By Dominic T.

The July sun wasn’t the only thing heating up in Brooklyn on Saturday night. As Kelsey Plum of the Los Angeles Sparks stood looking frustrated at center court, the Liberty’s Natasha Cloud couldn’t do anything but grin while the crowd roared.

Fittingly, a hyper-intense contest ended in a frantic layup by Sparks forward Rickea Jackson to beat the buzzer and put an end to New York’s 15-point comeback with a 101-99 victory. Silence fell over the arena so quickly you’d think someone had died on the court, while Los Angeles celebrated over the gravestone. Jackson finished the game with 24 points on 9-15 shooting, 4-6 from three. 

The recent explosion in popularity of the WNBA directly contributed to the passion both on the court and in the stands that night. When players faced off emotionally and physically, the crowd erupted. When the players are invested, the fans are invested at the games, on TV and online. In turn, the league can invest more into its players. The 2025 season has been defined by its fierceness, and it’s projected to earn $1 billion in revenue. 

Performances like that of the Liberty’s Sabrina Ionescu get even more attention as a result of the growing audience size. In her 16th career 30-point game, setting a franchise record, the 5’11” guard contributed eight rebounds, six assists, and four steals. Her final basket came with 23 seconds on the clock, tying the game 99-99 and sending the crowd into a frenzy. 

Perhaps the only person with more hustle than Cloud, meanwhile, was the man mopping the court in between offensive sets. The guard’s 22-point, nine-assist outing was sprinkled with multiple enthusiastic confrontations with Plum. Her death stare into the stands lit a fire in the crowd after a quick-step and-1 in the fourth quarter.

Despite Cloud’s hustle, Plum managed to orchestrate the Sparks offense, scoring 20 points and dishing out eight assists. The Liberty simply didn’t have an answer in the paint after Breanna Stewart went down with a hamstring injury three minutes into the game. 

With the loss just past the halfway point in the season, the Liberty ended their home stand 6-2, clinging to the first seed in the east. The Sparks expanded their red-hot win streak to five in an attempt to save their season. No matter who comes out on top this season, every team in the WNBA has won the hearts of basketball fans across the country.