Basketball takes a back seat during emotional time for Minnesota

The Lynx held their annual ‘Pride Game’ on Saturday, June 21, against the Los Angeles Sparks. A game preceded by their annual ‘Black Excellence Night’ on Tuesday, June 17, against the Las Vegas Aces. Prior to that, the first game of an emotionally meaningful homestand, the Lynx honored franchise legend Seimone Augustus for her induction into the Naismith Memorial Hall of Fame last year. 

An event preceded by an unconscionable tragedy. 

“It seems pretty meaningless, but you know, it’s certainly…hitting this close to home. Obviously, we know it’s a really difficult time. Not just in our country, [but] in the world.” 

Those were the first words of the late morning pregame media availability with Lynx president of basketball operations and head coach Cheryl Reeve on Saturday, June 14. The Lynx and Sparks were scheduled to tip off at 12 p.m. CT, roughly 10 hours following the politically charged assassination of Melissa Hortman, the speaker of the Minnesota House of Representatives, and her husband Mark, and the assassination attempt of Minnesota State Senator Mark Hoffman and his wife Yvette. 

A day intended to celebrate the incredible career of an incredible woman who called Minnesota home for a decade and a half had morphed into something completely different. A day filled with sadness, anger, confusion, and fear. 

“The radicalization that’s occurred, I think it’s very clear the timing of when our country really started to turn,” Reeve continued. “I think that today is a tough day all around. I think that basketball is what we do, and we’ll go out there and do what we do, but, when our game is over, God knows what we’re going to come off the court and learn what’s happening.”

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Prior to both teams taking the court, a moment of silence was held inside the Target Center in Downtown Minneapolis for the Hortmans, and for the Hoffmans. About 10 miles to the east, the day’s ‘No Kings’ protest gathered outside of the Minnesota State Capitol in Downtown Saint Paul, while the killer was still at large. 

A weighty tension hung on the silence of the sold-out crowd inside the Target Center. After a few moments, a fan from somewhere in the stands yelled, “Melissa!” The gravity of hearing her name mere hours after the horror that had taken place snapped the arena to attention. 

The game between the Lynx and the Sparks took place as scheduled. Minnesota won 101-78, though the final score of the game and who did what between the lines hardly seemed relevant.

“It’s a scary time that we’re living in,” Lynx Star Napheesa Collier said during the postgame press conference. “Honestly, the things that are going on in our country, taking democracy away from the land of the free, that’s supposed to be our slogan. It’s really scary. Especially to raise a kid in an environment like this where, you know, [my daughter] has less rights than I had growing up, less rights than the people before us and it’s continuing to go down. It looks like it’s trending downwards, it’s getting worse. 

“Very, very scary. It does put basketball into perspective. It’s not the most important thing. Coach said this too, I think as athletes we have a platform and we need to use it to speak out against things like this. This is not politics. This is life and morality and human rights, reproductive rights, women’s rights, this is not politics. So, I think it’s really important to stand up for, and fight against these things.” 

Standing up for what’s right and using sport as a vehicle of change is never something that happens by accident within the walls of the Lynx’s organization. It isn’t by coincidence that a celebration of the career and contributions of Seimone Augustus took place in the middle of Pride month. 

Her most public appearance of the week may have been her banner ceremony at Target Center, a ceremony she started by saying, ‘Minnesota, Minnesota, Minnesota, Lord I’ve missed you,’ but her most impactful appearances took place through visiting Twin Cities LGBTQ+ with the organization QUEERSPACE and the Twin Cities Pride Cultural Arts Center. 

“That’s the beauty about being with the Lynx,” Augustus told The Next in an interview on June 10. “When they reached out, it wasn’t just about the Hall of Fame, it was ‘What do you want to do? What are you involved in? Have those things that you were doing when you were with the Lynx changed? What can we add, takeaway, etc.?’”

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Augustus helped the Lynx raise four banners and sank over 2,400 unguardable shots during 14 seasons in Minnesota, but in all those years, she was even more effective off the court and has left a lasting legacy for people across the entire state. She was an outspoken and powerful advocate for marriage equality in Minnesota, and was also honored as the grand marshal of the 2012 Twin Cities Pride Parade. Of course, a visit to her second home would concern things far bigger than basketball. 

“I’ve always done things with the LGBTQ community, being in the [Pride] Parade, being around, whenever we didn’t have a game, I’m at the festivities, just being a voice,” Augustus said. “Throughout my time with the Lynx, I grew courageous enough to be able to express myself, and that helped move the needle forward when people talk about marriage equality. Minnesota for me is kind of like the foundation of me even finding my identity as a person. To be able to come back during Pride month and also be able to share some words and hopefully be able to provide some comfort for some high school kids that are going through a transitional period in their lives, it’s always great to be able to have those monumental moments.”

Augustus met with local Twin Cities youth at the Pride Cultural Arts Center the night before she was honored at the game against the Sparks.   

“Seimone is an absolute legend, and the conversation was absolutely fantastic at Twin Cities Pride,” Lynx president of basketball operations Carley Knox said in an interview with The Next on Tuesday, June 17. “She talked about her own journey of being an out athlete and the barriers she overcame. Just about being authentically herself and how that helped her become successful.” 

Knox, a fellow former grand marshal of the Twin Cities Pride Parade, received that honor last year for her multi-decade fight in this industry to use sport as a vehicle of change. 

“I was an out athlete in college and very politically active,” Knox said in an interview with The Next last year. “A lot of those opportunities, those doors closed in my face because of who I was. That’s why I’m so passionate about wanting to make it better for generations that come behind me. I don’t want opportunities to be stolen from people because of who they are.”

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Over the course of a week, the Lynx played three home games in June. Dozens of more games will be played before this WNBA regular season reaches its conclusion, but these past three Lynx home games have carried with them the weight of feeling an awful lot bigger than just three home games. 

Coach Reeve, who figuratively wears her heart on her sleeve in any game she coaches, and literally wears her values on the t-shirts and stylish jacket combinations that make up her gameday fit for Lynx home games. On Tuesday’s Black Excellence Night, her shirt bore tribute to the activist Angela Davis and one of her most famous quotes.

‘I’m no longer accepting the things I cannot change… I’m changing the things I cannot accept.’ 

“I’ve said this before, now more than ever, the space that we’re in, that we highlight and celebrate,” Reeve said. “I think that’s the thing, celebrate the history of [Black women], for me, I’m around resilient black women all the time, all the time. So it’s a special day in terms of being around and just wanting to empower and uplift and support in any way that I can. I’m always down for that, and hopefully our crowd understood the importance of the day for our Black players.” 

Minnesota is not unlike the rest of the world in that it’s still sorting through the carnage of recent events, tragedies, and heartbreak. Minnesota Lynx basketball doesn’t suggest, nor does it pretend to provide a clear, straight and narrow path out of the darkness. However, its history and its spirit suggest that, at the very least, it can be a vehicle that points towards the light.