Being one of the brightest stars in the WNBA, Sophie Cunningham should know a thing or two about just how good the best players in the women’s game are.
So it should come as a surprise to some that she didn’t come to the defence of her colleagues over viral comments made by former NBA champion Michael Porter Jr. last week, who said that a team of grade-school boys could take down the stars of the WNBA.
During an appearance on the Ball in the Family podcast with Lonzo and LaMelo Ball, Porter Jr. made the assertion that a team of elite eight-grade boys could beat the WNBA all-stars in a game of hoops.
Porter claimed to have scrimmaged against Cunningham’s University of Missouri team when he was “in the seventh or eighth grade, going crazy.
“I mean this as respectfully as possible, but ninth-grade Lonzo Ball in the WNBA is going crazy,” Ball said.
Cunningham ‘not surprised’ by Porter’s take
The topic went viral on social media before Cunningham weighed in on her own podcast, agreeing with the NBA stars.
“This is my personal opinion. But if you are a professional football player, basketball player, really any sport … If you’re in that elite-level group, yeah, you should be able to beat the girls,” she said on her Show Me Something podcast. “I’m not surprised by that. I just don’t get why it’s continuing to get brought up.
“If women are saying, ‘He couldn’t beat them,’ yeah, he could. Any NBA star could beat a female in high school,” she said. “I don’t want to be unrealistic or delusional. Like, men are just stronger, bigger, athletic. They just are a different build. So if you put them up against females, yeah, they’re gonna win.”
Cunningham, who co-hosts the pod with her friend West Wilson, clarified that the boys would have to be future pros, not just an average group of youngsters.
Put it in context
“The context of it is fair,” she said. “If (the eighth-graders) are future pros, it just depends how big they are. And the majority of the time, if they’re going pro, unless you’re a late bloomer you’re already pretty big.
“So I would say that that’s probably true. It’s probably true.”
Cunningham, who plays for the Indiana Fever alongside superstar Caitlin Clark, added that she was not trying to disrespect her WNBA colleagues, but was merely stating reality.
“I just don’t think that’s a fair matchup,” she said.
Cunningham, who finished her first season with the Fever after playing her first six WNBA seasons with the Phoenix Mercury, averaged 8.6 points and 3.5 rebounds per game.
With her podcast, a following of more than 1.3 million people on Instagram and friendship with Clark, Cunningham has become one of the league’s most recognizable stars off the court.