Yahoo Finance WNBA celebrates 25-year anniversary with creative logo as part of 'Count it' campaign
Count all 25 years of it.
The WNBA is launching a special edition logo, a new basketball and new uniforms for its 25th season that will tip off in May, the league announced on Monday. It's part of the league's "Count it" campaign and is partly in celebration of Women's History Month.
The league announced initiatives for the 25th anniversary season that includes greatest players, greatest moments, a special advisory council and the debut of the WNBA Commissioner's Cup.
'Count it': WNBA's 25th anniversary logo
The special logo remains the standard "fire" orange woman about to score a basket. Next to it is "XX," the roman numeral for 20, and four tallies with an orange strike through it. It signifies the number five rather than using the "V" roman numeral for it. Commissioner Cathy Engelbert told ESPN it's to "get across the idea of, 'Keep counting, because there is a lot more to come from the WNBA."
The new logo is the final still in a moving 60-second video of how WNBA players have shattered expectations, from superstars who have returned after having kids to social justice wins to A'ja Wilson having a monument on South Carolina's campus.
#CountIt pic.twitter.com/cEA9cKCtUV
— WNBA (@WNBA) March 15, 2021
The logo will be used on courts, jerseys and the game ball, which is now a Wilson Evo NXT ball. Las Vegas Aces and Australian national team center Liz Cambage is joining the company's Advisory staff as the first player from the WNBA, it announced.
“As we look to celebrate the first 25 years of the league, we are also setting the stage for the next 25 years. The WNBA’s new distinctive 25th season logo and Count It campaign signify what makes the league unique,” Engelbert said in a statement. “We are celebrating a quarter of a century of the impact the WNBA has made on sports and society, and on generations of young and diverse athletes.”
Details on new uniforms by Nike for each team will come later. The WNBA draft is scheduled for April 15.
The league and its players will continue its focus on social justice in 2021. The social justice council launched during the 2020 bubble season in Bradenton, Florida, and "The Justice Movement" will celebrate the league's history of advocacy.
The WNBA is also hoping it can safely bring fans back to stadiums as the NBA has done slowly throughout its 2020-21 season.
Commissioner's Cup will debut in 2021
Way back before COVID-19, the WNBA announced the debut of the annual Commissioner's Cup for the 2020 season that required a month-long break for the Tokyo Olympics. The worldwide pandemic forced its cancelation.
The Cup tournament will now debut in the 2021 season as a "competition within a competition," per the league, comprised of 10 designated regular season games per team that count toward cup standings. The two teams atop the standings will play in the Commissioner's Cup championship game following the Olympic break. It will be "an exciting jumpstart to resumption of WNBA regular season action," the WNBA said.
It features player prize pools and will bring together fans, players and local community partners for conversations and activities on equality and social justice.
The rescheduled Olympics are set to begin on July 23 and run through August 8 in Tokyo.
Looking back at 25 years of WNBA
The WNBA is the longest running women's professional league in the U.S. and thereby the first to reach 25 years. It is often the threshold to which other women's leagues hold themselves.
The league will honor this milestone by selecting the league's best players since it first started in 1997. Fans will have a chance to vote on "The W25." The 25 best moments will be voted on as well and be unveiled during the second half of the season and playoffs.
A new advisory council of women's basketball pioneers and legends will make up the 25th Season Advisory Council. It will meet "periodically" to discuss new ideas to grow the game and fanbase. That group currently includes former players Cynthia Cooper, Fran Harris, Lauren Jackson, Lisa Leslie, Rebecca Lobo, Sheryl Swoopes, Lindsay Whalen and Teresa Weatherspoon.
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