The WNBA Board of Governors unanimously approved the Connecticut Sun's relocation to Houston following the 2026 season, ending the franchise's 28-year run in the Hartford metro and returning professional women's basketball to the nation's fifth-largest media market for the first time since the Houston Comets folded in 2008.
The move was contingent on the franchise sale to a Houston-based ownership group, whose identity the league has not yet disclosed. The Sun played the 2025 season with an average attendance of 8,200 per game at Mohegan Sun Arena, fourth in the league but anchored to a venue that seats 9,323—limiting upside in a market ranked 30th nationally by Nielsen. Houston's DMA ranks 8th with 2.7 million television households, and the metro area has added 1.1 million residents since the Comets' dissolution, nearly all in suburban corridors where the new ownership is expected to explore arena sites.
The Sun's departure removes the WNBA's last franchise tethered to a tribal gaming compact. Mohegan Gaming & Entertainment has owned the team since 2003, leveraging the casino resort as a built-in hospitality and sponsorship engine but unable to scale beyond the 190,000-person Uncasville census tract. The franchise posted $18 million in revenue during the 2025 season, according to a person familiar with the financials, trailing only the New York Liberty, Las Vegas Aces, and Los Angeles Sparks. Houston's corporate density—home to 21 Fortune 500 headquarters—offers a deeper sponsorship pool than Connecticut's insurance and defense corridor, and the city's demographics skew younger and more diverse than the Sun's current season-ticket base, which indexes heavily toward women aged 45-64.
The relocation also resolves a longstanding league imbalance. Connecticut was the Eastern Conference's geographic outlier, requiring West Coast teams to build East Coast road swings around a single New England stop. Houston slots naturally into the Western Conference, reducing travel costs and enabling cleaner scheduling. The Sun's 2026 roster remains under contract through next season, and the league's collective bargaining agreement permits players to request trades following a relocation, though no movement is expected until the January 2027 trade window opens.
Houston's franchise search began quietly in early 2024 when commissioner Cathy Engelbert met with three ownership groups during the NBA All-Star weekend at Toyota Center. One group included former Comets players Sheryl Swoopes and Tina Thompson as minority stakeholders, though neither is part of the winning bid. The new ownership is expected to announce an arena partner by August 2026, with Toyota Center and a proposed downtown entertainment district both under consideration. Season-ticket deposits will open in September 2026, and the franchise will retain the Sun name through the 2026 season before rebranding for Houston.
The league has not announced a replacement franchise for the Eastern Conference, but expansion talks have centered on Philadelphia and Nashville, both of which submitted formal applications in March 2025. A decision is expected by December 2026, with any new team launching no earlier than 2028. Connecticut's market will remain without professional women's basketball for the first time since 1999, when the Sun joined the league as an expansion team alongside the Orlando Miracle and Minnesota Lynx.
The takeaway
Houston's return adds Fortune 500 density and fixes conference geography; Connecticut's exit orphans a top-four attendance market with no replacement timeline.
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