WNBA players continue to be at odds with the league over charter flights.
Earlier this week, Dallas Wings player Veronica Burton posted a video on TikTok showing her and her teammates taking a commercial flight while traveling during their playoff series.
Damn WNBA players had to fly commercial during the PLAYOFFS 😳 pic.twitter.com/ak1PvvDm8N
— 2Cool2Blog (@2Cool2BlogTV) August 16, 2022
A few weeks ago, players on the Los Angeles Sparks were forced to spend the night in an airport due to flight delays which led to WNBPA president Nneka Ogwumike to call on the league to allow teams to invest in charter flight options. Ogwumike also pleaded with airline companies to partner with the WNBA players.
Via CNN
“And in the spirit of collaboration,” Ogwumike continued, “we call upon both private and commercial airline companies to recognize this bold opportunity to lead: American, Delta, JetBlue, Southwest, United, NetJets, Wheels Up, JetSuiteX, among others: We encourage you to meet us at the table and partner with WNBA players to help eliminate the toughest opponent they face each season: travel.”
WNBA commissioner Cathy Engelbert has said that the league will provide charters for teams during the playoffs under special circumstances. Engelbert has also stated that both teams will fly on charter flight during the upcoming WNBA Finals.
“I think we’ll look for other opportunities to do charters like we have in the past,. “People don’t know we did a bunch of charters during last year’s playoffs when we had a west to east with challenging one day’s rest or no days’ rest, so we’ll continue to look for those opportunities should our budget allow it. But we wanted to start kind of chipping away and do WNBA Finals.”
