WNBA Finals

WNBA Finals logo

The WNBA Finals is the championship series of the Women's National Basketball Association (WNBA) and the conclusion of the league's postseason each fall. The series was named the WNBA Championship until 2002. Starting 2016 Verizon is the official sponsor.

The series is played between the winners of the playoff semifinals. At the conclusion of the championship round, the winner of the WNBA Finals is presented the championship trophy. The WNBA Finals has been played at the conclusion of every WNBA season in history, the first being held in 1997.

Since 2005, the winner of the WNBA Finals has been determined through a 2–2–1 format. The first, second, and fifth games of the series are played at the arena of the team who earned home court advantage by having the better record during the regular season.

History

Further information: WNBA Playoffs

The WNBA Finals were originally a single championship game to decide the WNBA champion. However, in 1998, after the addition of two teams, the WNBA Finals were turned into a best-of-three games series. In 2005, the WNBA Finals adopted a best-of-five format. This finale series was known as the WNBA Championship from 1997 to 2001, before changing to reflect its NBA counterpart. In 2016, the WNBA changed to its current playoff format seeding teams #1 thru #8 regardless of conference making it possible for two Eastern Conference or two Western Conference teams to meet in the Finals.

Year Winner Result Loser Finals MVP
1997 Houston Comets [lower-alpha 1] 65-51 New York Liberty Cynthia Cooper
1998 Houston Comets 21 Phoenix Mercury[lower-alpha 2] Cynthia Cooper
1999 Houston Comets 21 New York Liberty Cynthia Cooper
2000 Houston Comets 20 New York Liberty Cynthia Cooper
2001 Los Angeles Sparks 20 Charlotte Sting Lisa Leslie
2002 Los Angeles Sparks 20 New York Liberty Lisa Leslie
2003 Detroit Shock 12 Los Angeles Sparks Ruth Riley
2004 Seattle Storm 21 Connecticut Sun Betty Lennox
2005 Sacramento Monarchs 31 Connecticut Sun Yolanda Griffith
2006 Detroit Shock 23 Sacramento Monarchs Deanna Nolan
2007 Phoenix Mercury 32 Detroit Shock Cappie Pondexter
2008 Detroit Shock 03 San Antonio Silver Stars Katie Smith
2009 Phoenix Mercury 32 Indiana Fever Diana Taurasi
2010 Seattle Storm 30 Atlanta Dream Lauren Jackson
2011 Minnesota Lynx 30 Atlanta Dream Seimone Augustus
2012 Indiana Fever 13 Minnesota Lynx Tamika Catchings
2013 Minnesota Lynx 30 Atlanta Dream Maya Moore
2014 Phoenix Mercury 30 Chicago Sky Diana Taurasi
2015 Minnesota Lynx 32 Indiana Fever Sylvia Fowles
2016 Los Angeles Sparks[lower-alpha 3] 3-2 Minnesota Lynx Candace Parker
  1. Due to the WNBA's playoff structure in 1997, two Eastern Conference teams met in the championship game
  2. Due to the WNBA's playoff structure in 1998, two Western Conference teams met in the championship series
  3. Due to the WNBA's playoff structure in 2016, two Western Conference teams met in the Finals.

Highlights

Finals appearances

Statistics below refer to series wins and losses, not individual game wins and losses. Teams in red have folded and can no longer reach the WNBA Finals.

Active franchises with no Finals appearances

Records

This table shows a list of records through the history of the WNBA Finals.

See also

References

External links

This article is issued from Wikipedia - version of the 10/27/2016. The text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution/Share Alike but additional terms may apply for the media files.