Napheesa Collier Advocates for WNBA Rule Changes, Says League 'Is Too Physical Right Now'

As the WNBA prepares to tip off the 2026 season, Minnesota Lynx star Napheesa Collier lobbied for significant alterations to how the game is officiated.

Collier said Wednesday on NPR's Morning Edition that play is "too physical right now."

"I think that's been a complaint of players and coaches alike for the past several years," she said (via Vanshay Murdock). "We've been compared to the NBA of the 80s, in just our physicality. And I do think that hinders the players obviously. You come to watch players play offense and to score. When it's so physical, the game is not fun to watch and it's not fun to play."

The five-time All-Star explained how she and her peers are going to play based on what the rules allow. If more physicality is both permitted and helps a team win, then players are going to utilize that.

Changing the rules would then force players to adapt to a new normal, perhaps one that opened up the offensive side more.

The NBA has done this multiple times over the years. Outlawing handchecking and penalizing excessive contact more broadly are two obvious examples. The WNBA certainly wouldn't be unique if it rewrote the rulebook to increase scoring.

In general, there probably isn't a period across any sport where athletes were uniformly satisfied with the state of officiating.

The complaints are particularly acute in the WNBA, though, and they've been that way for the last few years. The concerns go beyond just how games are called and center on structural issues such as how long refs have worked in the W or women's basketball writ large.

The season is only days away from starting, so there isn't enough time for the league office to radically overhaul the rules in a way that Collier is proposing. Getting this conversation started now could at least plant the seeds for a major shift in 2027.