University of Connecticut women’s basketball coach Geno Auriemma said WNBA Commissioner Cathy Engelbert should try to shift the league’s dialogue away from transgender issues because fans don’t want to watch “another protest movement.”
“Nobody’s coming to watch another political statement. They’re not. They’re coming to watch a basketball game,” Auriemma said in a CNBC Sport interview.
The WNBA has become a flashpoint in debates over race, gender and sexuality as the league draws greater attention. There have been recent rallies at Indiana Fever games both for and against transgender participation in women’s sports after comments made by Fever guard Sophie Cunningham saying she wants to “protect young girls in a locker room, or young girls in sport who shouldn’t have to go against biological men.”
Earlier this month at a Fever game, Minnesota Lynx head coach Cheryl Reeve wore a shirt that said “Trans Kids Belong.”
Auriemma told CNBC he thinks WNBA players should stop talking about transgender issues — at least while there are no trans athletes playing in the league. Layshia Clarendon, the league’s first openly trans and nonbinary player, retired in 2024 after 12 seasons. Clarendon was assigned female at birth.
“I don’t know [of any trans players] that have tried to play in the league and have been denied playing in the league. It’s an issue that’s been made an issue that’s a non-issue. It doesn’t exist. I don’t know any other way to put it,” Auriemma said. “It’s hypothetical. It’s like the people that complain ‘The Odyssey’ isn’t authentic. How do you know? It’s myth.”
A WNBA task force of team presidents and general managers met Wednesday in part to discuss transgender athletes, a WNBA spokesperson confirmed to CNBC. The league noted that there are currently no eligibility issues involving gender identity.
“We will approach these important conversations thoughtfully and in alignment with the values of our league,” the spokesperson said in a statement. “There are no immediate eligibility matters affecting the WNBA, and we strongly denounce the bad-faith efforts to use these topics to demean or marginalize others.”
UConn women’s basketball head coach Geno Auriemma is interviewed during 2025 Big East Basketball Media Day at Madison Square Garden in New York, N.Y. on Tuesday, Oct. 21, 2025.
Tyler Sizemore | Connecticut Post | Getty Images
‘How do we want to come across?’
This isn’t the first time professional sports leagues have wrestled with how to handle political or cultural touchpoints. In 2016, then-San Francisco 49ers quarterback Colin Kaepernick and several teammates took a knee during the U.S. national anthem to protest police brutality and racial injustice. Two years later, the NFL banned the practice, asking players to stand for the anthem or stay in the locker room “or in a similar location off the field” until the anthem’s conclusion.
The NWSL took a different approach, allowing players to kneel, stand or stay in their locker room.
“We’re going to continue to play the national anthem, but with even more flexibility, and support each player’s right to express their individual views, or not,” then-Commissioner Lisa Baird said in a 2020 statement.
While it’s often difficult for the commissioner of a league to control what individual players do or say, Auriemma said he would advise the WNBA’s Engelbert to send a message to players about the brand of the league.
“I think what you can do is you can constantly reiterate to the players and to all the stakeholders, how do we want to be perceived? How do we want to come across?” Auriemma said.
He said he’s noticed a shift this year, calling the WNBA “desperate for attention” in the past but now “getting all the attention they’d ever want.”
“People have hijacked it, and it’s become whatever station you watch, whatever point of view you want to take, you’re going to have an opinion on what’s going on in the WNBA,” Auriemma said. “Wow, isn’t that great? Well, not if you’re not talking about the game itself. Not if you’re not talking about the brilliance of the individual players, the teams that are playing incredible basketball.
“The kind of attention that is being thrown at the WNBA — no, that’s not the kind of attention that you want for women’s sports,” he said.
Auriemma has been head coach of the UConn women’s basketball team for more than 40 years. He holds the record for the most NCAA Division I basketball championships by a head coach, with 12 national titles.
Apple TV will release a three-part documentary series about Auriemma’s time at UConn titled, “The Dynasty: UConn Huskies” on Aug. 21.
