October 25, 2024
The Liberty liberated the city and themselves in full-day championship celebration
The New York Liberty celebrated their WNBA title at Canyon of Heroes, City Hall and then back at Barclays Center
NEW YORK — The most full-circle New York moment occurred on Thursday.
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Almost exactly 138 years ago, the Statue of Liberty was officially dedicated and celebrated in New York. A celebration took place in lower Manhattan, and it was the first time the city of New York had a ticker tape parade.
The Canyon of Heroes, an event and route that evolved out of that very first parade honors not just statues, but celebratory events in American history including the victories of the city’s sports teams. Since that first impromptu parade, New York has thrown 206 ticker-tape parades through New York. On this day, the 207th once again honored that same statue or rather a team named after it.
The New York Liberty became the first New York sports team since the New York Giants in 2012 to celebrate with confetti on buses and floats following their first championship victory in franchise history over the Minnesota Lynx on Sunday evening.
On Thursday, the Liberty became the first women’s sports franchise to be celebrated along the Canyon of Heroes, but not the first women’s sports athletes to receive this honor. Twice, the United States women’s national soccer team has been honored with a parade and a ceremony at City Hall for winning the FIFA World Cup in 2015 and 2019. Olympians have been honored too after returning home with hard-earned medals.
While the ticker-tape parade and city hall visit weren’t new to women’s sports fans, it sure was to Liberty fans. This elation and celebration was also quite new to Liberty fans and the entire organization. Fans and former players had waited close to 28 years for a moment like this, a moment where one of the original WNBA franchises would finally be embraced in a way that felt just like any other long-time New York sports team that wins at the highest level.
“In my lifetime this city has not won a basketball championship and it took the women to do what the men couldn’t,” longtime Liberty fan Ashley Davis told The Next. “And sorry Knicks but um to see [the Liberty] as a child and to now celebrate this first win is amazing and again we’ve been here since the beginning.”
Davis, while wearing her Liberty pins of Teresa Weatherspoon and Vickie Johnson’s Liberty jerseys on her jean jacket, alluded to even more history that was celebrated and appreciated on Thursday. The fact that New York hadn’t won a professional basketball championship since 1976 when the Nets won in the now-defunct American Basketball Association hasn’t been lost on nearly anyone who took part in the festivities on Thursday.
Euphoria erupted at The Canyon of Heroes
Seafoam crowns and bootleg t-shirts were being sold on the streets, and fans had their most creative signs at the ready waiting to shower their heroes, the 2024 New York Liberty, with all the love they could. A line of fans wrapped around City Hall Park to make sure they had a spot for the ceremony that would follow the parade. A drumline ready to march in the parade was rehearsing.
Fans of all ages and of all stages of fandom were stationed behind the barricades along the parade route. One fan had an original program for the Liberty’s first game played at Madison Square Garden in 1997 in her pocket. Another fan’s eyes widened when she got word that Maddie, the Liberty’s original mascot (if you could believe it), had been spotted with Weatherspoon on a float.
Newer fans made creative signs that embraced the current team’s stars and the current team’s mascot Ellie the Elephant. One family went to Five Below and bought a bunch of supplies to make several signs and recreate the championship trophy too. They also found a fake tombstone in time for Halloween and added photos of the Liberty’s most visible championship run adversaries to the fake stone like Lynx coach Cheryl Reeve and guard Courtney Williams opposite an Aces logo and a photo of Las Vegas guard Kelsey Plum.
When Breanna Stewart and her family passed by on a float decked out in the “Stew York City” Puma logos and Puma mascot, she saw a sign of her face pasted onto the Statue of Liberty holding a basketball in her hands. Stewart grabbed the sign, took photos with it and graciously returned it to the family who made them.
Then, when Finals MVP Jonquel Jones passed by fans on her float with family and the Liberty’s owners Joe and Clara Wu Tsai, she tapped the loved one next to her to take a picture of a sign that amused her from a fan behind the barricade. She wore a Bahamian flag as a cape while holding up her MVP trophy while the confetti rained all over her.
The floats, which were designed by Clifton, NJ., small business Bond Parade Floats, were either chariots featuring different sponsors alongside Liberty branding or buses painted seafoam, white or black with the mosiac subway stop design plastered across them. Rob De Vito Jr., the owner of Bond Parade Floats, explained that he was very familiar with the Liberty since they were in talks to do this a year ago when the team advanced to the finals last year. While the 2023 WNBA Finals didn’t end the way both De Vito and the Liberty hoped, he had a feeling the collaboration would be delayed rather than denied.
“I actually left them with a message, a little email that said, ‘We’ll pick this back up next year,’” he told The Next. “Well, now they’ve gotta prove me right, and sure enough they did.”
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One of the bus floats, which carried the team’s basketball operations and performance staff, had the mantra “We all we got, we all we need,” a famous phrase that Jones ushered back into the 2024 zeitgeist. De Vito and his staff began their work on the floats and buses on Monday morning and worked late nights to get the job done in time for Thursday.
“It’s a great phrase,” he said. “It’s funny, we’ve been repeating that phrase. I said it to the guys at the shop the other day. So we kind of borrowed the phrase. It applies to many workplaces and aspects in life. It’s a great motto.”
The players and Liberty staff danced and got up and down from their floats. Kennedy Burke did the backward shuffle to the song “You’re a Jerk” by New Boyz while Nyara Sabally and her sister Satou made a TikTok from the back of their float. Satou needed the DJ to help her rest her phone on his stand. Courtney Vandersloot tried to spray a golden champagne bottle out to the fans behind the barricades, but she couldn’t quite pop it open. Her wife Allie Quigley insisted that she didn’t have to spray the fans so Vandersloot instead lifted her arms to the sky with the golden bottle in her right hand.
Kayla Thornton sang all the words to Lil Wayne’s “A Milli” before jumping off the float entirely to run around and high-five and take selfies with fans. Thornton wasn’t the only one who wanted direct interactions with fans. Vandersloot and Betnijah Laney-Hamilton hopped off their floats to have more personal connections.
Sabrina Ionescu signed a pair of her signature shoes that were thrown toward her along with a basketball. This was all before she too jumped off her float, which featured her whole family, and ran back and forth up and down the barricades high-fiving all the fans she could.
“I can’t put it into words,” Ionescu told some reporters from her float. “Look at the turnout. I don’t want to get emotional but this is something I can’t even put into words. It’s amazing. I had no idea what to expect but look at this, I get emotional talking about it. What we did for New York is amazing.”
The players also appreciated what New York had done for them. At 10:15 am that morning before the parade floats began their route, Stewart tweeted: “Who can hand a bottle of red wine to me when my float passes by??”
When Stewart jumped off her float, she high-fived as many as she could before seeing a fan with a brown paper bag in his hand to give to her. “There’s the wine, I’ve got the wine,” he said back to Stewart. She smiled and gave him a high five to thank him, she handed the wine in the brown paper bag to Emily Johnson, her main photographer, then proceeded to hop back onto her float.
Vibe changes and new goals are made at City Hall
Once the parade concluded, the champions made an appearance at city hall where they were honored by a group of New York public officials and received a key to the city from Mayor Eric Adams.
The Liberty played two videos to introduce the ceremony: one highlighting their playoff run and the other placing players from the 2024 roster alongside the Liberty legends from the late 1990s to early 2000s. Weatherspoon of course did the voiceover while she was shown alongside Ionescu. Rebecca Lobo was placed next to Stewart, Laney-Hamilton was put next to Becky Hammon in her Liberty jersey and Thornton was portrayed beside Johnson. Extended metaphors were up the wazoo.
New York Governor Kathy Hochul, who attended several Liberty games this season as well as in years past, welcomed the champions and praised the ownership’s investment in a team that used to play at the Westchester County Center. She gaffed when she called the Timeless Torches, the Liberty’s dance troop for people 40+, the Timeless Treasures. Some of the Torches who were in the audience stood up and shouted to get the Governor to correct herself.
While the governor is still learning all the ins and outs of New York Liberty lore, she did echo a sentiment from Liberty owner Wu Tsai, head coach Sandy Brondello, general manager Jonathan Kolb and Breanna Stewart. The Liberty intend to run it back and join the Aces as yet another WNBA franchise that wins back-to-back championships.
“This has been an incredible journey,” Stewart said at City Hall. “We’re not done yet, but we are going to appreciate the shit out of this moment for sure.” Even though, one of the Liberty’s parade buses said “finished business” the Liberty do not think they are finished. They want a dynasty or at least to try to be one.
“We basically finished some business but we’re not done yet,” Wu Tsai said. “It’s just the beginning. And I think judging from the love we are going to have to run it back.”
From there, broadcaster Ros Gold-Onwude moderated a discussion between players, head coach Sandy Brondello, general manager Jonathan Kolb, the owners, and CEO Keia Clarke. The pace of the ceremony slowed at this time, as did the energy. The panel format of the ceremony felt more contrived than natural.
In past City Hall ceremonies for sports teams, athletes have had more liberty to address the fans and share what they wanted to share. Jones understood this when she grabbed the mic from Gold-Onwude at one point to lead the crowd in a chant of “We all we got, we all we need.”
There were multiple moments when elected officials on the stage and fans in the audience wondered where their usually conspicuous mascot had disappeared to. Ellie the Elephant had ridden over to city hall on a float with Senator Chuck Schumer but stayed out of the sun until the end of the ceremony.
And it was probably a wise decision as Ionescu had to take off her jacket during the ceremony. I’m not sure how a person in an elephant costume who had to expound ounces of energy during the parade could not have taken a break away from the spotlight and the sun.
But then to everyone at the ceremony’s pleasure, Ellie emerged and in the only way she could: ready to dance with some headline-worthy tricks up her stylish sleeves. After a short and uninspired speech by Mayor Adams, Ellie made her entrance. The team summoned Burke, the team’s best dancer, to dance alongside the mascot, who handed the mayor her purse. It was incredibly subtle but the elephant’s message was quite clear. This elephant reads the news.
As the ceremony ended, Ellie remained holding Wu Tsai’s hand while the team received their giant keys to the city. Should this elephant also have gotten a key to the city? Probably, but a championship ring might be more up Ellie’s alley.
A historic season comes to an end at Barclays Center
For fans who couldn’t attend the parade, the Liberty organized an event to round up their fans for a finale at Barclays Center. The lower bowl was completely full and a few stragglers were sitting in the upper bowl as well. That didn’t include the fans that were allowed onto the court. It was notable that only with a few day’s notice, the fans returned in droves to celebrate their squad.
More elected officials spoke including Attorney General Letitia James, who advocated for WNBA players to be paid more, and then Senator Schumer. Schumer spoke about how much he feels connected to this New York Liberty team as he grew up playing basketball in Brooklyn. Schumer too praised Ellie, who he said is an exception to how he rolls. In a joke about the Republican party, his opposition, he said he often doesn’t hang out with elephants.
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Then at last the players were introduced but once again their verbal connection to the fans was limited. Jones blew kisses to the fans while she held onto her MVP trophy and then Stewart and Laney-Hamilton gave earnest remarks. Stewart called the arena Club Barclays while Laney-Hamilton reminisced.
“I remember the first year it was me and [Ionescu] were the only two that were on this team when we first got to Barclays,” she said. “And nobody thought we could do this and then we added so many other amazing players and not only us but everybody in the building helped us accomplish this goal. So I want to say thank you, thank you, thank you. And let’s celebrate. Let’s enjoy.”
It was disappointing to not hear more unfiltered and joyful remarks from other players. The fans deserved that too.
At the time, the energy wasn’t as palpable as it was during the parade. The players were drinking champagne in gold goblets and sitting on couches. They were grooving to the music while Stewart was lighting up a cigar and Laney-Hamilton was singing and rapping all of Fat Joe’s lyrics. The most striking part of the evening aside from Ellie the Elephant’s final Stomp featuring Lil Mama was when Fat Joe called head coach Brondello onto the stage.
Brondello then began to dance and got all of the players off the couch. They smiled at the fact that a 56-year-old Australian was vibing to New York hip-hop. Brondello blasted energy and smiles back into her players. It was almost like she was still coaching them but in fun rather than in what to do with the basketball late in the fourth quarter.
The team was exhausted from its week-long championship promotional tour. They’ve been on late-night talk shows and early-morning news programs. But a lighter schedule must have helped Brondello get into a dancing mood on Thursday night in addition to the fact that she stayed signing autographs, talking and taking pictures with fans 25 minutes after the party had ended.
When the fans began leaving the arena for the last time until most likely the 2025 regular season, the Liberty’s master of ceremonies Maria Clifton, also known as DJ Ria, began thanking the fans and telling them to come back next year and use word of mouth to spread the word.
It was an ironic comment acknowledging the hikes in ticket prices expected to come in 2025, but the Liberty have also reached a point where fans both within the New York metro area and around the world know who they are. This was not always the case.
The final piece of messaging from the Liberty before the house lights came up was a video narrated by Derek Jeter. In less than a minute, the Yankee legend explained broadly what the New York Liberty story has been for the past half a decade and how they got to where they are at this current moment. He explained what it means to become a champion in New York and how it is only special athletes who do so.
When Jeter was playing baseball at the height of his career in the mid-aughts, you’d be hard-pressed to see the Liberty acknowledged and cherished in the mainstream sports world. And around 15 years later, that now isn’t the case. How could you ignore a champion?
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Written by Jackie Powell
Jackie Powell covers the New York Liberty and runs social media and engagement strategy for The Next. She also has covered women's basketball for Bleacher Report and her work has appeared in Sports Illustrated, Harper's Bazaar and SLAM. She also self identifies as a Lady Gaga stan, is a connoisseur of pop music and is a mental health advocate.
