At long last, Breanna Stewart’s W.N.B.A. comeback was set for Saturday, when her
Seattle Storm were to face the Liberty and the vaunted No. 1 draft pick Sabrina Ionescu
in the league’s nationally televised season opener. Big-buzz, showcase games like that
one are nothing new to Stewart, of course. After winning an Olympic gold medal and four
national titles at Connecticut, she led the Storm to the W.N.B.A. title in 2018 and was
named the league’s most valuable player. Then came the biggest test of her career: a
devastating Achilles’ tendon rupture that caused her to miss all of last season.
Stewart spent months cooped up in Seattle, rehabbing and taking part in Black Lives
Matter protests before trekking to Florida at the start of July for the new season. She
joined the rest of the W.N.B.A.’s players at the IMG Academy, a 600-acre sports training
campus 45 miles from Tampa Bay where all 12 teams are living, training, and seques-
tering together as they play a shortened 22-game regular season.
Stewart’s wait to return to the court has been long and unsettling, with the tedium of
recovery stretched out by uncertainty over the league’s return. Having endured all of
that, Stewart will finally try to get back to her old normal — winning championships.
This interview has been condensed and edited for clarity.
Honestly, in a way I’m still shocked to be
back and about to get back out on court in
our league. It’s surreal. I was just thinking
about it today, in fact. About how I’m
going to put my Seattle uniform on and
this time, finally, it’s not going to be for a
photo shoot. How I’m actually going to go
and play a game that counts in this league
again. I’ve missed that so much. Missed
being around my teammates and the kind
of atmosphere we have and just fighting
with them for 40 minutes. Now I don’t
have to miss it anymore.
There’s a lot of change in the league,
with some players opting out and others
moving to different teams, and also some
really exciting new players. We’re fortu-
nate in Seattle because we have our entire
roster here and we’re healthy and experi-
enced. We’re going after a championship,
no doubt about it. We’re just as hungry as
we were in 2018, if not hungrier. This sea-
son has a different look to it, of course,
different than any other season. We know
some people want to put an asterisk on it,
but we’re here and we want to do what
we’ve come here to do.
I was the league M.V.P. in 2018, and then
missed last year. Elena Delle Donne was
the M.V.P. in 2019, and is out now because
of her concerns about Covid-19 and a
pre-existing condition. It’s definitely weird
when I think about that. I have so much
respect for Elena, who she is on and off
the court, and, you know, the fact she
wants to be able to play in an environment
where she’s feeling comfortable. She’s one
of the best and I always want to play
against the best, but her situation is one of
those things where there’s more to life
than basketball and we get that in this
league.
Me and a lot of my teammates basically
have a bike gang at this point.We’re living
on this campus in our bubble, and other
than the games which will be about a
20-minute drive away, everything we’ll be
doing will be on the campus. Since it’s so
huge and sprawling, most players have
been given a bike. I go to practice and the
weight room on a bike. In the beginning,
you should have seen all of us as players
trying to ride around, because for a lot of
us, we haven’t done it in forever. I can’t tell
you the last time I rode a bike. I was prob-
ably about 10 years old.
We’re having fun with it. Seems like
every time you turn a corner you see
someone, some great player. Coming back
from practice on my bike and I look
around up and there’s Candace Parker,
just passing me by. I’m like, “Hi, Can-
dace!”Outside of practice with our team, I don’t
think we feel we’re 100 percent comfort-
able hanging out as a group in the same
room. So really, we just don’t. No meetings
in small conference rooms or indoors in
small spaces like that. And we don’t find
ourselves really socializing with other
teams.Got a shiner, a big black eye the other day.
Just under the right eye, I took an elbow
from a teammate. That shows how nobody
is backing off when we’re on the court.
We’re wearing the masks outside, but then
we play we’re banging up against each
other. We recently had a scrimmage with
Dallas and it had all the normal physical
play, but I’ve got to say, it’s weird to be so
close to somebody else without a mask
who is not on our team.
I mean, in the end, it’s like we’re contra-
dicting ourselves with some of this. We’re
told to be six feet apart, but when we’re on
the court it’s impossible. We’re battling
there on the court up close, but, then in the
arena, you see that our seats are spread
out for distancing.So, the co-owner of the Atlanta Dream,
coming out against Black Lives? [In mid-
July, Atlanta Dream co-owner Kelly Loeff-
ler was widely denounced by players for
criticizing the league’s decision to honor
the Black Lives Matter movement at
games this season.] Well, I’m not going to
say her name, so I don’t give her any type
of power, but I think that from a political
standpoint, what she did was just try to
ruffle the feathers in the league and create
more attention for herself because her
Senate seat is up for grabs.
There’s so much going on outside the
bubble at this time in history, and we’re
still absolutely connected to it even though
we’re here. As a league we know what westand for, and what we stand by, and the
Black Lives Matter movement is some-
thing that is very important to us.
I think as the co-owner of the Dream, to
make those comments when you’re in that
position in a league that is 80 percent
women of color? We don’t appreciate that,
we don’t appreciate that at all. Personally,
I don’t think she should be an owner, but it
is not my job to decide who should not be
an owner.This league is in good hands with all of the
new, young talent coming in. Everyone
has their eyes out for Sabrina. She’s just a
natural hooper, and her pick-and-roll game
is like no other. I know from experience
that when you’re the No. 1 pick and com-
ing out of college after a great career you
don’t fly under the radar, and she defi-
nitely hasn’t. People are super excited
about seeing her at the next level, and I’m
one of them.The W.N.B.A. hopes to
build on increased interest
in women’s sports with its
new season. The return of
Seattle Storm forward
Breanna Stewart, who
missed all of last season
with a ruptured Achilles’
tendon, should help.PHOTOGRAPHS BY KENNY KATZ/SEATTLE STORMW.N.B.A. Star Aims for Old Normal: Winning Titles
As told to KURT STREETERAlong with the rest of the
world, athletes have had
their careers upended by the
coronavirus pandemic. They
are giving The New York
Times an intimate look at
their journeys in periodic
installments through the rest
of the year. This is Brianna
Stewart’s third installment.Timeout
28 SUNDAY, JULY 26, 2020
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