Sophie Cunningham and DiJonai Carrington’s ugly on-court moment was already enough to reignite one of the WNBA’s most divisive conversations. But when former Fever guard Sydney Colson jumped into the chaos with a cheeky “Love a trans foul” jab at Cunningham, she faced immense backlash. So, after her pun rubbed plenty of fans the wrong way, Colson has broken down what she actually meant.

“Any comedian worth their weight and salt would see the play that I saw and make the same. I watching this moment said, ‘Hmm, well, Sophie’s involved, and actually she’s had things to say off-court about transition that a lot of people, including ourselves, don’t agree with,” Colson said on the August 13 episode of Unsupervised.

“Does that mean that I think that Sophie should get fouled hard or does it mean that this is a perfect opportunity for a double entendre? It’s already a very viral clip because DiJonai has already had encounters with these lunatics online, and they’ve brought it back even though they showed several clips of DiJonai doing chase-down blocks all the time. This is a part of the sport. So, I’m like, ‘Oh my gosh.’ Well, if the person talking about this outside of basketball was just involved in a play – that’s a transition foul.”

A player moving from offense to defense, or vice versa, is transitioning, meaning a foul during that sequence is simply a transition foul. So with Sophie Cunningham involved in the play, Colson saw an opportunity to turn the familiar basketball phrase into a reference to the controversy over transgender athletes in women’s sports that had already engulfed her former teammate. However, the timing made it appear as though Colson was celebrating Carrington’s hard foul on Cunningham.

Cunningham, however, has remained firm on the stance that sparked the joke in the first place. After her July 21 comments drew widespread attention, the Fever guard made it clear that she had no intention of walking back her position.

“I said what I said. I think it’s kind of common sense. And I think I’ll always believe in that. I think it’s really important to protect children, and that’s little girls who are also involved in that category. I stand on what I said,” Cunningham told reporters ahead of her first game after the July 21 interview, against the Connecticut Sun.

For Sophie Cunningham, the issue has largely centered around protecting women’s sports and Title IX. The federal law, which was passed in 1972, prohibits sex-based discrimination in federally funded education and has played a major role in expanding opportunities for women and girls in sports.

Yet as fans have become increasingly divided over the issue, the discourse has grown far beyond her original comments. Former NBA players have even announced their intentions to enter the 2027 WNBA Draft, using the league’s current eligibility language to challenge how transgender participation in women’s basketball could be handled.

But Cunningham appears ready to leave the controversy behind and let the attention return to the court.

“I’m going to let people just do the speaking for themselves, but for me, I want to get back to basketball,” Cunningham said on August 5, according to ESPN. “It’s always been about basketball.”

Yet with Colson’s viral pun now bringing her comments back into the spotlight, that may be easier said than done.