The Connecticut Sun's final night in Connecticut was filled with the kind of joy that makes saying goodbye even harder.
Walking into Mohegan Sun Arena on Thursday night felt strange. I've walked into that arena plenty of times over the last few years, sometimes with a credential around my neck and a laptop in my bag, sometimes with my boys, and sometimes with friends who simply wanted to watch a WNBA game. But this time, I knew I was walking in for the last Connecticut Sun game that would ever be played there.
There was already a huge line outside the arena more than an hour before tip, and the lobby was buzzing with Sun orange. People were wearing brand-new jerseys alongside throwbacks from years ago with names like Edwards, Lacan, Charles, Carrington, Thomas, and Sales across the back. There were young fans who were just beginning to understand what it means to have a WNBA team in their state, standing alongside people who have been here since the beginning. Everyone was there for the same reason: one last time.
Inside, the arena was packed early. People were buying their final pieces of Sun merchandise, grabbing snacks, and finding their friends. There were hugs everywhere, from friends who were genuinely happy to see each other while also knowing this was the last time they would be meeting up for a game in this building.
That feeling followed us all night. Something would make me smile, and then I would remember why we were all there. Something would make me laugh, and then I would look around and realize I would never see this exact scene again. That was the Connecticut Sun's final night: happy and sad, over and over again.
It wasn't just the players and coaches saying goodbye. It was the front office staff, the media, the photographers, and the camera crews. It was the DJ, the dancers, the in-game entertainment crew, and the broadcast team. It was the Mohegan Sun staff members who have worked these games season after season, and the people who make the food, scan the tickets, clean the arena, and make sure thousands of people can walk into a building and spend a few hours watching basketball. And, of course, it was the fans. Everyone who had a role in making a Connecticut Sun game a Connecticut Sun game was experiencing their own version of a last.
For me, I've only had a few seasons here. I can't pretend I have the history that some people in that building have. I wasn't covering this team 10 or 15 or 20 years ago. I wasn't a season ticket holder, and I wasn't here from the beginning. But a few years was enough to fall in love with this space.
Connecticut loves women's basketball. I grew up knowing that because I grew up watching UConn and going to games at Gampel with my dad. I grew up understanding that there was something different about being in a place where women's basketball wasn't something you had to explain or justify; it was simply part of the fabric of the state. Then I got to experience that in a completely different way as an adult, because I got to cover the Sun and this league.
I got to sit in the media room and learn the rhythms of this team. I got to become friendly with the other people who covered them. I got to bring my boys to games and go with friends. I got to sit in the stands and watch little girls in Sun jerseys become completely consumed by whatever was happening on the court, while falling in love with the players and who they are off the court. And every time, it felt like there was room for everyone.
That might be what I will miss the most. You could be old or young, followed the team for 20 years or bought your first ticket last week, come dressed head to toe in Sun orange or show up because your friend asked you to come along. It didn't matter what color your skin was or who you loved. You were welcome there. There was room for you, and that matters, especially in women's basketball, where so much of the joy comes from the community that forms around the game.
I thought about that a lot throughout the night. I thought about it when Brendan Glasheen and Terrika Foster-Brasby were calling the final game. They have been voices of this team for years, and hearing them say goodbye made the ending feel even more real. I thought about it after the game when Jen Rizzotti stood in front of the crowd. Jen has spent so much of her life in Connecticut basketball, first as a player at UConn and now as the president of the state's WNBA team. She was emotional talking about what the organization has meant to her, and it was impossible not to feel the weight of that moment. She was saying goodbye to something that had been part of her life in so many different ways.
And then there was Blaze.
At one point before the game, Blaze and Jen Rizzotti had a half-court shot contest, and Blaze won. The place absolutely lost it and I laughed, because of course Blaze won the half-court shot contest. But then I had the thought that made me want to cry all over again: What happens to Blaze?
It was ridiculous and sad and funny all at once, which was the whole night in a nutshell. Even the mascot had a goodbye.
After the game, Aaliyah Edwards and Ashlon Jackson spoke to the media. Both were emotional, but both spent so much of their time talking about their teammates, their coaches, Jen Rizzotti and Morgan Tuck. For Aaliyah, there was another layer to it. Connecticut had already been an important part of her life before she ever put on a Sun jersey. She spent her college years playing at UConn, and now she was standing in the same state saying goodbye to the professional team she had eventually joined. She talked about the memories she had made here, both at UConn and in the WNBA, and what it meant to know she would not play in this arena again.
The media room had its own goodbyes, too. There's a Mohegan staffer named Mike who walks around during every game handing out candy. It's a small thing, the kind of thing you might stop noticing because he's always there. After the game, he came into the media room, and before he walked out, he turned to all of us and said, "Love you all." I barely know Mike, and I was tearing up anyway. Around me, the media members who have become friends over the years were crying, too. Some of them will go on to cover other teams, and some may move away. Wherever everyone lands, this chapter is closing, and we won't all be in that room together again.
Out on the court, the players stayed long after the game had ended, signing autographs and taking pictures while fans lingered in the stands and along the court. Nobody seemed particularly interested in leaving, and why would they? If you were a fan, you wanted one more minute. If you were a player, maybe you wanted one more minute, too. The night was over, but everyone was trying to stretch it out.
After the game had ended and the arena cleared out, a group of longtime fans organized a party on the Sun Patio. People stayed, danced, laughed, and hugged. Content creators like Aliyah Funschelle and Ari Chambers were there, and Saniya Rivers came out and danced with the fans. For a little while, it just felt like a celebration. And it was.
That's the strange thing about saying goodbye to something you love. You can be completely heartbroken and still have a really good time, maybe especially then, because we were together.
That has always been the point.
The Connecticut Sun was never just the people on the court. It was the people who kept coming back to the court: the friends who met at games, the families who made it part of their summers, the kids who grew up watching, the media members who became friends, the staff members who knew your face, and the people who traveled to Connecticut because they loved the WNBA. It was the people who had been here since the franchise arrived, the people who found the team five years ago, and the people who found it this year. All of us, in our own ways, made this place what it was.
That is why losing the Sun in Connecticut feels different than simply losing a team.
We can understand why the WNBA needs its franchises to have the facilities, arenas, resources, and infrastructure that allow the league and its players to keep moving forward. We want that for these players, and we want them to have everything they need to be successful. But it is still hard to accept that the next chapter for this team will be so far away from the place that has supported women's basketball for so long.
Connecticut has been a women's basketball state for generations. The Sun fit here. They made sense here. They belonged here.
And now, they are leaving.
The Sun didn't make the playoffs, so in some ways, this just felt like the end of another WNBA season. But next summer will come, and there won't be a Connecticut Sun schedule to check. There won't be opening weekend tickets to buy, or a new jersey to debate purchasing, or a reason to make the drive to Mohegan for a game. I think that is when it will really hit.
For now, I'm trying to stay with the other feeling, the joy. There's the joy of having had this at all, and of two seasons covering a team I grew to care about. There's the joy of bringing my boys into a WNBA arena, of girls' nights and media rooms and familiar faces, and of watching young fans find women's basketball. There's the joy of being surrounded by people who love this game and make room for everyone else to love it, too. We are sad because it is over, but we are also incredibly lucky that we got to have it.
And for one last night in Connecticut, everyone was there. Players, coaches, staff, media, families, friends, and fans all showed up one more time, all trying to hold on for just a little longer, all saying goodbye, in one way or another, to a place where they got to be themselves.
That is what Connecticut is losing. Not just a basketball team.
A place to be.
