Caitlin Clark will not play in Unrivaled this winter, multiple sources familiar with the matter told Front Office Sports.
The 3-on-3 winter basketball league start-up has been courting Clark since its launch last year. FOS reported at the time that the league was prepared to offer her a seven-figure deal, plus a “Lionel Messi–like” offer that included equity and revenue-sharing in the league.
The Miami league gave all of its first 36 players equity last year, and paid an average salary of more than $200,000—far more than the paltry $78,000 Clark earned in the WNBA this past season.
This season, the league expanded to eight teams and 48 players, and it had announced 46 of them by Thursday morning, leading to speculation that the remaining two spots were being held for Clark and WNBA MVP A’ja Wilson, neither of whom played in Unrivaled last year. Angel Reese, who did, has also not been announced as part of the second season.
Sports Business Journal reported Wednesday night that a league statement about “players we’re in productive negotiations with” was alluding to Clark, and that this was “the closest Clark has been to joining the league,” but the outlet later amended its reporting to say that Clark was not in negotiations with the league, and the league was waiting on Clark to change her mind.
The league and its leadership have taken on outsized importance amid increasing labor tensions in the WNBA. Unrivaled cofounder Napheesa Collier—who shares the same agent as Clark, Erin Kane—recently blasted the WNBA as having “the worst leadership in the world” and said her experience running Unrivaled with her husband and Breanna Stewart gave her the necessary perspective to criticize the league.
Clark said Thursday morning that she agreed with Collier. “I have great respect for Phee and I think she made a lot of very valid points,” she said Thursday.
The WNBA’s collective bargaining agreement expires at the end of this month, raising the possibility of dozens of its athletes playing in a rival league while a work stoppage drags on. Collier called the timing of the CBA expiration coinciding with the launch and expansion of Unrivaled a “perfect opportunity” last year.
Most WNBA players play in winter pro leagues either domestically or abroad to earn extra money and stay sharp, but Clark has never played professionally outside of the WNBA. Last year, Clark went directly from a long postseason run with Iowa into a full WNBA season; this year, she struggled with a series of injuries that led to her appearing in only 13 games, the first time in her career at any level that she missed time with injuries.
Asked about her offseason plans on Thursday, Clark alluded to playing for the national team. “I haven’t made any decisions,” she said. “There’s some USA Basketball stuff that is probably my top priority right now that I need to prepare for.”
The U.S. is already qualified for the 2026 World Cup, but the senior U.S. team—which did not include Clark at the Olympics last year—plans to play in several games next spring ahead of September’s World Cup.
Taking the Show on the Road
With or without Clark, Unrivaled is going to Philadelphia.
The 3-on-3 league will pack up from Miami and head to Philadelphia for one night next season, the league announced Thursday. Four of the league’s eight clubs will make the trip for back-to-back Friday night games on Jan. 30.
Unrivaled has been open about its plans to take its show on the road, particularly to a much bigger arena. With a TV deal with TNT Sports pumping cash into the league, Unrivaled opted for a small, roughly 850-person arena in the same building as its highly touted training, recovery, and childcare facilities. Philadelphia’s Xfinity Mobile Arena holds 21,000 people for basketball games.
“The energy and dedication of everyone who helped bring this tour stop to life, combined with the passion of Philadelphia’s sports fans, made the city the perfect stage for Unrivaled,” league president Alex Bazzell said in a statement.
The Unrivaled trip will mark the first women’s professional basketball games in Philadelphia since 1998 for the short-lived American Basketball League’s Philadelphia Rage. The WNBA earlier this year awarded Philadelphia an expansion team set to begin play in 2030. Harris Blitzer Sports & Entertainment, which owns the 76ers, paid a $250 million expansion fee for the team. The unnamed WNBA franchise will share a brand-new arena with the 76ers and Flyers.
Philadelphia mayor Cherelle Parker attended Unrivaled’s announcement Thursday in Love Park.
