Napheesa Collier Makes Funny, Honest Admission About Losing 2024 WNBA Finals

The Lynx superstar isn't shy to admit she's not over the defeat.
Collier averaged 19 points and 8 assists per game in the 2024 WNBA Finals
Collier averaged 19 points and 8 assists per game in the 2024 WNBA Finals / Wendell Cruz-Imagn Images
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Napheesa Collier had a tremendous 2024 season for the Minnesota Lynx, winning Defensive Player of the Year and finishing second in MVP voting as she led her team back to the WNBA Finals. Unfortunately she couldn't finish the job once there, falling to the New York Liberty in five games.

The ending of Game 5 was rather controversial and included some calls from the referees that the Lynx felt were questionable at best. Collier highlighted those calls in an Instagram post she put up after the loss, leading to accusations that Collier wasn't handling the defeat as well as she could.

Talking to Taylor Rooks this week, Collier spoke about the Finals and made a funny, yet honest, admission— she's still not over it and she is definitely a sore loser.

"I'll just never forget it," Collier said. "It was my first really hard loss in my career and especially when you feel like it was, like, unfair, whatever it was. I feel like it's something hard to get over and I'm honestly not going to apologize for that.

"I'm a competitor. I want to win. I shouldn't get over that. I should use it as fuel, which is exactly what I'm doing. I'm working really hard... Next time I'm there, I want to win."

When Rooks asked what kind of backlash Collier receives for admitting she's not over the loss, she acknowledged she's not good at losing.

"People just calling me a sore loser. I'm like, 'I am a sore loser. It sucks! I agree with you. I am very sore about losing.'"

It's definitely the attitude Minnesota would prefer Collier to have. Professional athletes need this sort of thing to drive their competitiveness and desire for greatness. It sounds like Collier, already a great player, is dead-set on getting better just so she doesn't feel what it's like to lose again.

A frightening prospect for the rest of the W.


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Liam McKeone
LIAM MCKEONE

Liam McKeone is a senior writer for the Breaking and Trending News team at Sports Illustrated. He has been in the industry as a content creator since 2017, and prior to joining SI in May 2024, McKeone worked for NBC Sports Boston and The Big Lead. In addition to his work as a writer, he has hosted the Press Pass Podcast covering sports media and The Big Stream covering pop culture. A graduate of Fordham University, he is always up for a good debate and enjoys loudly arguing about sports, rap music, books and video games. McKeone has been a member of the National Sports Media Association since 2020.