Whenever a league’s top teams face off in the playoffs, there is a lot of intrigue and hype. But when the outcome of the series is decided by factors outside the players’ control, that’s the worst outcome for the series. In the 2024 WNBA finals, Minnesota Lynx head coach Cheryl Reeve had publicly criticized the officials after losing the title. She had said, “All the headlines will be, ‘Reeve cries foul.’ Bring it on. Bring it on. Because this s— was stolen from us. Bring it on.” And now, 343 days later, yet another refereeing controversy has seemed to follow Cheryl Reeve.

As Napheesa Collier was being carried to the locker room with an injured ankle, Cheryl Reeve was being held back by the rest of her coaching staff. After calling out the league referees for a big part of the 2025 season, it seemed like Collier’s injury was the last straw for her. The consequence of her aggressively calling out the refs was an ejection and a ban for game 4. While it may be strange to see a long-tenured head coach act in such a way, according to WNBA analyst Rachel DeMita, this incident was just a buildup of not just this, but what happened 343 days ago.

Speaking of the incident on the latest edition of her Courtside Club podcast, Rachel said, “A lot of us for this whole season felt like we were Cheryl Reeve in that moment because it has been a buildup. This reaction from Cheryl Reeve, I don’t think it was just one play and seeing your star player going down. I think it’s a buildup of what happened in the entire season. I think it’s also a buildup in a spill over from what happened in the finals last season because the referees in the finals last year were god awful.”

Last year in the Finals, the New York Liberty and Minnesota Lynx gave us an epic series. However, there is always going to be a big asterisk on the series’ result due to the dubious standard of refereeing. Especially in the deciding game 5, the foul called on Alanna Smith that send Breanna Stewart to the line with 5.2 seconds remaining was one of the worst and most controversial calls in the finals. That call resulted in Breanna Stewart making the game-tying free throws and sending the game to overtime, where the Lynx lost. Naturally, Cheryl Reeve was very angry about the referees in her post-game press conference.

And now this season, it seems like all of us are like Cheryl Reeve. For the entirety of the 2025 WNBA season, fans, players, and coaches alike have been very vocal about the poor standard of refereeing in the WNBA. For the unaware fans, it may seem like this is just a narrative from the Indiana Fever and Caitlin Clark’s fans. But there have been plenty of other coaches as well. Cheryl Reeve, Chris Koclanes, Becky Hammon, and Tyler Marsh are just a few names who have spoken against them.

While we are not taking anything away from the Phoenix Mercury. They are deservedly 2-1 up in the series. But now that the best player of the opponents is out of the game (and potentially longer), there are always going to be questions about how the series ended. There are even bigger questions being asked after the NBA’s referees’ official X page posted a breakdown video of the foul incident between Napheesa Collier and Alyssa Thomas.

NBA Referees Defend WNBA Officials After Cheryl Reeve Calls Out Higher Ups

After her ejection, there were bound to be plenty of questions regarding the officiating in Cheryl Reeve’s post-game presser. However, in typical Cheryl Reeve fashion, she did not take any questions but rather just made some explosive comments. She said, “If this is what our league wants, ok. But I want to call for a change of leadership at the league level when it comes to officiating. It’s bad for the game. The officiating crew that we had tonight, for the leadership to deem those 3 people semifinal playoff worthy, is f—— malpractice.”

In response to this, a rare occurrence happened. The NBA referees’ official X profile released a slowed-down version of the videos explaining why there was no foul in this case. While they might have released it as a way to clarify things, it had the opposite effect, as fans and WNBA analysts alike felt it was very strange that NBA refs were coming out and supporting WNBA refs. Sure, there were a few analysts who also agreed with their version of events that there was no foul.

But nobody could deny the fact that this video was strange. To many, it felt like a measure of damage control rather than making things clear. While the debate may continue and many of us might have different opinions on whether there was a foul or not, the fact remains that the Lynx have to try to make the finals without its best player. And even if they were to make the finals, we would be robbed of seeing a matchup between two top players in the league.