Bars and breweries across the Twin Cities will host watch parties Sunday night as the Lynx and Liberty vie for the WNBA championship in the fifth and final game of a nail-biting, competitive series.
Neighbors will gather. Long-distance friends will text updates throughout the game. At Riverview Theater in south Minneapolis, families will watch on the big screen with buckets of popcorn.
But loyal Lynx fans eagerly awaiting tipoff extend far beyond Minnesota’s borders. They seem to be everywhere — from California to North Carolina and every state in between (we see you, South Dakota). Because nowadays, “Everyone Watches Women’s Sports,” a T-shirt slogan more common than “Just Do It” for WNBA followers.
At 89, Edith Rylander said she’s been following the Lynx since their inaugural season — in the late 1900s, as kids say these days.
“It’s just a great pleasure to be able to watch any of our Minnesota teams, but especially the Lynx, who I have a special soft place in my heart for because of watching college and originally high school women’s basketball expand and get better and better and better” she said.
Rylander said that while the state’s other teams were “flaming out” over the years, not so the Lynx.
“My goodness, it’s just been a splendid, consistently watchable team over the years,” she said. “It’s been astounding.”
But it wasn’t until the Lynx reached the playoffs this year that Rylander could watch them. She lives outside the team’s TV broadcast coverage area. The poet and author recently moved from Grey Eagle, Minn., with her husband to a senior living community in Davidson, N.C., to be near her daughter.