By Rachel Bachman

Just weeks ago, the WNBA was on the brink of disaster.

After two years of explosive growth spurred by the 2024 arrival of Caitlin Clark and other young stars, the players and the league were on the verge of a labor impasse that threatened to delay the start of the season.

Unless they reached a deal, the two sides faced the possibility of canceling games for the first time in the WNBA's 30-year history, just as those games were becoming more valuable than ever.

But this week, when they finally struck a tentative deal, it did more than avoid the embarrassment of a work stoppage. It turned into a historic triumph for the players: They landed a 364% increase to their salary cap, making it the biggest jump ever seen in U.S. professional sports history, according to the WNBA Players Association.

If the deal is approved by players and the WNBA's board of governors in the coming days, then the average player will earn about $584,000 this season.

"We realized that this was more meaningful than any of us could have ever imagined," said Nneka Ogwumike, president of the players association's executive committee.

The radically upgraded collective-bargaining agreement has created a new reality in women's basketball. Two years ago, fans were shocked to learn that Clark, the No. 1 overall draft pick, would make just $76,535 for her rookie season.

Now, the lowest-paid WNBA player will make a guaranteed $270,000. That's more than the supermax salary across the entire league last season, $249,244.

WNBA players also landed their first-ever meaningful share of league revenues, at 20%. Many WNBA teams don't turn an annual profit, however, which is common at this stage across leagues as owners invest in facilities and labor. (In the NBA, players earn roughly a 50% share of league revenues.)

Still, the CBA deal is a high-water mark for a league with a tumultuous history. NBA commissioner David Stern launched the WNBA in 1997 with eight NBA-owned teams. Over the years some teams sold to independent owners, while others relocated or folded.

The WNBA was on a gradual upswing in 2024 when Clark arrived after breaking the NCAA career scoring record at Iowa. League attendance surged. Viewership on ESPN ballooned by 170%.

And even while Clark sat out most of last season due to injury, the WNBA continued its rise. In 2025, regular-season games averaged 1.3 million viewers on ESPN, the same that NBA games averaged on the network in 2024-25.

Now, NBA owners who once saw the WNBA as little more than a tax write-off are scrambling to buy expansion franchises. By 2030, the WNBA is set to have 18 teams, up 50% from 2024.

The WNBA still lags far behind its parent league financially. The new WNBA salary cap will start at $7 million per team, behind the NBA's current cap of $155 million.

And the WNBA's $200 million-a-year broadcast package with Disney, Amazon Prime and NBCUniversal is still a fraction of the NBA's $7 billion-a-year deal with the same networks.

But under the new deal, the WNBA is about to mint a crop of new millionaires overnight, with designated veteran player deals fixed at $1.4 million in the CBA's first year. Ogwumike said she hadn't counted how many there will be but added, "I am looking forward to that stat."

(END) Dow Jones Newswires

March 20, 2026 12:00 ET (16:00 GMT)