Phoenix Suns and Mercury owner Mat Ishbia joins “The Pat McAfee Show” to discuss what he’s looking forward to from the upcoming WNBA All-Star Weekend in Phoenix. (1:35)
The 2024 WNBA All-Star Game reaches its 20-year milestone this weekend, continuing the tradition of showcasing the league’s top talent.
With 2024 marking the Olympic year, Team USA, featuring A’ja Wilson, Sabrina Ionescu, and Jewell Loyd, will take on the remaining Team WNBA headlined by rookies Angel Reese and Caitlin Clark.
Just like the NBA, the All-Star Game uniform has undergone several design updates since the first All-Star Game in 1999 when players wore their team jerseys, up until 2006 when the league introduced the first East-West uniforms. Then, format changes to the midseason showcase in 2018 and 2021 were also reflected in players’ on-court attire.
This year’s uniform has several nods to the league’s ever-evolving nature. Just above the size tag there are 20 embroidered stars to represent the event’s 20th edition. There is also a tag that reads “1/144” to emphasize the total number of players in the league.
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Here is a look at the WNBA All-Star uniforms in the past and how they’ve evolved.
2006: East 98, West 82
The WNBA, which had a partnership with Reebok at the time, introduced its separate conference jerseys which contained the league’s logo colors. The East All-Stars wore white and the West All-Stars wore orange. Players’ numbers were present on the front of their jerseys with just their last names on the back. A patch of the player’s designated team was placed just above the name.
Capitalizing on the first All-Star Game look, the 2007 uniforms featured a star design along the side. The league went with the look in the 2009 All-Star Game after skipping 2008 because of the Beijing Summer Olympics.
2011: East 118, West 113
After going with a white jersey for the East since the beginning of the All-Star uniform era, the league switched to black uniforms.
2015: West 117, East 112
A lighter jersey with an outlined font that became the league’s signature look for the next few seasons. Each player had their number on the front of the jerseys and their team logo patch on the back.
2018: Team Parker 119, Team Delle Donne 112
The WNBA switched up its format in 2018 from East and West All-Stars to selecting team captains, allowing opposite conferences to play on the same squad. Similar to the NBA All-Star look, Nike designed the uniforms using only black and white swatches. Each player’s jersey included their colorless team logo on the top left. A white “W” was placed across the front of the jersey with “NBA” in gray.
2019: Team Wilson 129, Team Delle Donne 126
The trend of paying homage to the host city and team came into play in 2019. Captain Elena Delle Donne’s team wore white jerseys while A’ja Wilson’s team sported red with gold trimming, inspired by the Las Vegas Aces.
2021: Team WNBA 93, Team USA 83
The COVID-19 pandemic caused the All-Star Game to go on a two-year hiatus and the 2020 Tokyo Games to be postponed to the following summer. With the Olympics being held during the regular season, the WNBA introduced the Team USA vs. WNBA All-Stars format. Though Team USA wore its jerseys in the exhibition, the WNBA All-Stars reverted back to orange jerseys with “WNBA” in big lettering following “All-Stars” in a smaller font across the bottom.