Fans Accuse Cathy Engelbert of New York Liberty Bias Over WNBA Finals Outfit
The New York Liberty became the 2024 WNBA champions on Sunday, after what might have been the most exciting playoff series in the league's history.
While Game 5's outcome didn't come without controversy, the bottom line is that the Liberty did enough to earn their franchise's first WNBA title — and that's something nobody can ever take away from them.
There were multiple noteworthy figures in the sport attending Sunday's game at the Barclays Center in Brooklyn. Among the most notable was Cathy Engelbert, who is of course the WNBA's Commissioner.
While it makes sense that the WNBA Commissioner would be such a monumental game for her league, Engelbert attracted attention for a strange reason on Sunday.
Fans on social media noticed that Engelbert was wearing a dress that appeared to depict New York City's skyline.
While there would be nothing wrong with wearing this outfit outside of Sunday's game, social media found it suspect that Engelbert would appear to be representing the city of one of the teams competing.
X user @clutch2_j posted a screenshot of Engelbert in the dress and wrote, "Cathy in a whole New York dress the game was over before it started 😭😭😭".
Cathy in a whole New York dress the game was over before it started 😭😭😭 pic.twitter.com/iWf7SeINwv
— J_CLUTCH2 (@clutch2_j) October 21, 2024
"I don’t want to be like this, but you can’t tell me the fix wasn’t in when Cathy is literally wearing the NYC Skyline on her dress," added X user @annaeknutson.
I don’t want to be like this, but you can’t tell me the fix wasn’t in when Cathy is literally wearing the NYC Skyline on her dress. pic.twitter.com/PjbvFxsOns
— anna (@annaeknutson) October 21, 2024
A third fan wrote, "The commissioner of the wnba wore a NY themed dress to the trophy presentation lmao".
While it's difficult to catch everything on Engelbert's dress design, it was made by a New York City native and certainly looks like the Big Apple.
WNBA fans seem convinced that just about everybody in the Barclays Center was working in the Liberty's favor on Sunday.
Grant Young covers Women’s Basketball, the New York Yankees, and the New York Mets for Sports Illustrated’s ‘On SI’ sites. He holds an MFA degree in creative writing from the University of San Francisco (USF), where he also graduated with a Bachelor’s Degree in Marketing and played on USF’s Division I baseball team for five years. However, he now prefers Angel Reese to Angels in the Outfield.