Indiana Fever guard Sophie Cunningham is asking her WNBA peers to recalibrate their expectations of fan behavior, saying that demands for parity come with a price, which is acceptance of the sports norm.
“We don’t make excuses for our players, so I’m not making an excuse now for how our players respond to our fans,” said Cunningham, during a recent episode of her No Hesitation podcast. “Some of that has to do with what happened to A’ja Wilson, the No. 1 overall pick in the first round of the WNBA playoffs.”
Us women in sport… we scream from the rooftops that we want equality, that we want to be treated like the men,’ Cunningham said on her podcast. ‘But if you’re asking for all these fans to come and they do something that a sport fan would probably do if you’re on the other team… and then we’re going to come for them for just pointing, saying that you fouled. Like, grow up. What are we doing?’
The A’ja Wilson Fan Incident & “Double Standards”
Cunningham spoke about Game 2 of the Fever-Aces playoff series, in which Wilson did battle with a fan directly behind the baseline who pointed at her after a foul was called. Wilson was assessed a technical for moving toward the stands, but she didn’t face any further punishment from the league.
According to Cunningham, the league handled this double standard, asserting that Wilson, who she compared to the “LeBron James” of the WNBA, was treated like a star.
“if you want to get technical, that could have called for a suspension,” said Cunningham, who felt the scandal over fan arm movements was very much blown out of proportion.
The remarks continue a string of outspoken criticism from Cunningham this year. At the beginning of the summer, an ESPN profile depicted a new, no-holds-barred character for Cunningham, who offered up some divisive opinion on limiting trans athletes from competing in female sports as “common sense.” Her remarks were the subject of national media coverage and a public call for inclusion from the WNBPA.
Reflection on Indiana Fever’s Playoff Exit
And in addition to on-court discussions, Cunningham looked back on the Fever’s 2026 campaign, which included a three-game first-round playoff loss to the Las Vegas Aces.
Cunningham said that the falloff in Indiana’s consistency, after praising fellow Terrapins Clark, Mitchell and Boston, was “just that we had that disruption in our schedule midway through the season with the FIBA break and everything.
‘It was so fun and so good… I think FIBA may kind of put a little bit of a dent in the momentum we were building,’ Cunningham said. ‘It kind of sucks because we’re just all so competitive and we’re all just trying to get a championship in the end… all these fun, historic in-season stats really don’t mean much because we all just want to win.’
The Fever’s regular season scoring leader was also their best player all season, but Indiana’s was as fall ended in heartbreak.
