:57]
Sabrina Merchant
I went with Ariqa Gumbawale in the final four last year and I think but you know, she's just an awesome one on one player. Agree.
- [58:05]
Zena Kaeda
I'm going to take Kalia Copper who lost in the second round of last year's tournament. But again, very good one on one player and I think can guard players of all different sizes.
- [58:16]
Ben Pickman
So I think it's also important to know, I mean, Arike Gubawale was a standout a little bit in this category, but a lot of bigs made it to the finals.
- [58:25]
Zena Kaeda
True. And Aaliyah Edwards.
- [58:27]
Ben Pickman
Yeah. Azra Stevens. Yeah, it was. The bigs were dominating the littles. Derek Hamby was having a little aggression. Yeah. Okay, we'll see, we'll see. That's why I want to guard with some size. But we'll see what happens. All right guys, final decision here. Who's going to win the title? Sabrina, you're nodding. I'm gonna go with you first.
- [58:49]
Sabrina Merchant
Who you think I'm gonna take Rose? I like the continuity. They won last year and historically I've not done well betting against Chelsea Grant.
- [58:57]
Ben Pickman
That's real.
- [58:58]
Zena Kaeda
That's real.
- [58:58]
Ben Pickman
We all have it. Okay, Ben, who you taking?
- [59:01]
Zena Kaeda
Well, Rose would be the first ever back to back champion in unrival second season.
- [59:05]
Sabrina Merchant
Man.
- [59:06]
Ben Pickman
He ain't wrong, though.
- [59:07]
Sabrina Merchant
He ain't wrong. They're also the first ever champion and.
- [59:11]
Ben Pickman
He'S just stating facts.
- [59:12]
Zena Kaeda
Just saying facts. That's what we're trying to do in this pod. I am not a prisoner of the moment. You can read my story that went up on this site on Monday morning for my title prediction that was made before any of the games were played. So Rose and Laces, I think are very good teams, but I am taking the Mist to win the unrivaled championship.
- [59:33]
Ben Pickman
Oh, dang, Ben. I am a prisoner of the moment and I like what I saw yesterday morning. So yes, I am taking the Mist. I think that's gonna be good. I want to hear what you guys have to think. Those of you listening, are we completely looking over the Laces right now? Are we ignoring your favorite, your players?
- [59:53]
Sabrina Merchant
I would pick a coach of the year. It would be Andrew Wade from the Laces. Let's be that clear.
- [59:57]
Ben Pickman
That's good.
- [59:58]
Sabrina Merchant
I love the way they play.
- [60:00]
Ben Pickman
Yeah, the Laces are fun. I'm kind of watching them behind my computer right now and the defense is going to always be there with that team. And yeah, I. I just seemed like one more shooter, you know.
- [60:11]
Zena Kaeda
The Laces won their first four games last year. They were one of the title front runners for a while up there with the Lunar Owls as like a dominant team in the regular season through the first couple of weeks and then injuries just derailed the entire season.
- [60:23]
Sabrina Merchant
So the whole ride is basically why I didn't pick them as my title favorite this year.
- [60:29]
Ben Pickman
I agree. And that's what I was referencing when I said they're not the same floor spreaders that they were last year. I'm happy that Kayla McBride is not doing her overseas season unrivaled and straight into WNBA season though. I'm happy she's going to be able to get a little bit of rest.
- [60:43]
Sabrina Merchant
But she's playing right now. Don't worry.
- [60:44]
Ben Pickman
She is overseas.
- [60:46]
Zena Kaeda
Yeah.
- [60:46]
Ben Pickman
Oh, overseas. I'm saying yes, exactly. But just not.
- [60:49]
Sabrina Merchant
Yeah, not rest.
- [60:50]
Ben Pickman
Not, not rest.
- [60:50]
Zena Kaeda
But I like can just say I like our chances in a three on three tournament. Like me, you, me, Sabrina, Xena against any other media trio right now. I'm gonna put a call out there to our friends, to our friends at ESPN or Yahoo or front office sports or whatever. If we were gonna play an unrivaled style 3 on 3 game, I do like our chances. Okay, well, you know, what do you think about that, Xena?
- [61:12]
Sabrina Merchant
I think I do better in a FIBA 3 on 3 than a full court unrivaled.
- [61:15]
Zena Kaeda
Again, that's not including, like Rebecca Lopez. You know, we're talking on.com, people.
- [61:21]
Sabrina Merchant
Yeah. Carolyn Pack, Rebecca Lobo and Andrea Carter.
- [61:24]
Ben Pickman
We would be taking. Oof. What did you say earlier, Ben? You said beat the brakes off. That might happen if those three are playing against us. But yeah, I like those chances. You know, we gotta be careful what we wish for because we did see the Liberty actually put on a media day situation. And then we saw the Celtics do it too.
- [61:43]
Sabrina Merchant
The Celtics one look way less fun.
- [61:45]
Ben Pickman
Way less fun. Way less fun. Okay. Yeah. Either way, we want to hear what you guys think about what's going to happen this unrivaled season, what we should be looking out for. And we're so happy you're back. We're happy to be back. This was a really fun and long awaited show. We're happy to be back in the midst of all this basketball that's happening. Let us know who you want to hear from. We want to get more interviews going on this side of this year. And yeah, remember, there's no off season, so there's no off season for you too. Make sure you're dropping those likes and subscriptions and sharing this show and doing the little five star reviews. Keep it at five stars. You don't really like the other stars. Anything lower than that, you can keep it to yourself. Okay. All right, guys, we're closing this out. Appreciate all of you for watching. Make sure you're following on YouTube. Head on over to our partner at the Yahoo Sports hub for more content. Sports.yahoo.com womenssports on behalf of the Athletic, Sabrina Merchant, Ben Pickman. I'm Zena Kada. Thanking you. We'll see you next time. No off season is hosted by Zena Cato with Chantelle Jennings, Sabrina Merchant and Ben Pickman. It's produced by Tanika Burrell. Our executive producer is Andrea B. Scott. Our theme music is by Marcus Bagala. Monica Compton is our video editor. Shannon Ryan is managing editor of women's basketball at the Athletic. Jesse Burton is our head of audio and Tim McMaster is director of audio operations.
- [63:21]
Sabrina Merchant
Oh, could this vintage store be any cuter? Right? And the best part, they accept Discover. Except Discover in a little place like this. I don't think so, Jennifer.
- [63:31]
Ben Pickman
Oh, yeah. Huh?
- [63:32]
Sabrina Merchant
Discover is accepted where I like to shop.
- [63:34]
Ben Pickman
Come on, baby.
- [63:35]
Sabrina Merchant
Get with the times.
- [63:37]
Zena Kaeda
Right.
- [63:38]
Sabrina Merchant
So we shouldn't get the parachute pants.
- [63:40]
Ben Pickman
These are making a comeback, I think.
- [63:44]
Commercial Narrator
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Zena Kaeda
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- [63:52]
Sabrina Merchant
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Ben Pickman
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Sabrina Merchant
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Ben Pickman
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Sabrina Merchant
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Zena Kaeda
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