NEW YORK – The WNBA on Monday announced plans to play a reduced season, with a 22-game schedule that would begin in late July without fans in attendance because of the coronavirus pandemic.
The league is still finalizing a partnership with IMG Academy in Florida to play all the games at the facility in Bradenton or other nearby locations. Players and team officials for the league’s 12 teams would be housed at IMG and hold training camps there.
“There’s a lot to do between now and the tip of the season, now that we’ve selected IMG Academy” as the location to play, WNBA commissioner Cathy Engelbert said in a phone interview. “My hope is the July 24 date will stick. We have scenarios and plans to lift and shift the tip of the season. It could slip to a couple of days later. We want to have the appropriate number of days for training camp.”
Engelbert, who said she had a site visit at IMG, hopes to have teams in Florida by the first week of July to start training camps. The season had been postponed indefinitely in April because of the coronavirus pandemic.
The WNBA would use its regular playoff format, with the top eight teams making the postseason and the first two rounds being single-elimination. The top two seeds would have byes until the semifinals. The playoffs would begin in the middle of September and end in early October.