Sun brace for an 'emotional' farewell as the WNBA franchise plays its final game in Connecticut

UNCASVILLE, Conn. (AP) — The Connecticut WNBA franchise will play its final game in the state before it moves to Houston next year after an impressive run for the first independently owned team in the league.

Texas will be the third stop for the franchise. The team moved to Connecticut in 2003 from Orlando. The Sun made three trips to the WNBA Finals, hosted a record four All-Star Games and Connecticut was the first team to turn a profit in the league's history. The team, which was purchased for $10 million, was sold for $300 million.

“It’s been an emotional week,” team president Jen Rizzotti told The Associated Press. “The silver lining of the chapter closing is it forces you to look at what this franchise has meant for over two decades and make sure the story is told and the legacy lasts forever.”

The franchise is moving to the home of the former Comets, who won the first four WNBA titles. Its time in Connecticut will end Thursday when the Sun face Toronto in the regular-season finale.

Rizzotti will move to Houston with the team as the president of basketball operations. She said that 75-80% of the front office staff will also make the move.

“It’s exciting to celebrate the past while also being emotional that it’s ending,” she said. “Thursday is a celebration of our fans with fan appreciation night. One game isn’t enough to show the appreciation of how much they poured into the franchise for 24 years.”

The WNBA seems to have outgrown the Sun with the new collective bargaining agreement demanding standard amenities for all teams that include state-of-the-art practice facilities.

The Mohegan Tribe, which owns the franchise, sold the team to Houston Rockets owner Tilman Fertitta for $300 million.

The Sun had an offer for $325 million from a group led by Celtics minority owner Steve Pagliuca that would have moved the franchise to Boston. The WNBA basically blocked that deal from happening by saying that “relocation decisions are made by the WNBA Board of Governors and not by individual teams.”

Now the franchise is becoming the first to relocate since San Antonio moved to Las Vegas in 2017.

“It’s sad,” said former Connecticut Sun CEO Mitchell Etess in a phone interview. "I put a lot into it and to see it go is sad. It did confirm that it was a good business decision to bring it there in the first place. If I was still CEO I’d recommend we sell it for that much profit."

Being in the smallest market in the WNBA led to difficulties for the franchise to attract top free agents. Over the past two years the team has gone from being a WNBA Finals contender to rebuilding mode.

Still, despite a 10-33 record, the Sun were drawing nearly 8,700 fans a game in the 10,000-seat arena.

Throughout the season Connecticut honored some of the franchise's iconic players, including Jonquel Jones, Jasmine Thomas, Alyssa Thomas, Tina Charles along with coaches Curt Miller and Mike Thibault. The group joined other Connecticut standouts — Margo Dydek, Katie Douglas, Nykesha Sales, Taj McWilliams-Franklin, Lindsay Whalen and Asjha Jones — in the rafters at the arena.

Thibault was the last of the group to be honored as Connecticut hosted the event after last Sunday's game against Minnesota. Whalen, Charles and McWilliams-Franklin were in attendance for that contest as well as dozens of other former employees and front office staffers.

They told stories and stayed well after the game reminiscing about the franchise. Rizzotti expects a similar celebration after Thursday's finale.

“I know we’re going really blow the game out,” she said of celebration plans. “Lot of things we’re giving away, postgame mingles and autograph opportunities. When everybody leaves we’ll just pop Champagne on the court for the last time. I'm proud of what we built.”

Etess remembers trying to sell NBA Commissioner David Stern on moving a franchise to the Mohegan Sun. The late commissioner was concerned about putting a team in a casino, but as it turns out, he was ahead of his time.

“There was a lot of excitement at the beginning, still a casino and a professional sports team being together wasn’t well received everywhere,” Etess recalled in a phone conversation. “David Stern took a lot of the hard questions when that was happening. In retrospect, it was an icebreaker for a lot of the gambling stuff that happened since. The tribe was proud of having the team as it was great to bring national attention to the state and casino.”

The Mohegan Tribe bought the team for $10 million and with the WNBA in CBA negotiations the franchise had a few months to get everything ready to start in 2003. Thibault remembers when he was hired as the coach in January, the franchise had literally nothing.

Thibault said he had to order basketballs, uniforms and even sports bras for his players. The franchise quickly turned into contenders, reaching the WNBA Finals in 2004 and 2005.

Thibault joked that when the team first started fans came to games to cheer on former UConn players when they came to town, but soon they became fans of the franchise.

“The first year, we didn’t have as good attendance as we had hoped, but that changed quickly,” Etess said. “We didn't give tickets away. After the second year we were always up there in total attendance for many, many years.”

The Sun became the first team in WNBA history to make a profit when they made it happen in 2010.

“It meant a lot to us,” Etess said. “We really focused on doing everything right, trying to run the team professionally.”

Etess is sad to see the state lose its last professional team in an area that has been a women's basketball hotbed for so long.

“It's odd that the league didn’t want the team to stay in Connecticut,” he said. “Connecticut is such a crucial part of women’s basketball. The state that loves women’s basketball isn’t going to have a pro team, doesn’t feel right to me.”

See AP’s full WNBA coverage here

FILE - Connecticut Sun guard Leila Lacan (47) celebrates a play with teammates during the second half of a WNBA basketball game against the Dallas Wings in Arlington, Texas, Wednesday, Aug. 27, 2025. (AP Photo/LM Otero, File)

FILE - Fans show their support for the return to Connecticut of Diana Taurasi as well as the Connecticut Sun, during WNBA basketball team's home opener in Uncasville, Conn., Saturday, May 22, 2004. (AP Photo/John Spivey, File)

FILE - Connecticut Sun's Tina Charles (31), Renee Montgomery (21) and Kara Lawson (20) return to the court after a timeout in the second half of Game 3 of the WNBA basketball Eastern Conference finals against the Indiana Fever in Uncasville, Conn., Thursday, Oct. 11, 2012. (AP Photo/Jessica Hill, File)

FILE - WNBA League President Val Ackerman, left, and Mohegan Tribe Tribal Chairman Mark Brown hold a basketball shirt of the type that will be worn by the WNBA team Connecticut Sun during a news conference Tuesday, Jan. 28, 2003, at the Mohegan Sun Arena in Uncasville, Conn. (AP Photo/Bob Child, File)

NEW YORK (AP) — Ben Rice one-upped Aaron Boone. And then he two-upped the New York Yankees manager.

Boone predicted during spring training that Rice would finish with 39 home runs this season. Rice hit Nos. 40 and 41 in Wednesday night's 9-2 victory over the Tampa Bay Rays, tying for the American League home run lead.

He smiled and pointed at Boone when he returned to the dugout after driving Mason Englert's first pitch of the game into Yankee Stadium's right field second deck. Rice grinned at Boone some more after another solo homer in the fourth.

“I think I said, `Hey, there’s 40 for you,'” Rice recalled. “I was joking with him after the 41st one, saying, `Hey thanks for inspiring me this year.' But it’s all in good fun. Back in spring when he told me that, I knew that secretly meant he was hoping I’d hit 40.”

Rice is tied for the AL home run lead with Baltimore’s Pete Alonso, the Rays’ Junior Caminero and Houston’s Yordan Alvarez. He is hitting .263 and leads the Yankees with 97 RBIs and an .899 OPS, becoming a first-time All-Star and the biggest cog in an offense missing Aaron Judge and Giancarlo Stanton for most of the season.

Boone deliberately picked an odd total rather than a round figure.

“I was confident he was going to have a really big year,” he said. “Probably wanted to make sure it was just south of a number, maybe to maybe let him know that.”

Rice, who had three hits and a walk, became the 13th Yankees player with a 40-home run season but just the third to reach the milestone during his first three seasons after Joe DiMaggio and Judge. Rice's plate appearances often prompt a rendition of Elton John's "Bennie and the Jets″ from the stadium's organist, and Rice has sparked an often struggling offense with 16 go-ahead homers this year and three that have tied games.

“One thing I always tell guys the difference between minor leaguers and big leaguers is the consistency,” Judge said. “He’s one of the best. I can look up at the clock and I know exactly where he’s going to be in the cage. You know what he’s doing in the training room, the weight room. It’s just every single day, man, this guy’s a machine.”

A 12th-round pick in the 2021 amateur draft from Dartmouth, where he played just 30 games over three years due to the coronavirus pandemic, Rice was mostly a catcher but occasionally a first baseman in the minors. He made his big league debut in June 2024 at age 25 after Anthony Rizzo broke a forearm.

Rice hit .171 with seven homers and 23 RBIs in 50 games that year, then batted .255 with 26 homers and 65 RBIs in 138 games last year.

With Stanton sidelined for most of the season, the left-handed-hitting Rice has 93 games at DH this year and 52 at first.

“It's tough to pull him off his back leg,” Yankees pitcher Gerrit Cole said. “He’s really able to stay balanced and deliver high-efficacy strikes on various pitches in all parts of the zone.”

Rice was hitting .306 through May, then batted .196 in June. An 18-for-58 (.119) slide after the All-Star break dropped his season average to .248 on Aug. 22 but he's rebounded to bat .333 (34 for 102) since.

“Went through a lull, which is inevitable, even in a great season,” Boone said. “Had a stretch in there where it was a struggle and he was grinding but kind of battled through that and feel like the last few weeks has been on a really good run.”

Rice's potential was evident on July 6, 2024, less than a month into his big league career, when he became the first Yankees rookie with three home runs in a game and tied Lou Gehrig's Yankees rookie record of seven RBIs. Consistency took time.

“A lot of it I always feel like is just experience-based,” Rice said. “You just see more pitching at the big league level, get exposed to guys who throw all different kinds of pitches from different angles and slots and all these things. I feel like I’ve always been a good learner in that way.”

See AP’s full MLB coverage here

New York Yankees' Ben Rice reacts after hitting a solo home run in front of Tampa Bay Rays catcher Liam Hicks during the first inning of a baseball game Wednesday, Sept. 23, 2026, in New York. (AP Photo/Adam Hunger)

New York Yankees' Ben Rice reacts after hitting a solo home run during the first inning of a baseball game against the Tampa Bay Rays, Wednesday, Sept. 23, 2026, in New York. (AP Photo/Adam Hunger)