The Golden State Valkyries could win their first WNBA championship on Thursday morning. Watching them do it might require an awkward conversation with your boss: The WNBA announced Monday that Game 6 of the Finals against the Atlanta Dream will tip off at 12:30 p.m. ET on Oct. 29 — 9:30 a.m. in the Bay Area, where the Valkyries are based.
Valkyries guard Veronica Burton has a suggestion. "Call in sick. I recommend it," she said after Golden State’s Monday-night win, according to reporter Annie Costabile. That victory gave the team a 3–2 series lead and a chance to clinch a title in the franchise’s second season — provided its fans can clear their work calendars to watch.
The issue comes down to two teams needing the same arena. The Dream's usual home, Gateway Center Arena, holds approximately 3,500 spectators. Atlanta hosted Finals Games 3 and 4 at the roughly 17,000-seat State Farm Arena instead, selling out both games. Keeping Game 6 there, however, meant working around the Atlanta Hawks, who were already scheduled to host the Cleveland Cavaliers on Thursday evening.
The solution? A doubleheader. Move the WNBA game from 8 p.m. to 12:30 p.m. and delay the Hawks’ tipoff by an hour, from 7 p.m. to 8 p.m. Commissioner Cathy Engelbert thanked the teams, leagues, arena, and broadcaster "for the collaboration and flexibility that made this move possible."
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Fans were less enthusiastic about the flexibility now required of them.
"How are we supposed to watch this game in the middle of the workday?? This is so strange to me," one commenter asked on Reddit's r/wnba. Another Atlanta-based commenter said they had planned to attend but now couldn't even watch live. "I’d rather them play at Gateway so at least folks could watch it in real time," they wrote.
Flavor Flav offered fans some help getting the afternoon off, posting a signed permission slip to give their bosses. "Consider it your contribution to gender equality," he wrote in the document.
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Commentators across sports offered their own (rather heated) opinions. To Richard Deitsch, host of the Sports Media Podcast, the timing threatened to undercut the moment the season had been building toward. "The prospect of crowning a champion on a Thursday afternoon is just brutal optics (and will be brutal television ratings.)," he wrote on X.
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The Ringer founder Bill Simmons sounded similarly exasperated with league leadership, writing, "People want to like this league!"
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Their frustration comes after a season of record audience growth for the WNBA. According to the league, 51 regular-season telecasts averaged at least one million viewers, up from 19 last year. Its social accounts generated four billion views, with engagement up 24 percent from 2025. The demand is there, which helps explain why making a potential championship game harder to watch has struck such a nerve.
For some critics, the decision also sends a message about how the players are valued. Former NFL player and commentator Emmanuel Acho called it "high-key disrespectful" to the sport and its athletes.
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In the Reddit discussion, some fans also questioned why a women's Finals game had to work around a men's regular-season matchup in the first place, with many finding the whole ordeal wildly "mysoginistic" and exposed a blaring double standard. "If this were a men’s game, this time would never even be considered," one Reddit commenter said. Another commenter in r/WNBATalks wrote, "If society was less misogynistic, it wouldn’t be an issue."
Women's sports creator and podcast host Coach Jackie also questioned the decision in a video posted to Instagram. "Somebody could become a WNBA champion over brunch? During lunch? While you’re in a Teams meeting? Did you think it through?" she asked.
The players, meanwhile, have been more measured. Dream guard Jordin Canada welcomed the chance to play in front of another State Farm Arena crowd, while teammate Allisha Gray kept her focus on what was at stake.
"It’s the Finals, you gotta do what you gotta do," Gray told the San Francisco Chronicle. "We can play at 8 a.m., 10 a.m., midnight, you have a championship to win."
