hoop muses: an insider’s guide to pop culture and the (women’s) game

＂In vibrant color and style, Hoops Muses tells the vital stories that celebrate the history and tradition of our game.＂ --Sue Bird, WNBA legend

Hoops Muses is an homage to the game, bringing style and flair to all the details, moments, and people who have shaped the collective world of (women’s) hoops.

Hoops Muses will take us through time - literally. We begin in the future, in 2072, on the night of the WNBA’s 75th Anniversary, as New York Liberty phenom Jacklyn Jones is paid a visit by one of basketball’s long-ago (wink, wink) greats. This unlikely duo then goes on a sweeping, roundtrip adventure through basketball history, starting at the very beginning: Springfield, 1891. As the years pass, they learn the roots of the game (think: the first-ever collegiate game between Stanford and Cal, where men scaled the walls for a peek inside, or, the legend of Chicago’s Club Store Co-Eds, the all-Black barnstorming squad of the 1930s). AND as the early 20th century morphs into modern times, they see the game grow, the milestones reached. On their journey, they learn about the teams and the women (along with a few men) who helped build the foundation on which The Future will be built:

-Fort Shaw and the 1904 World Championship
-Pat Summitt and the early years of the Lady Vols
-Delta State, featuring Margaret Wade and Lusia Harris
-Cheryl Miller and Hollywood’s USC Trojans
-UConn-Tennessee and the ＂Sliding Doors＂ moment that sparked their rivalry

Plus, they have front-row seats to a whole lot of quirky, blissful fandom, including ...

The Movies That Should Have Been
WNBA Jam
The Moments
The Shots

To be a (women’s) hooper is to be part of a long and proud tradition ... but one not often celebrated in popular culture. Hoops Muses is here to change that.

Seimone Delicia Augustus (born April 30, 1984) is an American former professional basketball player who last played for the Los Angeles Sparks of the Women’s National Basketball Association (WNBA), Dynamo Kursk, and the U.S. national team. She was drafted by the Minnesota Lynx first overall in the 2006 WNBA Draft, and left to sign with the Sparks 14 years later. An eight-time All-Star, Augustus has become one of the most recognizable faces in the WNBA, earning MVP honors while leading the Lynx to the 2011 WNBA championship, the first of four WNBA championships that she won with the Lynx.

Kate Fagan is an Emmy-award winning journalist and the No. 1 New York Times bestselling author of WHAT MADE MADDY RUN, as well as the coming-of-age memoir THE REAPPEARING ACT. Her third book, ALL THE COLORS CAME OUT, will be released in May 2021 from Little, Brown. She currently writes for Sports Illustrated, and previously spent seven years as a columnist and feature writer for espnW, ESPN.com and ESPN The Magazine. She lives in Charleston, South Carolina with her wife, Kathryn Budig, and their two dogs.

Sophia Chang hails from the borough of Queens, New York and in less than a decade managed to champion a name for herself in the art, design and streetwear community world wide. With her BFA from Parsons School of Design coupled with a natural acumen for business she has collaborated with a-list names across multiple fields. Passionate about everyone’s story, she listens and interprets those stories to empower the community she loves and respects. Sophia is a creative engine that lives to propel her friends and clients to greatness.