Since the WNBA’s inception in 1997, every team in the league has won a championship — except for the New York Liberty.
Unfinished Business, a selection at the Tribeca Film Festival, reveals the unique struggles that players on the Liberty and in the WNBA continue to face, especially when they play for a team struggling to win.
In a trailer exclusive to PEOPLE, current and former Liberty players and executives detail how the team continues the pursuit of their first WNBA title.
“To have a league, we had to stand so that people know we belong,” former Liberty star Teresa Weatherspoon says in the trailer.
Weatherspoon, 57, now an assistant coach for the NBA’s New Orleans Pelicans, also discusses the financial and physical struggles that come with life in the WNBA.
“Some of them didn’t get contracts to go overseas,” Weatherspoon recalls, adding that during the offseasons, she “might see [WNBA players] working in a McDonalds.”
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“It’s really exciting to be a part of a team that’s going to change New York basketball,” Ionescu, 25, says in the trailer.
Melissa Majchrzak/NBAE via Getty Images
Former Liberty star Natasha Howard is also featured in the trailer. Howard, 31, speaks about the demanding schedule for WNBA players. In the trailer, Howard says she’s played for leagues in Russia, Turkey and Israel, among other countries.
Other topics explored inUnfinished Businessinclude social justice efforts, both past and present, how the athletes “sacrifice their bodies” despite insufficient compensation, and how the league navigated marketing to an expanding LGBTQ+ audience.
“A number of teams were concerned that they had so many gay fans,” journalist Tamryn Spruill says in the trailer, referring to the earlier days of the women’s league. “The league didn’t know how to market these women,” she explains.
Additionally, the project celebrates the rapid growth of the WNBA at large in recent years. “It’s reached a level that we haven’t seen before,” a voiceover says in the trailer.
source: people.com
