Hey there, I'm Emily Kaplan.

Yes, you're probably wondering what I'm doing from outside my usual spot.

Dodging pucks and grabbing cliches ring-sided at HL Games.

Don't worry, that's not going anywhere.

But you are going to be hearing different voices posting ESPN Daily in the coming weeks,

and I'm one of them. I'll be with you the rest of the week, helping this podcast do what

it's always done. Tell the best sports stories in audio, day in, and day out.

Thanks for listening.

Alexa Phillipu, the WNBA draft is set for tonight, and women's basketball is having a moment.

But like, I'm cognizant, we use that term having a moment a lot, and it doesn't seem to capture,

because this feels like more than a moment. It feels like momentum. So you were at the women's

final for in Dallas. Can you please just describe what it was like to be there and how significant

this tournament was for the sport? Well, I think in some ways you could tell the direction,

the momentum that was going to be happening, even as early as the regionals.

There were some great crowds there, and so you could tell that there was something special

brewing, and then you get to Dallas, and there's a ton of credential and media coming in from all over

the place. And then the storylines really just spoke for themselves. You had South Carolina's

class for an undefuted season, yet Caitlin Clark's ridiculous and historic tournament run.

You had Angel Reese's inevitability and her flair and her authenticity, and even an up-and-comer,

like Virginia Tech, who had never been on that stage before. And so altogether, you could see,

especially National Semifinals in really the National Title game, that in real time,

the National Conversation was shifting to those games and to those athletes. And so I think

...