WNBA Finals Totally Explained

Everything about The Wnba Finals totally explained

The WNBA Finals is the championship series of the Women's National Basketball Association (WNBA), held in early September and played under a best-of-five playoff format. The team winning the Eastern Conference Finals earns one of the two seeds in the championship round, with the other going to the team that wins the Western Conference Finals. This event has been played at the conclusion of every WNBA playoffs, the first being held in 1997.

History

The WNBA Finals were originally a single championship game to decide the WNBA champion. However, in 1998, after the addition of two teams, the WNBA Finals were turned into a best-of-three games series. In 2005, the WNBA Finals adopted a best-of-five format. WNBA Championship Series>

Year	Champions	Format	Result	Opponent	Finals MVP
1997	Houston Comets	1 game	65 - 51	New York Liberty	Cynthia Cooper
1998	Houston Comets	2-of-3	2 - 1	Phoenix Mercury	Cynthia Cooper
1999	Houston Comets	2-of-3	2 - 1	New York Liberty	Cynthia Cooper
2000	Houston Comets	2-of-3	2 - 0	New York Liberty	Cynthia Cooper
2001	Los Angeles Sparks	2-of-3	2 - 0	Charlotte Sting	Lisa Leslie
2002	Los Angeles Sparks	2-of-3	2 - 0	New York Liberty	Lisa Leslie
2003	Detroit Shock	2-of-3	2 - 1	Los Angeles Sparks	Ruth Riley
2004	Seattle Storm	2-of-3	2 - 1	Connecticut Sun	Betty Lennox
2005	Sacramento Monarchs	3-of-5	3 - 1	Connecticut Sun	Yolanda Griffith
2006	Detroit Shock	3-of-5	3 - 2	Sacramento Monarchs	Deanna Nolan
2007	Phoenix Mercury	3-of-5	3 - 2	Detroit Shock	Cappie Pondexter

Highlights

The 2003 Finals was best known for rekindling a heated rivalry between the two teams' head coaches, Los Angeles Sparks head coach Michael Cooper and Detroit Shock head coach Bill Laimbeer. Both coaches were fierce NBA competitors who played in the NBA Finals against each other in 1988 and 1989.

In 2001, the #4 seed Charlotte Sting was the lowest seed ever to make the WNBA Finals.

2006 marked the first time that a #1 seed didn't participate in the WNBA Finals. Detroit and Sacramento were both 2 seeds.

The New York Liberty have the most Finals appearances (4) without winning one.

The Detroit Shock are the 3rd team to win multiple championships (following Houston and Los Angeles respectively). However, they're the first team to win non-consecutive championships.

2006 marked the first time that the team with the best point-differential in the regular-season didn't win the WNBA Finals. The Connecticut Sun had the best point differential in '06 but was ousted by the Shock in the Eastern Conference Finals.

The Detroit Shock hosted the two largest crowds in Finals History (22,076 in Game 3 of 2003 WNBA Finals and 19,671 in Game 5 of 2006 WNBA Finals)

Finals appearances

The statistics below refer to series wins and losses, not individual games won and lost.

Num	eam			CT
4	Houston Comets	4	0	1.000
4	New York Liberty	0	4	.000
3	Detroit Shock	2	1	.667
3	Los Angeles Sparks	2	1	.667
2	Phoenix Mercury	1	1	.500
2	Sacramento Monarchs	1	1	.500
2	Connecticut Sun	0	2	.000
1	Seattle Storm	1	0	1.000
1	Charlotte Sting*	0	1	.000

*Dissolved following 2006 season

Active franchises with no Finals appearances

Atlanta Dream Founded in 2008.

Chicago Sky Founded in 2006.

Indiana Fever Founded in 2000.

Minnesota Lynx Founded in 1999.

San Antonio Silver Stars Founded in 1997 as Utah Starzz relocated to San Antonio in 2003.

Washington Mystics Founded in 1998.Further Information

Get more info on 'Wnba Finals'.

External Link Exchanges

Do you know how hard it is to get a link from a large encyclopaedia? Well we're different and will prove it. To get a link from us just add the following HTML to your site on a relevant page:

<a href="http://wnba_finals.totallyexplained.com">WNBA Finals Totally Explained</a>

Then simply click through this link from your web page. Our crawlers will verify your link, extract the title of your web page and instantly add a link back to it. If you like you can remove the words Totally Explained and embed the link in article text.
As long as your link remains in place, we'll keep our link to you right here. Please play fair - our crawlers are watching. Your site must be closely related to this one's topic. Any kind of spamming, dubious practises or removing the link will result in your link from us being dropped and, potentially, your whole site being banned.