{"id":15037,"date":"2020-06-04T17:17:18","date_gmt":"2020-06-04T07:17:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/basketball.draftcentral.com.au\/?p=15037"},"modified":"2020-06-04T17:27:49","modified_gmt":"2020-06-04T07:27:49","slug":"wnbl-opens-up-free-agency-period-jackson-praises-league","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/central.rookieme.com\/basketball\/wnbl-opens-up-free-agency-period-jackson-praises-league\/","title":{"rendered":"WNBL opens up Free Agency period, Jackson praises league"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Women’s National Basketball League (WNBL) had announced earlier this morning that the Free Agency Period for the WNBL 2020\/21 season would begin from 1pm AEST and that all eight of the WNBL\u2019s clubs could begin contract negotiations with their Unrestricted Free Agents from this afternoon.<\/p>\n

This season\u2019s current Free Agency headliners are in abundance, as numerous Opals representatives are on the block to possibly re-sign with their original teams or test the market for a new location. The list comprises of superstars like Alice Kunek<\/strong> (Sydney Uni Flames), Tess Madgen<\/strong> (Townsville Fire) and Darcee Garbin<\/strong> (Townsville Fire) just to name a few.<\/p>\n

We know the futures of three players from last season, as veteran superstars Nat Hurst<\/strong> (Adelaide Lightning), Gabe Richards<\/strong> (Bendigo Spirit) and Sarah Graham<\/strong> (Sydney Uni Flames) have all announced their retirements following the conclusion of the 2020 season.<\/p>\n

Another group of players for WNBL fans to keep an eye on, are those who played last season in the WNBA, as per league sources, Liz Cambage<\/strong> (Las Vegas Aces), Bec Allen<\/strong> (New York Liberty), Alanna Smith<\/strong> (Phoenix Mercury) and Sami Whitcomb<\/strong> (Seattle Storm) are all also possible signees for the upcoming season, which could beef up the competition tremendously in terms of skill, ability and profile.<\/p>\n

To make keeping track of movements of the players and who\u2019s available on the market, the WNBL has created a list of all of the league\u2019s current Free Agents, and a Tracker to log all the moves that said Free Agents make during the offseason.<\/p>\n

2020-21 Free Agent List: Click Here<\/a><\/p>\n

2020-21 Free Agency Tracker: Click Here<\/a><\/p>\n

In the midst of the league\u2019s announcement this morning, Basketball Australia\u2019s Head of Women in Basketball Lauren Jackson chimed in to promote and express her pride in the WNBL and the level of play the league is responsible for. Here\u2019s what she had to say.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe WNBL should be considered the template for how to develop world-class athletes for both domestic and international honours while delivering a product which is envied by the rest of the world.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe are entering an extremely exciting period for Australian women\u2019s basketball, with the delayed Tokyo Olympics in July 2021 and Sydney set to host the 2022 Women\u2019s Basketball World Cup. With the Opals currently ranked number two in the world and the Gems finishing with the silver medal at last year\u2019s FIBA 19s World Cup, never has there been a greater opportunity for Australia to claim that title as the world\u2019s best women\u2019s basketball nation.<\/p>\n

\u201cIn addition to the sensational Australian talent who have either re-signed or on the Free Agency List for next season, the WNBL could welcome back some of our homegrown superstars including the likes of Liz Cambage and Alanna Smith, which would be phenomenal for the WNBL.\u201d<\/p>\n

With the season to begin on November 20, each club now has a clearer picture on the timeline they have to work with and prepare their rosters for WNBL 2020\/21.<\/p>\n

Broadcasting details for next season are soon to be announced in \u201cdue course\u201d, says the league.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Women’s National Basketball League (WNBL) had announced earlier this morning that the Free Agency Period for the WNBL 2020\/21 season would begin from 1pm AEST and that all eight of the WNBL\u2019s clubs could begin contract negotiations with their Unrestricted Free Agents from this afternoon. This season\u2019s current Free Agency headliners are in abundance, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":87,"featured_media":15040,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_active":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_note":"","_exactmetrics_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[2871,11],"tags":[394,3001,1788,3000,240,245,2499,2495,590,268,392,3002,43,2067,2110,266,1997,391,1972,3003],"class_list":["post-15037","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","category-wnbl","tag-adelaide-lightning","tag-alanna-smith","tag-alice-kunek","tag-bec-allen","tag-bendigo-spirit","tag-darcee-garbin","tag-gabe-richards","tag-liz-cambage","tag-melbourne-boomers","tag-nat-hurst","tag-perth-lynx","tag-sami-whitcomb","tag-sarah-graham","tag-southside-flyers","tag-sydney-uni-flames","tag-tess-madgen","tag-townsville-fire","tag-uc-capitals","tag-wnbl","tag-wnbl-free-agency"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/central.rookieme.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15037","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/central.rookieme.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/central.rookieme.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/central.rookieme.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/87"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/central.rookieme.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=15037"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/central.rookieme.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15037\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/central.rookieme.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/15040"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/central.rookieme.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=15037"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/central.rookieme.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=15037"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/central.rookieme.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=15037"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}