In Super Squads, The Athletic follows the New York Liberty and Las Vegas Aces in their quests to win a WNBA championship. Our reporters will tell the stories of the players on two of the most star-studded teams in league history and examine how their paths shape the future of the WNBA.
HENDERSON, Nev. — Silver, white and black Aces branding is all over the front of the large industrial building. Straight ahead past any of the four sets of double doors at the front of the structure, there are two sliding barn doors with screens on the front displaying a “2022 World Champions” graphic that open up to reveal two regulation-sized practice courts.
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Toward the left of the practice area, a team shop and hallway lead to the space that’ll be used for the Al Davis-Eddie Robinson Leadership Academy. To the immediate right, a set of stairs leads to offices for the coaches and front office members. A few steps past the stairs, a welcome desk and another hallway leads to the training room, film room, player locker room, coaches’ locker room, a film room, players’ lounge and family room.
A custom name plate is above every player’s locker with a TV and built-in Mac mini-PC inside. All of the seats in the film room are massage chairs. The player lounge features TVs, gaming consoles, laptops, speakers and a kitchen. The training room has an array of weights and equipment, a nutrition bar, sauna, hot and cold plunge pools, a hydro treadmill, numerous other gadgets and a staff member on-hand who knows how to use it all.
All of this should be normal for the WNBA — as it is for most major professional sports franchises — but that’s not the case. The 64,000 square foot Aces headquarters is the first of its kind solely dedicated to a WNBA team in the league’s 27-year history.
𝗧𝗛𝗘 𝗙𝗜𝗥𝗦𝗧 𝗢𝗙 𝗜𝗧𝗦 𝗞𝗜𝗡𝗗 💎
Presenting the Las Vegas Aces Headquarters. pic.twitter.com/iB57abUcu3
— Las Vegas Aces (@LVAces) April 28, 2023
For owner Mark Davis, who purchased the Aces in January 2021, building a facility was a prerequisite. The design creation started the following month and interior construction began that October. Less than two years later, the result of the effort is a state-of-the-art space located less than a mile from the headquarters for the Raiders, which Davis also owns. After the Aces made their transition into the facility official last month with the start of training camp ahead of the 2023 season, he reflected on the accomplishment.
“When I bought the team, there were two things that I felt were necessary: No. 1, it was to create a family atmosphere and, secondly, it was to give that family a home,” Davis told The Athletic earlier this month. “And what we wanted to do is build them a world-class facility that was second to none. I’m so proud of these women for what they do. It’s a home that they deserve.”
Outside of the initial purchase of the Aces, obviously, the team headquarters is the most significant investment Davis has made in the franchise to date. It falls in line with his broader commitment to effectively put his money where his mouth is. In May 2021, he hired team president Nikki Fargas, who had been the coach at LSU. In December 2021, he hired coach Becky Hammon away from the San Antonio Spurs and made her the first head coach in WNBA history to earn a $1 million salary. In April 2022, he hired general manager Natalie Williams and gave her the necessary resources to construct a super-team that now includes A’ja Wilson, Candace Parker, Chelsea Gray, Kelsey Plum and Jackie Young. The facility remains a landmark achievement, but it doesn’t surprise anyone within its walls.
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“I mean, Mark pitched it to me when I was a free-agent coach,” Hammon told The Athletic last month. “At the end of the day, you want to play for somebody, and you want to work for ownership, that believes in you like that. You talk about setting the mark and saying, ‘This is how much I believe in you,’ then you tend to go, ‘Man, I want to go prove that guy right.’”
The Aces already did that by winning the WNBA Finals for the first time last year, but they aren’t satisfied. Not only do they want more for themselves, but they’re also hoping what they’re doing can raise expectations for their league.
“You’re starting to see the push towards promoting and supporting women’s sports because they’re incredible athletes just like the men are,” Williams told The Athletic. “What Mark Davis is doing is breaking the boundaries. Paying Becky Hammon what he is, it paid off, for sure. Building a facility like this for these women, this is setting the bar and the standard of where things should be for women.”
Of course, that sentiment goes beyond management. The Aces players want their experience to become commonplace.
“It’s incredible,” Wilson said last month. “I don’t think people really understand. And I’m blessed because I came into a franchise that was building and that wanted more for us. I didn’t have to go through the slums of figuring stuff out, but it’s really key. I always think about even when they’re talking about NBA guys that are now investing in this, I’m like, it’s bigger than wearing that orange hoodie. Put your money where your mouth is. Put your money where your hoodie is. And so, for Mark to kind of step out — not even step out because I think this is who he is — it’s something special. Like I said, this isn’t just a fad or a trend; women’s basketball and the WNBA, we’re trying to be here for the long run.
“So, you have to invest in us now.”
Winning is what made everything possible. In 2017, the Raiders received approval from the NFL to relocate from Oakland to Las Vegas. And, after the 2017 season, the San Antonio Stars received permission to relocate to Vegas and become the Aces. Davis had already been a longtime fan of women’s basketball, but it was then that he became an Aces fan and bought season tickets.
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The Aces were a losing team in 2018, but it landed them the draft pick that allowed them to pick Young. That, plus the signing of Liz Cambage that offseason and ascension of Wilson, helped transform them into a playoff team that advanced to the 2019 semifinals. Vegas locals responded in droves, the team started to gain national traction, and Davis became interested in purchasing the franchise.
That was put on hold because of the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020, but the Aces’ run to the WNBA Finals that season in an eventual loss to the Storm in the WNBA Bubble only increased Davis’ desire to buy the franchise. That finally came to fruition in 2021 and, though the Aces’ season would end in an earlier playoff exit than the year before, Davis felt they remained on the cusp of a championship.
In response, Davis pushed to land Hammon. She modernized the offense from former coach Bill Laimbeer’s twin towers approach — Cambage signed with the Sparks last offseason and is currently out of the league — to become more of a guard-oriented system engineered by the skills of Plum, Gray and Young orbiting around the sun that is Wilson. Hammon was just as demanding as her predecessor but could connect with them on a different level thanks to her past as a WNBA star. And with Wilson, Plum, Gray and Young all playing some of the best ball of their careers, the Aces attained the championship that had eluded them.
“Vision becoming reality,” Davis said. “All of the things that we were hoping to accomplish we’ve been able to do in such a short timeframe, but we’re not done. I mean, we’re only at the beginning of it.”
Nothing drove that mentality home more than the Aces signing Parker, a seven-time All-Star, in February, while retaining most of their core. The team’s success was a motivating factor for Parker, but it’s important to note that she’s already a two-time WNBA champion, is still one of the best players in the league and had other suitors. One of the primary elements that sealed her decision was the facility.
“Candace knew what we were building here,” Williams said. “She wanted to be here anyway, and she wanted to be around Chelsea Gray — her former teammate — and to be coached by Becky Hammon — one of the best coaches in the WNBA — but this is a huge selling point to anyone in free agency because no one else has this currently.”
Coming off winning a championship and adding a WNBA legend, the Aces have sold over 5,000 season tickets, which is the most in the WNBA. Both on and off the court, the Aces are thriving as they prepare to start their quest in their season opener May 20 to become the league’s first repeat champion since the Sparks in 2002.
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“We’re ready to get rocking and rolling but, at the same time, I don’t think we’re going to get too seeped into going back-to-back or defending that championship,” Wilson said. “At this point, I’m thinking we’re starting all over again. I’ve completely, honestly, erased last year because, in my eyes, it doesn’t matter. Our target was big on our back without a banner, so I already know our target is going to be even bigger now.”
Wilson’s comments are reflective of the ideology instilled by Hammon. The Aces are appreciative of how far they’ve come, but what’s important now is finding a way to maintain it. Not only is that imperative from a competitive standpoint, but also continuing to grow what the Aces have started to build holistically in Vegas.
“People like winning,” Hammon said with a laugh. “So, if we just keep winning, I think people keep coming. But, more importantly, along with this facility, we’ve got a great brand of basketball out there. We score a lot of points. People like watching offense. I’m going to be all over their asses on defense this year, but it’s exciting, fun basketball to watch. And I think the more visible it becomes, the more people come and watch, they want to keep coming back. Some of the skill sets of the women that we have is unbelievable. And so, people want to come be a part of a winning team. We’re happy to be that.”
The Aces aren’t perfect. It’s impossible not to acknowledge that after former Aces forward Dearica Hamby, who was traded to the Sparks in January, accused the team of discriminating against her for being pregnant. The WNBA announced a penalty Tuesday for the Aces’ of a two-game suspension for Hammon and the loss of a future draft pick.
“Being traded is part of the business. Being lied to, bullied, manipulated, and discriminated against is not,” Hamby said in a statement on Instagram after the deal. “I was promised things to entice me to sign my contract extension that was not followed through on. I was accused of signing my extension while pregnant. This is false. I was told I was ‘a question mark.’”
The WNBA subsequently launched an investigation, which is still ongoing. Davis didn’t want to go into much detail, but indicated the organization didn’t ostracize Hamby due to her being pregnant with her second child, who was born in March.
“I don’t think I can comment on that specific incident right now with Dearica until it’s resolved, but I will say that this organization is run by three women (Nikki Fargas, Natalie Williams and Becky Hammon) who have children and I wouldn’t expect them to treat anybody with disrespect or anything else because of pregnancy or children that they have,” Davis said. “It just doesn’t fit the narrative at all. That’s all I want to say on that at this point because, again, it’s still being, I believe, investigated by the league.”
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It’s expected that Davis would defend the Aces’ franchise. And while his words may be true, Hamby’s claims are still representative of some of the issues WNBA players face as they strive for more fair, equitable and considerate treatment from the league. If that’s something Davis truly wants to see happen, then what allegedly happened with Hamby can’t occur again. For the players still with the franchise, there remains a belief that it’s committed to helping push for better treatment of WNBA players.
“It really is huge,” Wilson said. “And there’s a lot of times where we say things and it throws the public off because they’re like, ‘Wait, what do you mean?’ And it’s like, ‘No, this is real. This is what we go through.’ So, when we’re standing up and standing on things that we believe in and want to talk about, it’s not just for the fluff; it’s something that we live through. And so, for us to have this and to go from us not having lockers at one point to now having an HQ of our own, I think it goes to show the direction that we’re going and where women’s basketball needs to go.”
The Storm have already emerged as another team with plans to build a dedicated team facility. And though the Liberty don’t have an entire headquarters solely for their use, owner Joe Tsai built a locker room, training room, practice court and more inside the Barclays Center for them to start using last season. Both are important signs of progress.
“It’s all about growing the league,” Davis said. “And in order to do that, you have to invest. And you have to invest in your franchise. We’re hoping to be the example for some of the other franchises to show that investing pays off.”
Every WNBA team may not have an owner who can match the investments that have been made by the Aces, Storm and Liberty, but that could change moving forward with changes such as NBA athletes being permitted to invest in WNBA franchises, greater support from the NBA as a league and the increasing interest in women’s basketball as a whole. If things continue to trend upward, then it’s not too far-fetched to imagine a world where dedicated facilities, chartered flights and greater pay and benefits in the WNBA are achieved.
“If there’s one thing about setting bars and setting standards, people either rise to ’em or they don’t, they fade away,” Hammon said. “So, hopefully, people make the choice to rise up. I think, generally, when given challenges and expectations, people tend to rise rather than the reverse. But if there’s never a bar set or a standard or a goal set, people can tend to just wander or become numb to normalcy. And I think this is a statement that this is what normal should look like in a professional sports league.”
The Super Squads series is part of a partnership with Google Lens. The Athletic maintains full editorial independence. Partners have no control over or input into the reporting or editing process and do not review stories before publication.
(Illustration: John Bradford / The Athletic; top photo of Candace Parker: Courtesy of Las Vegas Aces)