While attempting a three-pointer late in the fourth quarter of Tuesday’s game between the Dallas Wings and Minnesota Lynx, All-Star forward Satou Sabally landed on Bridget Carleton’s foot and rolled her left ankle, at which point she stumbled to ground and held her leg in pain. As Sabally nursed the injury and laid on the court, a select number of Lynx fans were yelling at her. Eventually, at least two fans were ejected from the game. After collecting herself, Sabally ventured to the charity stripe and knocked down all of her foul shots. Following the second make, she blew a kiss to the Minnesota crowd.
Here's the two principle incidents where fans were ejected behind the Lynx bench pic.twitter.com/sNENN8NOlB
— CJ Fogler account may or may not be notable (@cjzero) August 23, 2023
Once the game concluded, Sabally took to Twitter and condemned the “disgusting fan base in Minny” and said there were “terrible words from the sidelines all game long.”
Disgusting fan base in Minny. The Schadenfreude to see someone get hurt can’t be a WNBA culture. Terrible words from the sidelines all game long
— Satou Sabally (@satou_sabally) August 23, 2023
Wings head coach Latricia Trammell also spoke about the incident during her post-game presser.
“I can handle a lot and so can our players as you know,” Trammell said. “But when Satou goes down and you have someone in the stands that yells out, ‘I’m glad you’re hurt,’ there’s no place for that. [Lynx head coach] Cheryl [Reeve] did apologize for that, still doesn’t make it right. But yeah, I mean, this league isn’t about that.”
I asked Wings coach Latricia Trammell about the end of the game and the Satou injury with the Minnesota crowd.
She had this to say: pic.twitter.com/31SrDHZww9
— isaac (@isaacappelt) August 23, 2023
The longstanding issue of instances stemming from entitled and brazen fans speaking down toward players is always disheartening and unacceptable. It’s a shame another incident occurred Tuesday night in Minnesota. Kudos to Sabally for speaking out, as well as her head coach, and calling it like she saw it.