When Margaret Stender was a young girl, she had no hope of extending her skill at, and love for, playing basketball beyond her college years at the University of Richmond. Now the president of Chicago Sky, the Women’s National Basketball Assocation (WNBA) team, takes pride in offering hope to younger generations of female hoopsters. “These women are the best basketball players in the world-they have played all over-and they are not “self-entitled,” Stender says. “They are college graduates, poised and professional.”
They also have some serious game.
At 5-feet-10, Chicago Sky guard Chelsea Newton is one of the shorter players on the team. Newton, 24, of Monroe, La., played basketball at Rutgers before being drafted by the Sky. She and Amanda Lassiter, a Chicago Sky forward, were at the breakfast to meet with local residents.
“It’s cool,” she says of being looked up to, literally and figuratively, by so many young female basketball players. “But my first priority is to stay focused on my game.”
Eliana Baker, 9, wearing her YMCA basketball team shirt, entered the breakfast flush with victory.
“My basketball team at the Y just won the championship!” she announced proudly. “We were undefeated!” The 9-year-old student at the Children’s School says, “I’ve been playing for about two years and really like it. I get nervous before the games-we practice on Friday and play a game on Saturday. I am really not very good at basketball,” she admits sheepishly. Her younger brother, Simon, also enjoys playing soccer and basketball. Jeff Baker, a former football player for the University of Pennsylvania says of his children, Eliana and Simon, “I just want them to do what they want to do.” Abe Thompson readily agrees. “I’ve seen parents at sports camps my son Phoenix has attended and they are just like, “Go! Score! Get’ em!” he shakes his head. “It should be all about having fun and the kids enjoying the sport!”
Dale Davis says her niece, Stekara Hall, 12, is a guard on the basketball team at Percy Julian and “basketball is her life-well, that and her iPod.” Davis thinks the WNBA has provided her niece with good role models and a potential post-college career goal. “These women are just what young athletes like Stekara need to see-college graduates who are succeeding at the game.”
Thompson, a local businessman and entrepreneur, hosted this neighborhood meet-and-greet with Chicago Sky at his home on Saturday, March 10. “When Abe owned WVON he broadcast the Chicago Bulls when they had about 3,000 fans. He had the vision to know the Bulls would grow in popularity, and he is a true supporter of the Chicago Sky,” says Stender, whose team is now in their second season.
Originally, she explains, the choice to create a women’s NBA team was up to the local men’s NBA team, and for a long time the Bulls “weren’t interested.” Later, the organization changed the rules and allowed independents to create a team, and today several businesspeople, led by Chicago-based insurance giant Richard Alter are owners of the team. Chicago Sky is one of 13 WNBA franchises. Everyone left the March 10 gathering with a Chicago Sky photo calendar and many little girls with dreams of being the next big thing.
