WNBA Toronto unrolls the red carpet as it’s officially unveiled

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When the guest list for your news conference includes Drake, Kyle Lowry, Scottie Barnes and the prime minister of Canada, you know your announcement is big.

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And not even the fact that the news was already weeks old could dampen the enthusiasm inside Hotel X on Thursday morning as WNBA commissioner Cathy Englebert confirmed Toronto was indeed the recipient of the 14th WNBA franchise.

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The team will begin play in 2026 at the Coca-Cola Coliseum after Larry Tanenbaum and his wife Judy made sure Canada’s most vibrant sports market would become the first home outside the U.S. for the wildly popular women’s basketball league.

Coming hot on the heels of a successful debut for the Professional Women’s Hockey League in the GTA, expectations of initial success in terms of draw and interest are high.

But as much as the potential for this market and all of those data points Englebert loves to mention that helped sell the league on Toronto, it was the strength and solidity of Larry Tanenbaum backing the bid that pushed it over the top.

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“I think as I met Larry, and talked to Larry about why he would want to do this … women’s sport, as far as being an owner is hard. It takes long-term commitment,” Englebert said.

“He was just so gracious about the growth of the league, wanting to contribute to that, wanting to bring a new fan base in. He had all the right narratives on why he would want to do this. Just because a city calls you (with an interest) you don’t just say: ‘OK the data looks good. Let’s grant a franchise.’ You have to have a connection and a partnership with the potential owner and you want them to be successful.”

Clearly, Englebert found that with Tanenbaum and his own Kilmer Sports Ventures, at least to start.

This didn’t happen without some bumps in the road — none bigger than MLSE, of which Tanenbaum is chairman, choosing not to pursue the franchise.

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Tanenbaum’s pursuit of a Toronto NBA team eventually led to the city being awarded an expansion franchise, but the NBA chose the John Bitove Jr. and Allan Slaight group as owners.

As incoming president of the still-to-be named WNBA team, Teresa Resch suggested that the hard road only made the landing of it that much sweeter, and possibly long-term even better.

“It’s one of those things where in hindsight the path is very clear, but in the moment it doesn’t seem like that,” Resch, the former Raptors vice-president of basketball operations said. “So yeah, it looked like a stumbling block, but I think as I stand here today, I think we are positioned probably the best that we can be to be successful. Every single person that will be employed by this team will be focused solely on making this team a success. We are going to be able to utilize the resources of Larry Tanenbaum and also a group of limited partners that he is bringing on board that we will be talking about in the next couple of months, as well, once they are ready to join and have been vetted by the league.”

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One day down the road, people may even look back on the way it all went down and even thank Ed Rogers, the man reportedly responsible for blocking MLSE’s involvement in pursuit of a WNBA expansion team, for forcing things to go another way.

Resch made the decision last March to leave the Raptors after 11 years to pursue this goal of a WNBA team with Tanenbaum, an idea the two have spoken about since the day the Raptors brought them together.

Over the years with the Raptors, Resch’s attention to detail has served her well and will again be key as she steers the franchise through its infancy. She was the driving force behind the OVO practice facility and helped turn a ballroom in a downtown Tampa hotel into a practice facility for the Raptors during the pandemic when they played an entire season in the Florida city.

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She also played a key role in the building of Raptors 905, the G-League affiliate of the NBA team that played such an important role in helping develop the likes of Pascal Siakam and Fred VanVleet who were key members of that 2018-19 championship team.

All those skills will be called on as Resch and the staff she hires navigate bringing the WNBA to Canada.

“This is Entrepreneurial 101,” Resch said of the two-year run-up she now faces. “It’s starting things from scratch. I think with Larry, he has done it multiple times so he just kept pushing and pushing and pushing. Nothing that is ever worth it is ever easy and I think this is a testament to that.

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“Honestly, this is unprecedented. The WNBA has never had a team internationally and it comes with a lot of very difficult details to work through that there is no precedent for. So, it’s not easy but it’s worth it and I’m glad we’re here today.”

On top of establishing the franchise itself, Resch and the team have a $40-million commitment from Tanenbaum for their own state of the art practice facility, for which the location and opening date are still be to be determined. In the interim, the team will practise at the University of Toronto.

As for a team name, Resch said she would like it to reflect the entire country, in keeping with Tanenbaum’s insistence that the franchise is Canada’s team, not just Toronto’s team.

There is no timeline for when that team name will be announced but Resch said the plan is to open it up to the public and make it as interactive as possible, much the way the Raptors were eventually named.

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