As the WNBA playoffs shift to the lower seeds’ home arenas for Game 2, the Golden State Valkyries won’t be hosting their postseason game at Chase Center, where they played all 22 regular-season games. Instead, the Valkyries will be moving on Wednesday to SAP Center in San José, Calif., home to the NHL’s San Jose Sharks, to play the top-seeded Minnesota Lynx.
Golden State has built one of the best fan bases in sports during its inaugural season. Fans flocked to “Ballhalla” in their Valkyries’ violet in record numbers. The Valkyries led the WNBA in attendance with 18,064 fans per game, selling out every contest for the highest average attendance in league history in its first season of existence. Golden State’s net rating was 13.1 points per 100 possessions better at home than on the road during the regular season, the second-largest gap in the league behind New York.
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“We have faith in our fans that they’re going to continue to show out for us wherever we play,” guard Veronica Burton said after clinching a playoff berth.
The irony of Golden State’s predicament is that the WNBA changed its postseason format this season to ensure a home game for each playoff team. From 2022 to 2024, only the top four seeds were guaranteed a home playoff contest, resulting in teams like the 2024 Indiana Fever being eliminated entirely on the road. But the 2025 first round series switched from a 2-1 best-of-three to 1-1-1.
The Valkyries had a different issue. Their owner, Joe Lacob, is an investor in the Laver Cup, a tennis tournament. Lacob agreed to host the 2025 event at Chase Center two years ago, before the WNBA had awarded an expansion team to Golden State. Given the support the Valkyries have had from their ownership group since their inception, this type of problem presumably won’t recur.
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Nevertheless, relocating playoff games is an all-too-common occurrence for WNBA teams. In 2021, the Phoenix Mercury were displaced from their home arena twice during their run to the WNBA Finals by a Maluma concert and Disney on Ice. The Los Angeles Sparks moved a 2019 semifinal game from Crypto.com Arena in downtown L.A. to Long Beach State because of the Emmy Awards.
The Washington Mystics played their entire 2018 postseason run away from Capital One Arena because of renovations. The ability to control their own dates motivated the Mystics’ move to CareFirst Arena the following season, even though that building has a capacity of 4,200.
The New York Liberty also had to move the 2024 Commissioner’s Cup from their home arena to Long Island because of the NBA Draft. However, the last three WNBA postseasons haven’t experienced any relocations.
This article originally appeared in The Athletic.
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