Flashback: It's Sunday in New York City, the end of a tough season for the New York Liberty, so I thought it'd be nice to reflect back to a time when the New York Times actually covered the WNBA.
Early fans of the league -- and especially Liberty fans -- will recall the 1998 season and, in particular, August 16th. After an up and down season, it seemed clear the Liberty were going to miss the playoffs. Suddenly, things got turned around during a horrible road trip, but if they were going to make the post-season, they were going to have to win out. Standing in their way? The juggernaught that was the Houston Coments of Cooper, Perrot, Swoopes, Thompson and Tammy "just get me to the playoffs" Jackson.
The game had everything: playoff implications, the seeds of a just emerging rivalry, national t.v. and an amazing, attention getting, lead in: The cover of the New York Times Sunday Magazine. Michelle Agins' shot of Kisha Ford cutting to the basket was complemented by a stunning photo essay within entitled "They've Got Game and Laundry, Too: The No Frills Life of the New York Liberty."
There were several other articles, including "Building a Team with a Whole New Game Plan," "Pumping 'Em Up, Packing 'Em in" and an essay by John Edgar Wideman entitled, "My Daughter, the Point Guard. It started:
Early fans of the league -- and especially Liberty fans -- will recall the 1998 season and, in particular, August 16th. After an up and down season, it seemed clear the Liberty were going to miss the playoffs. Suddenly, things got turned around during a horrible road trip, but if they were going to make the post-season, they were going to have to win out. Standing in their way? The juggernaught that was the Houston Coments of Cooper, Perrot, Swoopes, Thompson and Tammy "just get me to the playoffs" Jackson.
The game had everything: playoff implications, the seeds of a just emerging rivalry, national t.v. and an amazing, attention getting, lead in: The cover of the New York Times Sunday Magazine. Michelle Agins' shot of Kisha Ford cutting to the basket was complemented by a stunning photo essay within entitled "They've Got Game and Laundry, Too: The No Frills Life of the New York Liberty."
There were several other articles, including "Building a Team with a Whole New Game Plan," "Pumping 'Em Up, Packing 'Em in" and an essay by John Edgar Wideman entitled, "My Daughter, the Point Guard. It started:
In her famous essay ''A Room of One's Own,'' Virginia Woolf posed a question: If Shakespeare had a sister, what might have been her fate if she dared write poetry? Would a female sensibility produce distinctively ''women's sentences''?In its tenth year, we're still asking these questions, but I'd like to think we're getting closer to the answers...
Well, what if a sister of Michael Jordan, motivated by the same fiery determination as her brother, had the chance to hone her hoops skills against the best female players in the world? Would women competing in a professional league evolve a vocabulary and grammar for the game that speaks a new language to fans? In its second season, the W.N.B.A. is answering questions we are just learning to ask about women's sports.
posted by Helen at 9:10 AM
