After five WNBA Finals games, the Golden State Valkyries lead the series 3-2. That means when the action returns to Atlanta for Game 6, the Valkyries will have the chance to close out the series and win their first WNBA Championship in just their second year as a franchise. However, as things stand, the Valkyries may not actually get to celebrate at State Farm if they win… To say this has ruffled some feathers in the WNBA community would be an understatement.

“Guess what happens if someone wins a championship after Game 6? They have to turn that arena over for the Hawks game. And so that championship celebration may not actually be on that court,” ESPN reporter Ramona Shelburne said.

According to reports, if the 2026 champions are crowned on Thursday at State Farm, the Valkyries would be rushed off the floor to celebrate their win at a practice arena so workers can prepare the space for the Atlanta Hawks-Cleveland Cavaliers game.

Golden State Warriors and Valkyries beat reporter Kenzo Fukuda wrote, “It’s an unmitigated disaster that we’ve gotten to this point.”

Award-winning columnist Dan Wolken wasn’t kind when discussing the situation as well…

“It’s happening because the WNBA and the Atlanta Dream messed up, waited until the last minute for a fix and settled for what they believed the best of several bad options,” wrote Wolken.

And it’s not just that the potential 2026 championship winners wouldn’t have time to soak in the atmosphere if they do win; the game schedule is also set to hurt the Valkyries’ fans.

To accommodate the Hawks vs. Cavaliers game, the WNBA has given up a primetime TV slot to make the compromise and host Game 6 at the State Farm. Instead of an evening slot, the Dream will host the Valkyries on Thursday, October 29 at 12:30 p.m. ET. That means fans in California will have to watch their team play a potential closeout game at 9:30 a.m. (PT) while sipping their morning coffee.

So, fans of both teams get the short end of the stick, and even Dream’s head coach, Karl Smesko, acknowledged it. While speaking to the media, he said that neither team would get time for a shootaround ahead of the game, and fans may be forced to choose between work commitments and tuning in to the game.

No wonder journalists like Celtics writer Noa Dalzell called the situation “Ridiculous.”

After all, high-stakes games, especially WNBA Finals games and even All-Star Games, air during primetime. The 2026 WNBA All-Star Game happened on Saturday, July 25, 2026, at 8:30 p.m. ET (7:30 p.m. CDT) at the United Center.

Naturally, many community experts have questioned the WNBA and the Atlanta Dream about how we got here.

Who is to blame for the chaos?

Former Connecticut Sun and Los Angeles Sparks forward Chiney Ogwumike agreed with Wolken during her appearance on ESPN’s First Take.

“I say, as a member of the WNBA family, get ahead of the circumstances where we’re dealing with these games one by one beforehand instead of pre-planning? Because the NBA, per Ramona Shelburne’s reporting, said if they had a one-week’s heads-up, they could have accommodated, to make sure that this game is in prime time and receiving the eyeballs that it so fully deserves,” said Ogwumike.

“This is a logistical failure and a lack of communication, which has plagued the WNBA leadership over the last year. The players and the fans deserve this to be prime time.”

However, in a new development, the Dream have addressed the issue in an open letter to their fans. In their letter, the team explained that they had actually raised concerns about this exact scheduling clash months in advance!

“Two months ago, when the WNBA finalized playoff dates and times, we raised concerns that the W Finals schedule conflicted with NBA games at State Farm Arena. As we moved through the playoffs, we reiterated those concerns. Our concerns did not receive the attention, nor the urgency that they deserved,” the team wrote in their letter.

While the Dream expressed their love for their current home arena, the Gateway Center Arena, they also clarified that this historic series, where both teams are competing for their first WNBA championship, deserved to be played at a “world-class stage,” like State Farm Arena, which dwarfs Gateway Center’s seating capacity at nearly 17,000.

Beat reporter Andrew Dukowitz argued that the league may not be financially affected at all, despite giving up the primetime slot, which makes this an even bigger disservice to the fans.

“To pull the curtain back, all the TV contracts for playoffs are already set in stone; the league technically doesn’t make any extra money based off the ratings, so financially, the league isn’t going to be hurt by this decision,” Dukowitz wrote on X.

“It’s literally insulting to all the players, fans, reporters, team employees, and people that pour so much time and effort into growing a game for a league and a team to value 250k in ticket rev over offering a prime time game and growing the game,” he added.

While the community is clearly unhappy with how things turned out, it was evident that this would come down to the wire even before the scheduling conflict arose.

State Farm was finalized in the eleventh hour

While the controversy has shifted toward the scheduling conflict, just a few days ago, the league and the Dream were scrambling to decide where to host the Valkyries.

While Gateway Center was an option, the Dream wanted the bigger State Farm, and according to reports, which you can check out here, the WNBA, NBA, Valkyries, Dream, and Atlanta Hawks met on Sunday to negotiate.

“We continue to explore all options,” a WNBA spokesperson told ESPN, while a Dream spokesperson clarified what would happen if they couldn’t secure the venue.

“We are waiting to hear from the league if any changes can be made to allow us to play in State Farm Arena. If not, the game will be played in Gateway Center Arena,” said the Dream spokesperson.

“After a weekend of nonstop frantic discussions and negotiation, Game 6 of the WNBA Finals will be played Thursday at 12:30 pm at 17,000-seat State Farm Arena in Atlanta, sources told ESPN,” Shelburne revealed on October 26.

“It took collective efforts from the WNBA, NBA, the Hawks, State Farm Arena, Dream, Valkyries and broadcast partners to figure out the best course of action,” she added.

Game 4 faced a similar situation as the Hawks made the adjustment, and the WNBA Finals game tipped off at 1 p.m. ET on Saturday, October 24. However, it wasn’t a potential series-closing game that could determine the 2026 WNBA Champions.

The WNBA has broken through into the mainstream with massive growth, and you can dive deeper into that in this story. So it’s not surprising that the community is raising its voice about the schedule. What could’ve been a grand broadcast on primetime television for fans to enjoy may just be relegated to an afternoon game in Atlanta, where the potential champions may not even get to celebrate their win in the moment.

Shelburn did later post that there is “a resolve to make sure any potential championship that is won Thursday afternoon is celebrated on the court.”

However, there is no official confirmation on how the league plans to accommodate it. On the flip side, even if the Dream does tie up the series 3-3 in front of their home crowd, it won’t change the fact that a lapse in planning created such a situation in the first place.