We’ve reached a historic WNBA Finals, as the two teams with the lowest combined winning percentage in WNBA Finals history will square off for all the glory.

The No. 6 Sky made their way here by taking apart the top-seeded Sun, while the No. 5 Mercury clawed their way to a thrilling semifinal win in Game 5 over the Aces to set up a rematch of the 2014 Finals.

With so much on the line for the teams, it’s always fun to put something on the line for yourself as well. That’s where betting comes in.

Let’s get you set for everything you need to know to bet on the WNBA Finals.

Chicago Sky

The Sky present an interesting betting case as the quintessential “peaking at the right time” team. It’s often the case in sports that such teams find another gear to the extent that sportsbook models aren’t able to adjust fast enough.

This seems to be true with Chicago, who has not only won five of its six playoff games but also covered the betting spread in all five wins. That even includes two double-digit wins as underdogs.

Part of the reason is their elevated play, of course, and it wouldn’t be fair to ignore the contributions of players like Kahleah Copper or Azurá Stevens who have stepped up their game. But the presence of Candace Parker has been a key to this surprising run.

Much has been made of Chicago’s overall win-loss records with and without Parker this season, and that point remains true when looking at the records against the spread (ATS). At 11-11 with one push, the Sky were a .500 ATS team with Parker in the lineup during the regular season. In theory, every team should be a .500 ATS team if the sportsbooks are good at setting the lines.

In the nine games Parker missed, however, the Sky covered in just one of them. Combine that with the experience and intangibles the former champion brings to a franchise with no rings, and maybe we should have seen this coming.

Parker also had a significant effect on the totals during the regular season: The under hit in five of nine games without her on the floor but in just eight of the 23 games that she played. There were higher scoring totals in the games with last year’s Defensive Player of the Year on the court. Go figure.

Phoenix Mercury

It’s easy to forget now, but the Mercury entered the second half of the season firmly on the playoff bubble. They sat in seventh place at the Olympic break, just a game up on the ninth-place Wings.

What followed was a ten-game winning streak that cemented Phoenix’s status as contenders and earned their bettors lots of money in the process. The Mercury covered the spread in seven of their first eight games coming out of the break, and in doing so they launched themselves up the leaderboard of most profitable teams.

As it stands now, no team has earned its bettors more money on either the moneylines or the spread. Including the regular season and the playoffs, the Mercury are 25-13 against the spread (with a push) and would have earned $888 for bettors who bet $100 on all of their moneylines.

The concern for Phoenix going forward will be depth. With Kia Nurse’s season over and Sophie Cunningham still nursing an injury, Sandy Brondello played just seven players in Game 5 against Las Vegas. Kia Vaughn and Bria Hartley combined for 20 minutes, which was the entirety of the bench’s contributions.

Shey Peddy was sensational in the win — and has been for the last few games in which she’s been called on to step up — but the soon-to-be 33-year-old had played 30 minutes just once in her career prior to September. The injuries and heavy starter minutes in the Game 5 war against Las Vegas may come back to hurt the Mercury as they go deeper into the Finals.

Where Phoenix can make up for that is in the paint. Chicago doesn’t have a Liz Cambage, so Brittney Griner will have a decided size advantage over anyone Chicago can throw at her. Expect more doubles in this matchup, so Phoenix’s perimeter shooting will be vital.

Previous matchups

When talking about the history between these two teams, the 2014 Finals immediately come to mind. Courtney Vandersloot, Allie Quigley, Diana Taurasi and Brittney Griner all played in that one, in which Phoenix emerged with the trophy.

More relevant for betting on this year’s iteration, Phoenix took all three regular season matchups in 2021. The first two were without Parker on the floor, and both were essentially coin-flip games. One ended in overtime, the other gave us a half-court Eurostep for the win.

A EUROSTEP HALFCOURT GAME WINNER 😳

Kia Nurse 🔥🔥🔥pic.twitter.com/8HMnfAEXIn

— Complex Sports (@ComplexSports) June 2, 2021

The Mercury took the last matchup by 20 points in the midst of their incredible August run. All three games closed with the home team favored by fewer than two points, and Phoenix covered in each game.

Before this year, the Sky had covered the spread in seven of their last eight matchups with the Mercury, including the last time they met in the playoffs — a 105-76 Sky win in the 2019 first round.

Home sweet home?

In typical pre-pandemic years, home-court advantage has been worth multiple points per game at basically any high level of basketball, including in the WNBA. After a 2020 season without home court for anyone, that factor was supposed to come back into play this season.

Not so, according to the numbers. Home teams outscored road teams during the regular season by less than half a point per game, and in the playoffs they’ve been practically even at 1,093 to 1,088.

Sportsbooks still don’t see it that way though. Lines for the semis moved by close to five points when the series shifted locations, a number that would have been consistent with past seasons’ data.

Home-court/field advantage has been steadily declining across most sports in recent years as replay review becomes more prevalent and limits the role of human error in officiating, but that wouldn’t be enough to explain the drastic drop in the WNBA this year. The culprit is presumably a combination of factors, such as fan restrictions at certain arenas and random variance.

Regardless, if bettors are looking for an edge on the spread in this series, the road teams may have one. They’ve covered in eight of 13 playoff games so far.

Half and quarter totals

Another edge for bettors may come in the over/unders for each half or quarter. Not all sportsbooks offer this, but the ones that do generally set those lines by dividing the game total by approximately two for the halves and by four for the quarters.

That’s already a little inefficient during the regular season, when games tend to get slower and teams average lower scoring during each successive quarter (and thus half). During the playoffs, that effect magnifies as the energy expenditure ramps up and legs tire even earlier.

This year, teams have totaled 1,121 points in the first half of all playoff games and just 1,013 in the second half. The quarter totals have dropped from 595 in first quarters to 489 in fourth quarters, marking an 18 percent decrease. It may be worth betting on the overs for the first half and quarter or on the second-half and fourth-quarter unders.

Series lines

Several sportsbooks are offering moneylines on the series winner, and they all like it to be a tight battle.

PointsBet Sportsbook has the Phoenix line at -120 and Chicago at +100, implying a 52 percent win probability for the Mercury.

Some books, PointsBet included, allow you to cash out your bet for the current value partway through (think of it like selling stocks). On those books, all you need for the Sky +100 side to turn a profit is for Chicago to steal one of two in Phoenix. If the series shifts to the Windy City knotted at one apiece, Chicago will likely take over as the favorite and that bet will increase in value.

Finals MVP

On Thursday, BetRivers Sportsbook posted Finals MVP odds for top players from the three teams remaining at that time. That list has been cut to 11 players, led by Griner and Taurasi with +300 odds each.

Those odds work the same way as game and series moneylines, so check out our intro if you’re new to betting and are interested in putting money on a Finals MVP winner.

I’m looking at the point guards here for good longshot odds. Skylar Diggins-Smith is at +1000 while you can get Courtney Vandersloot for +1400.

In Diggins-Smith’s case, Griner and Taurasi are certainly more likely to take the award, but are they really over three times more likely? That’s what these odds imply, but the third member of the Big Three may be a little closer to the first two than that suggests.

As for Vandersloot, while voters do love to back the leading scorer (which will most likely be Copper), they also love all-around stats and leadership. As the veteran signal caller of the offense and the best passer in the league for several years running, Vandersloot has a pretty clear path to winning this award as well.

For a more likely bet, go with Parker at +400: Her status as a legend (and hometown hero) will be hard for voters to look past if the Sky win. Her odds are almost even with Copper, but that doesn’t accurately reflect the emotions and storylines that will be at play.

(Also, while I won’t recommend betting on her, can we just stop and appreciate the fact that Shey Peddy is on this list at all? You can actually bet on Shey Peddy to win the Finals MVP … and she’s even ahead of three players!)

The verdict

For both Game 1 (Chicago +3.5) and the series, I see more value on the Chicago side. The way the Sky are clicking and the near-disappearance of home court should be enough to keep this series close, and that favors the underdog. The extra few days of rest shouldn’t hurt either.

As far as the over/unders, we’re talking about a Chicago team who made us forget how historic Connecticut was on defense and a Phoenix squad that is better equipped to simply outscore them than to stop them. Both have smaller offensively minded backcourts as well. I’ll ride the overs unless they start to creep too high later in the series. Game 1’s line is at 166.5 on PointsBet, a spot at which I’m definitely comfortable taking the over.

Whether you put money on the games or not, enjoy the moment. It’s not every year that we get a matchup this enticing and unlikely, so sit back and take it in. It’s bound to be entertaining.

Calvin Wetzel is a contributing writer at Just Women’s Sports, covering basketball and betting. He also contributes to Her Hoop Stats and Bet Her. Follow him on Twitter at @cwetzel31.

After an illustrious career for both club and country, Gotham FC and U.S. Women’s National Team defender Kelley O’Hara announced today via Kelley on the Street that she will be retiring from professional soccer at the end of this year, making the 2024 NWSL season her last.

"I have always said I would play under two conditions: that I still love playing soccer, and if my body would let me do it the way I wanted to," O’Hara told Just Women’s Sports in the lead-up to her retirement announcement. "I realized a while back that I was always going to love it, so it was the physical piece that was going to be the deciding factor."

The 35-year-old will retire as a two-time World Cup champion, an Olympic gold medalist, and at least a two-time NWSL champion, depending on where Gotham finishes this season. Her legacy as a player is hard to fully encapsulate, and will forever run through some of the biggest snapshots in USWNT and NWSL history. 

In 2012, O’Hara played every minute of the USWNT’s Olympic gold medal run, after having recently converted into a defender. Her soaring goal off the bench in the 2015 World Cup semifinal is the stuff of legend. And her return from lingering injury to play in every knockout match of the national team’s 2019 World Cup win cemented a storybook international career. 

It was O’Hara who scored the overtime goal in 2021 to earn the Washington Spirit their first-ever NWSL championship, and O’Hara who returned to help see Gotham earn a title in 2023 after years spent in the trenches with the club’s previous iteration, Sky Blue. Her 15-year career spanned two professional women’s soccer leagues in the U.S. (she earned her first professional title in 2010 with WPS’s FC Gold Pride), as well as sweeping changes to the sport both on and off the pitch.

On the field, O’Hara has always been known for a motor that never quits, making the right flank her domain in attacking possession and defensive transition. In recent years, she’s also been celebrated for a competitive fire that raises the level of her teammates, whether she’s in the starting XI or supporting from the bench.

But injuries take a toll, a reality not always seen by the fans watching from home. "I've never taken anything for granted, and I feel like I've never coasted either," O’Hara said of her late-career success in the NWSL despite battling injuries. "I've always been like, 'I gotta put my best foot forward every single day I step on this field' — which is honestly probably half the reason why I'm having to retire now as opposed to getting a couple more years out of it. I've just grinded hard."

Recently, O’Hara has been sidelined at Gotham with ankle and knee injuries, and the situation motivated her to really prioritize listening to her body. "To get injured and come back, and get injured and come back, and just keep doing it, it really takes a toll on you.

"People don't see the doubt that's associated with injury,” she continued. "As athletes we feel a certain way, we perform a certain way, our body feels a certain way, we're very in tune with our bodies. And there's always so much doubt surrounding injury. It’s like, 'Can I feel the way I felt before?' The reality is sometimes you don't."

O’Hara didn’t arrive at the decision to move on from her playing career lightly. But once she began seriously considering making 2024 her final year during the last NWSL offseason, it felt right. "Once I was like, 'Alright, you know what, this will be my last year,' I have had a lot of peace with it," she said. "Truly the only thing I felt was gratitude for everything that my career has been, all the things I've been able to do and the people I've been able to do it with."

She said she’ll miss daily interactions with her teammates and all the amazing memories they’ve created, though she feels lucky to have formed relationships that go beyond sharing a locker room. "You're basically getting to hang out and just shoot the shit with your best friends every day," she reflected. "Which is so unheard of, and I just feel very lucky to do it for so long."

The Stanford graduate also mentioned that the NWSL’s suspension of regular season play in 2020 due to the Covid-19 pandemic made her realize how much playing allowed her the space to simply be creative every day. The tactical elements of soccer provided O’Hara an outlet for problem solving and made use of her naturally competitive edge.

She’s now gearing up to channel her on-field intensity into her post-playing career full time, which is a new chapter she’s excited to begin. "I don't know if the world's ready for it, like the fact that I'm not going to be putting all of my energy into football all the time," she said with a laugh. 

O’Hara said she would like to stay connected to the game in some fashion, whether it be as an owner, coach, or member of a front office. She’s also interested in the growing media space surrounding women’s sports, having provided on-camera analysis for broadcasters like CBS Sports in addition to starting a production company with her fiancée.

"I just feel like I have a lot of passions, and things that excite me," she says. "And I do want to stay as close as I can to the game, because I feel a responsibility — and I'm not sure in what capacity — to continue to grow it."

A sense of responsibility to grow the game has been a consistent refrain for the USWNT and NWSL players of O’Hara’s era, who ushered in a new age of equal pay for the national team and collectively bargained protections for those in the league. The landscape for new players looks different than it did 14 years ago, in large part due to this pivotal generation.

"I feel an immense sense of pride around that, because I don't know if any of us knew that was gonna happen," she said. "We kind of, as things unfolded, took the next step towards changing what women's football looks like in this country and around the world.

"I'm really grateful to have been part of this era with the players that I was [with], not backing down and pushing and knowing that was the right thing to do."

Whatever the future holds, O’Hara is going ahead full throttle. It’s a piece of advice she’d also give to the next generation of professionals looking to make their own impact.

"Whatever you do in life, do it because you love it, and the chips will fall in place," she said. "If you love something, you're willing to do what it takes. You're willing to make the sacrifices, you're willing to handle the roller coaster.

"To me, it's simple. Don't do it for any other reason but that, and I think you'll be alright."

The Phoenix Mercury center spoke with Robin Roberts about her 10-month incarceration, reflecting on her poor living conditions and shaky mental state ahead of her May 7th memoir.

"The mattress had a huge blood stain on it. I had no soap, no toilet paper," Griner told the ABC News anchor in last night’s 20/20 special. "That was the moment where I just felt less than a human." 

She also detailed some of her lowest moments during that time, saying with tears in her eyes that she went so far as to consider taking her own life on more than one occasion. However, the thought of Russian officials not releasing her body back to her family made her reconsider.

"I just didn't think I could get through what I needed to get through," said Griner.

View this post on Instagram

A post shared by Just Women’s Sports (@justwomenssports)

In February 2022, Griner was arrested and charged with drug possession and smuggling by a Russian court after Sheremetyevo International Airport police found vape cartridges containing hashish oil in her luggage. The cartridges were prescribed by Griner’s doctor for chronic pain back in Arizona, where medical marijuana is legal. In the interview, the two-time Olympic gold medalist said she had a "mental lapse" while packing, and never intended to bring the cannabis products with her when she returned to play for UMMC Ekaterinburg.

"It's just so easy to have a mental lapse," Griner said. "Granted, my mental lapse was on a more grand scale. But it doesn't take away from how that can happen." 

She was later sentenced to nine years behind bars after her Russian attorneys advised her to plead guilty the following July. Griner was then sent to a remote penal colony where she was forced to spend her days cutting cloth to make military uniforms. From there, it only got worse.

"Honestly, it just had to happen," she said when asked about her decision to cut off her signature long locks. "We had spiders above my bed making nests.

"My dreads started to freeze," she added. "They would just stay wet and cold and I was getting sick. You've gotta do what you've gotta do to survive."

Shortly after Griner’s initial arrest, the U.S. State Department classified her case as wrongfully detained, escalating its urgency within the government and calling even more attention to the situation. On December 8th, she was freed in a prisoner exchange negotiated by the Biden administration.

While she told Roberts she was "thrilled" when she got the news, she was also very upset about having to leave fellow wrongful detainee Paul Whelan behind. She also continues to carry guilt about her arrest, saying "At the end of the day, it's my fault. And I let everybody down."

Griner’s memoir, Coming Home, hits shelves on May 7th.

"Coming Home begins in a land where my roots developed and is the diary of my heartaches and regrets," Griner told ABC News in an exclusive statement. "But, ultimately, the book is also a story of how my family, my faith, and the support of millions who rallied for my rescue helped me endure a nightmare."

Longtime USWNT fixture Carli Lloyd took to Instagram Wednesday morning to announce that she’s pregnant with her first child. 

"Baby Hollins coming in October 2024!" she wrote. The caption framed a collaged image of baby clothes, an ultrasound photo, and syringes indicating what she described as a "rollercoaster" fertility journey.

View this post on Instagram

A post shared by Just Women’s Sports (@justwomenssports)

In a Women’s Health story published in tandem with Lloyd’s post, the Fox Sports analyst and correspondent opened up about her struggles with infertility and the lengthy IVF treatments she kept hidden from the public eye.

"Soccer taught me how to work hard, persevere, be resilient, and never give up. I would do whatever it took to prepare, and usually when I prepared, I got results," Lloyd told Women’s Health’s Amanda Lucci. "But I found out that I didn’t know much about this world. I was very naive to think that we wouldn’t have any issues getting pregnant. And so it began."

Lloyd went on to discuss her road to pregnancy in great detail, sharing the highs and lows of the process and expressing gratitude for the care and support her family and medical team provided along the way. She rounded out the piece with a nod toward others navigating the same challenges, encouraging people to share their own pregnancy journeys, painful as they may be.

"My story is currently a happy one, but I know there are other women who are facing challenges in their pregnancy journey. I see you and I understand your pain," she said. "My hope is that more and more women will speak up about this topic, because their stories helped me. I also wish for more resources, funding, and education around fertility treatments. There is much to be done, and I hope I can play a role in helping."

The 41-year-old New Jersey native retired from professional soccer in 2021, closing out her decorated career with 316 international appearances, the second-most in USWNT history, in addition to 134 international goals. A legend on the field, Lloyd walked away from the game with two World Cups, two Olympic gold medals, and two FIFA Player of the Year awards.

On Tuesday, FIFPRO announced the launch of Project ACL, a three-year research initiative designed to address a steep uptick in ACL injuries across women's professional football.

Project ACL is a joint venture between FIFPRO, England’s Professional Footballers’ Association (PFA), Nike, and Leeds Beckett University. While the central case study will focus on England’s top-flight Women's Super League, the findings will be distributed around the world.

ACL tears are between two- and six-times more likely to occur in women footballers than men, according to The Guardian. And with both domestic and international programming on the rise for the women’s game, we’ve seen some of the sport's biggest names moved to the season-ending injury list with ACL-related knocks.

View this post on Instagram

A post shared by Just Women’s Sports (@justwomenssports)

Soccer superstars like Vivianne Miedema, Beth Mead, Catarina Macario, Marta, and England captain Leah Williamson have all struggled with their ACLs in recent years, though all have since returned to the field. In January, Chelsea and Australia forward Sam Kerr was herself sidelined with the injury, kicking off a year of similar cases across women’s professional leagues. And just yesterday, the Spirit announced defender Anna Heilferty would miss the rest of the NWSL season with a torn ACL. The news comes less than two weeks after Bay FC captain Alex Loera went down with the same injury. 

Project ACL will closely study players in the WSL, monitoring travel, training, and recovery practices to look for trends that could be used to prevent the injury in the future. Availability of sports science and medical resources within individual clubs will be taken into account throughout the process.

ACL injuries in women's football have long outpaced the same injury in the men's game, but resources for specialized prevention and treatment still lag behind. Investment in achieving a deeper, more specialized understanding of the problem should hopefully alleviate the issue both on and off the field.