Celebrating the Players That Made Women's Basketball

KQED's Forum

KQED

News, Politics, News Commentary

4.2 • 726 Ratings

🗓️ 17 April 2026

⏱️ 55 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

The 2026 WNBA season tips off next month. It’s expected to see historic viewership and attendance, after last season’s record-breaking run as the most-watched regular season in the history of the league. But even though this is the WNBA’s historic 30th season, women have been playing basketball since long before 1996. Sports journalists Jordan Robinson and Emma Baccellieri set out to profile the female trailblazers who changed basketball history, like Denise Long Rife, the first woman drafted by an NBA team when she was recruited to the San Francisco Warriors in 1969, and Ora Washington, who in the 1930s became a star on her YMCA’s all-Black basketball team after already winning “almost every tennis trophy available to a Black woman in pre-war America.” We’ll celebrate the players and coaches who made women’s basketball into the phenomenon it is today, and get a preview for the upcoming season, with Robinson and Baccellieri. Their new book is “Court Queens: Celebrate the Players, Teams, and History of Women’s Basketball.” Guests: Jordan Robinson, sports journalist; co-author, "Court Queens: Celebrate the Players, Teams, and History of Women’s Basketball" Emma Baccellieri, staff writer, Sports Illustrated; co-author, "Court Queens: Celebrate the Players, Teams, and History of Women’s Basketball" Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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1:17.3	From KQED. Welcome to Forum. I'm I'm I Kim. The WNBA's 2026 season is expected to see historic viewership and attendance after last season's record
1:22.8	breaking run is the most watched regular season in the history of the league. and the players just signed the richest contract in WMBA history.
1:30.3	We'll talk about some of the players and coaches making women's basketball the phenomenon it is today,
1:36.3	and the women who came before.
1:39.3	Did you know Denise Long-Ripe was the first woman drafted by an NBA team, the then San Francisco Warriors in
1:46.5	1969. This I learned from Emma Bachelary and Jordan Robinson's new book, Court Queens,
1:53.7	which celebrates the women who changed basketball history with hundreds of profiles and photos.
1:59.0	And the authors join me now. Emma Bacheloria Sports Illustrated
2:02.5	staff writer who focuses on women's sports and baseball. Emma, welcome to forum. Thank you for having me.
2:08.7	Glad to have you. Jordan Robinson is also with us, a journalist covering the intersection of
	...

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