WNBA announces expansion team in Portland, league’s 15th franchise

The WNBA is expanding to Portland by granting the league’s 15th franchise to the city.

The team, which was announced Wednesday, will begin play in 2026 and be led by Lisa Bhathal Merage and Alex Bhathal, the owners of the NWSL’s Portland Thorns. The family also has ties to the NBA as Raj Bhathal, their father, is the principal co-owner of the Sacramento Kings and is majority owner Vivek Ranadive’s alternate on the league’s board of governors.

The team will play its home games at the Moda Center in downtown Portland, where the NBA’s Trail Blazers also play.

“We believe in the transformative power of women’s sports and are thrilled that the W will call Portland home,” Lisa Bhathal Merage said in a statement. “We know that Portland’s vibrant and diverse communities will highly support and rally around this team. Our goal is to grow this organization in partnership with the Portland community and we look forward to supporting the best women’s basketball players in the world when they take the floor at the Moda Center in 2026.”

The @WNBA‘s 15th team calls the Rose City home.

🌹🏀 #WelcometotheW pic.twitter.com/7Qqf0igffW

— WNBA Portland (@wnbaportland) September 18, 2024

Portland previously had a WNBA team from 2000 to 2002. The Fire, as they were called, were owned by the late Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen. Though they had a loyal fan base, the organization struggled with financial losses and folded after three seasons. 

News of the Portland expansion also comes after the city was under strong consideration by the WNBA to be the location of its 14th franchise, which was later awarded to Toronto. A past Portland bid for a WNBA team had been led by Kirk Brown, a wealthy businessman who had founded the company that is now called ZoomInfo.

But such talks fell apart late in the process, just prior to a public announcement being made last fall. 

In a letter last November to U.S. Senator Ron Wyden, which informed Wyden that consideration of the city in the league’s upcoming round of expansion would be “deferred for now,” WNBA commissioner Cathy Engelbert wrote while it “became clear that Portland is an ideal destination for a WNBA franchise,” issues related to Moda Center would prevent Portland from getting a team right away.

Engelbert later told reporters at NBA All-Star Weekend last February “there’s definitely more to it. There’s always more to it. It’s never one thing,” adding, “you have to find the right long-term committed ownership groups with the right arena situation.”

In February 2023, Engelbert visited Portland for an event centered around women’s sports, led by Wyden. It was held at The Sports Bra, a Portland bar devoted to women’s sports, and had appearances from prominent women in sports from around the state.

That October, just weeks before Engelbert’s letter, Wyden expressed confidence in an interview with The Athletic about Portland’s chances of getting a WNBA team. 

“What the commissioner saw when she accepted my invitation to come to Oregon is, I think, unprecedented in the country,” he said. “We mobilized, not just the Ducks and the Beavers and the Thorns and the Trail Blazers and the like. We showed that enthusiasm for a team in our community is unprecedented.

“I think that’s why when the final scoreboard gets posted, we’re gonna win.”

In a statement Wednesday, Engelbert called the WNBA’s return to Portland “another important step forward” for the league.

“Portland has been an epicenter of the women’s sports movement and is home to a passionate community of basketball fans,” Engelbert said. “Pairing this energy with the Bhathal family’s vision of leading top-flight professional sports teams will ensure that we deliver a premier WNBA team to the greater Portland area.”

The Portland Fire — and their mascot, Spot — played three seasons in the WNBA from 2000 to 2002. (Sam Forencich / WNBAE / Getty Images)

Rose Garden Report’s Sean Highkin, who first reported news about the Portland expansion, said that the Bhathals’ existing relationship with the NBA gave them a significant edge throughout the process.

“It’s a basketball city,” said Phoenix Mercury coach Nate Tibbetts, who was an assistant coach with the Trail Blazers from 2013 to 2021. “There’s not a lot of professional sports, I know that they support winning teams and it’s a great place in the summer, so I’ll definitely look forward to going there. With the University of Oregon and Oregon State, and the history that they have with women’s basketball, it’ll be definitely a city and a state that will support it, which is awesome.”

Last May, the WNBA announced its decision to expand to Toronto. It will begin play in that market in 2026.

In April, The Athletic first reported the WNBA intended to expand to 16 teams. Its 13th franchise, the Golden State Valkyries, is set to begin play next season and already have sold 17,000 season-ticket deposits, which they said makes them the first professional women’s sports team to pass that mark.

GO DEEPER

WNBA expansion Valkyries already eclipse 17K season ticket deposits

In April, Engelbert listed Philadelphia, Denver, Nashville, Tenn., and South Florida as other places the league is exploring as options for expansion. The Athletic previously reported Charlotte, N.C., has also been in consideration.

“As potential ownership groups clamber for a piece of the W, we expect to have more news on the front in the coming months on expansion, and the goal remains what I said at (last April’s WNBA Draft), to have 16 teams by no later than 2028,” Engelbert said during July’s All-Star Weekend.

Required reading

(Photo: Steph Chambers / Getty Images)