LOS ANGELES — Standing on the court of Crypto.com Arena, a day before the 30th anniversary of the first ever WNBA game played on June 21, 1997, DeLisha Milton-Jones couldn’t help but get emotional.
The former Florida star didn’t join the Sparks until 1999, two years after the team’s inception. But in the moment, Milton-Jones was unable to hold back tears as she reminisced about how far the league has come, and of former teammates who were no longer present and unable to see the fruits of their labor.
”It’s a blessing to be alive and experience this because I have friends that have passed. And it’s pretty cool and it really puts a lot in perspective,” Milton-Jones told a small group of reporters following a kids basketball clinic hosted by the Los Angeles Sparks.
”We all went on with our lives and we gave a lot to this franchise, to this league period. And we’ve been waiting for something to get back to us, and having this moment has been fulfilling for the soul.”
With the Sparks and New York Liberty facing off 30 years to the date of when those two teams rang in the inaugural WNBA season, several of the franchise’s former players made the trek back to Los Angeles to be recognized by the organization alongside their Liberty counterparts.
The group spanned multiple Sparks rosters, with Lisa Leslie among the players from the inaugural season, Milton-Jones, Nicky McCrimmon and Ukari Figgs among the players from the Sparks’ back-to-back championship years and Essence Carson from the 2016 title team.
During a halftime ceremony, the Sparks paid tribute to Daedra Charles, one of the players on the team’s inaugural roster, who passed away in 2018.
For some of the other former players, they echoed Milton-Jones’ sentiments in that they’ve felt forgotten. They’ve felt like the Sparks organization and the WNBA as a whole didn’t really care much for recognizing and honoring those who paved the way. Sunday’s ceremony was something they’ve longed for.
“I’ve been waiting 27 years for this. It seemed like we were the forgotten ones,” McCrimmon told The IX Basketball. “I’m just happy that the Sparks organization reached out and actually wanted to bring back the former players … we paved the way.”
McCrimmon did not join the Sparks until the 2000 season. She started her stateside professional career in the ABL with the Long Beach Stingrays, and also played for the Atlanta Glory before the league went under. At that point, McCrimmon was able to be drafted into the WNBA.
The former USC standout was a part of the Sparks’ 2001 and 2002 championship teams. She played a total of four seasons with the franchise before a couple of brief stints with the Houston Comets. While McCrimmon wasn’t exactly pleased with her departure from the Sparks, she says she was able to find some closure following this past weekend’s celebration.
”I would love to come back and support the team because honestly, when I left, that was it. I didn’t want to have anything to do with the Sparks because it left a sour taste in my mouth,” McCrimmon said. “But now we have new ownership and they’re trying to do the right thing and I appreciate it.”
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Milton-Jones also played in the ABL to start her professional career. She was selected by the Portland Power in the 1997 draft, and was then a part of the dispersal draft when the league folded and many of its players joined the WNBA.
The celebration was not only an homage to the former players, it was also a chance for them to reconnect and relive some of the best moments of their careers and shared experiences. Being in the same building where they won their first WNBA championship together was a full circle moment, and there was a sense of pride for having established the winning expectations when players don the purple and gold.
”It’s just been great to rekindle those old flames that you have with your teammates that no one will ever begin to understand. It was in the locker room or in those quiet moments that we weren’t on the floor that allowed you to just become one as a team,” Milton-Jones said. “It created a culture, and it was a culture of winning for many years that we experienced here with the Sparks.”
While Milton-Jones and McCrimmon were part of both Sparks’ championship teams in the early 2000s, Figgs was only around for the 2001 title squad. Unlike most of her teammates, the WNBA was already established when she came out of college in 1999.
The Sparks selected Figgs with the No. 28 pick in the 1999 WNBA Draft and she was a consistent source of production as a starting guard. During the team’s 2001 title run, she averaged 8.3 points and 5.9 assists, per Basketball Reference.
Although she wasn’t a part of the inaugural season, being able to share in that recognition with her teammates that were, especially with how far the WNBA has come since then, was a tremendous moment.
“It’s amazing. I thank the Sparks for not only having us back but for us to be able to have some time together to kind of remember some of those great times we had,” Figgs told The IX Basketball. “For some of the players that were here that first inaugural season, to be able to come back 30 years later and see what the first season really meant to women’s basketball, is amazing.”
After Figgs left the Sparks following the 2001 season, she would play two more years in the WNBA, one with the Portland Fire and one with the Houston Comets. She was still a productive player up until she retired, but those years with the Sparks, and especially the title she helped bring, will always be the highlight for her.
”Houston had won those first four years, so it was just one of those things where we had to get over the hump and come together,” Figgs said. “Some of the players from that team are still people that I talk to today very often and have a big part in my life. It was a really great time.”
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Standing there on that same court after all these years, the memories came rushing back. The same court where the Sparks hoisted their first ever championship trophy, with the banners in the rafters serving as a reminder.
Memories of what it felt like to achieve the highest heights possible at a time when everything still felt so surreal. Everything was exciting but uncertain at the same time. There wasn’t a sense of where the league would be all these years later, it was just about living in the moment.
”It was a dream come true. There’s no better feeling than to have your friends and family watch you play and actually win. You know how when people sing the national anthem, and when you’re somewhere else in a different country, if you sing that national anthem, you just feel it. For the Olympics, you just feel it,” McCrimmon said.
“When we sat out here, we played and we were actually able to win, there’s just nothing like it. I can’t even really describe it. It’s just something that takes over you because you’ve been waiting for this all your life.”
