What do WNBA players not on Team USA do during the FIBA World Cup break?
Yahoo Sports' Caroline Fenton and women's basketball writer Cassandra Negley discuss what the WNBA players who are not included on Team USA do during the 2026 FIBA World Cup break. Catch the full conversation on the "Hoops 360" podcast, and subscribe on Apple podcasts , Spotify , YouTube, or wherever you listen.
Video Transcript
Rules are not the only things that are being applied a- at least in the World Cup side of things.
For all of the other players that are not going to be participating in the World Cup, they have rules as well from the, from the WNBA.
Give us a, you know, peek behind the curtain of what life is going to look like for non-members of Team USA.
So back home in the US, players are already off on vacation if they are not at the World Cup.
This is part of the collective bargaining agreement that was agreed to in March.
Teams are required to give players not competing in the World Cup or in international play, is what it says, a vacation of seven consecutive days.
That article in the CBA does describe an early vacation and a late vacation.
That can be decided in training camp by the team which players take the early and which players take the late.
I was told that that is not required.
You can allow your players to just all go off on a seven-day vacation.
They will return and then will begin practices.
Teams are not allowed to hold more than seven practices per week during the hiatus.
No practice can exceed three hours.
It cannot exceed four if it includes film and conditioning activities.
So a team could theoretically practice about 10 days together during the break with their full remaining squad if they have that same vacation period, and it seems like a lot of teams do.
We've talked about this ad nauseam, but this is a great opportunity for, as Sophie Cunningham called her Mercury teammates and now her Fever teammates, the others to- practice together, build chemistry off the court, take a breather.
This could be a very interesting po- postseason given that so many of these players have a little three week before jumping into the playoffs.
I called them the others on Yahoo Sports Daily, and somebody on the internet got very mad at me, which people on the internet get mad all the time.
I'm like, "It's not me.
I don't call them that, I promise."
That is their- It's a direct quote, guys.
That is their term, not mine.
