News finally came out that WNBA star Candace Parker eloped in November…in Lake Tahoe. She married NBA scrub Shelden Williams, whom I’m guessing was too busy averaging 3 points a game for the Kings to give her a proper ceremony…

“We just decided that with both of our schedules, it would be better to elope,” Williams said.

The newlyweds live in Sacramento with their three dogs.

Parker and Williams had been engaged since last May, which is pretty moronic, especially since Shelden has only now disqualified himself from that ever-tempting waterfall of NBA road snatch. Seriously, even if you look like this, it’s like a perpetual flood of poo-nanny wherever these guys go. Why do you think Kareem was in the league for 20 years? For the socks?

[The Sacremento Bee (last item), via Game On]

Fans expecting a night of jumpers and bounce passes at last night's LA Sparks-Detroit Shock game were instead treated to an episode of the Bitchy & Scratchy Show, as the final five seconds exploded into a melee, ruining thousands of father-daughter bonding sessions and lesbian dates.  Well, maybe not the lesbian dates.  Superstar rookie Candace Parker — the woman who has dunked in a game twice as many times as everyone in the history of the WNBA combined — was at the center of the tempest:

Parker got tangled up with Detroit’s Plenette Pierson and fell to the ground. As she was getting up, Pierson intentionally ran into her, setting off the melee.  Parker threw a punch at Pierson before being tackled by Detroit’s Deanna Nolan. Players and coaches from both teams joined in, and Mahorn knocked Lisa Leslie to the court at one point.

Pierson, Parker, Mahorn, and DeLisha Milton-Jones (who shoved and punched Mahorn) were all ejected, at which point the two teams played the agonizingly slow final 4.5 seconds of he game.

From a spectator standpoint, I have to say: it's a pretty good scuffle.  Certainly not an all-out brawl, but definitely more serious than some dinky catfight.  I guess the WNBA finally showed they can play like their male counterparts.  "Malice at the Palace II."  Much better than the name for regular Shock games, Malaise at the Palace.

Candace Parker dunked for the Los Angeles Sparks in a 77-63 win over the Indiana Fever last night, becoming just the second person to dunk in a WNBA game since the league's inaugural season of 1997.  Teammate Lisa Leslie accomplished the feat, sort of, in 2002.

Excuse me while I'm sincere for a moment: Candace Parker is a great athlete, and while I prefer sexier women's sports like tennis, beach volleyball, and foxy boxing, I admire that the WNBA gives young women role models in sports who don't make headlines for their sex appeal.  Still, it's kind of sad that a dunk is such a huge deal.  Ordinarily I'd make some kind of joke about the drunk sorority girl bragging about peeing in a urinal, but I think the mainstream media has already been patronizing enough.

This is two-time NCAA champion, WNBA champion, and Olympic gold medalist Sue Bird serving up what appears to be some kind of grande crappuccino.  Frankly, it's good to see that the WNBA finally found a way to give its players health insurance.

[Boring facts: this was a Seattle Storm-Starbucks cross-promotion last August.  I found it in Getty Images while writing this post for FanHaus's Attractive Olympian series.]

If you think I'm such an irresponsible disseminator of information that I'm covering this story just for the headline, you're exactly right. Sort of.

The [Seattle] Storm has signed [sic] veteran forward Sheryl Swoopes…who will turn 37 on March 25 [and] is a three-time WNBA most valuable player…Only three other players have won the [The MVP] more than once — Cynthia Cooper, Lisa Leslie and Storm star Lauren Jackson [pictured].

You might remember that Swoopes made headlines in October of 2005 when she came out of the closet and announced that she and Alisa Scott, then an assistant coach with Swoopes' Comets, were going to raise Swoopes' son together. Swoopes also insinuated that the move may have been inspired by the fatigue that comes with being a open lesbian in Texas, whereas the more liberal state of Washington is actually gay-friendlier, allowing civil unions for gay couples.

So cheer up, Seattle. Even though your NBA team is being ripped out from under you, y'all still have a monster ladies' squad. You have Swoopes, Swin Cash, Sue Bird, and Lauren Jackson [link NSFW]. Ah, Lauren. I knew there was a reason I put up a WNBA post. – Monday Morning Punter

[Seattle Times] 

I've been hearing things about the WNBA playoffs recently, and it turns out the playoffs just ended, with the Phoenix Mercury beating the Detroit Shock in Game 5 of the championship series.  In case you're unfamiliar with the WNBA playoffs — really, and you call yourself a fan? — Game 5 was the deciding game, and the Shock was favored heavily at home.  Cappie Pondexter (who was NOT a pitcher in the Negro Leagues) won the series MVP.  For some perspective on the win, I turn it over to Diana Taurasi's blog:

Whooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo! [...] Through everything, thick and thin, through diamonds and coal, we did everything we could to win. People doubted the running game, they doubted Small Ball, they doubted the Rover defense and we say YES to all of the naysayers, doubters and haters. We did it.

We are Phoenix. We run-and-gun, we shoot the three and we win championships.

And people wonder why the WNBA isn't as popular as the NBA: if the league can't screw an exciting Phoenix team out of a title, how does it expect to survive?