Deja Kelly wasn’t sure what to expect when she signed with the Charlotte Crown back in May.
After playing her college ball at Oregon and North Carolina, Kelly spent some time in training camp with the Las Vegas Aces in 2025, played in Athletes Unlimited last winter, and also worked in television for the Big Ten Network. As summer approached, she wanted to keep playing basketball, but knew options were limited – especially if she wanted to play in the U.S. where her friends and family could watch her.
Then the Upshot League started, of which the Crown are one of four teams in its inaugural season. Founded by former WNBA president Donna Orender and backed by Zawyer Sports and Entertainment, the Upshot League sought to fill a gap in the U.S. women’s basketball ecosystem by providing an environment in which the players squeezed out by the WNBA’s limited roster sizes could still play team basketball, develop their skills and get paid for it.
While not affiliated with the WNBA, a simple way of thinking about the Upshot League is that it’s the women’s basketball equivalent of the NBA’s G League.
“Whenever you’re part of something for the first time, it’s kind of nerve-wracking because it could be all over the place. It could go either way,” Kelly told USA TODAY Sports. “I think overall, once we ironed out all the wrinkles, this is really high-level basketball. The talent level is there, so it’s really good competition every single night. That’s something that definitely exceeded my expectations.
“And organizationally, everything has fallen into place. There’s a really good structure. That’s how I know the league is going to continue to grow. I’m just really blessed that this opportunity found me.”
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The Upshot League will wrap up its first season on Saturday, Aug. 29 when Kelly’s Charlotte Crown face the Jacksonville Waves at VyStar Veterans Memorial Arena in Jacksonville, Florida. Tip-off is at 7 p.m. ET and the game can be streamed live, for free, on the league’s YouTube channel.
“I never doubted that we would have fantastic players. I didn’t worry about that. I wouldn’t say that I’m surprised they’re even better than I thought, but they are,” Orender told USA TODAY Sports. “The quality of the competition, of the athletes, all of that is just superior to what I think we had envisioned.”
Coached by Jessica Bogia, the Waves wrapped up a spot in the championship weeks ago and own the league’s best record at 25-9. Jacksonville’s roster features former college stars like Ariel Hearn of Memphis, Shyanne Sellers of Maryland and Tennessee’s Rennia Davis.
Eight of Bogia’s players have previous experience in the WNBA.
“That was the sell: ‘Come be seen right now. Come show the W that you’re playing, that you’re active. These are games that they can watch,'” Bogia told USA TODAY Sports. “For us, our strength is our depth. They’ve been able to put their egos aside. You know, the W isn’t looking for them to go drop 20 (points), right? What else can you do? What else are you bringing to the table? Can you play defense? I think that’s been how we’ve been able to find our most success.”
A former three-time All-ACC selection at North Carolina while playing for Courtney Banghart’s Tar Heels, Kelly leads the Upshot League this season in scoring and passing, averaging 17.8 points and 4.1 assists per game. The Crown are coached by Trisha Stafford-Odom, a former standout player at Cal in the early 1990s and most recently the head coach at NC Central who has guided them on a recent surge where they’ve won 14 of their last 15 games entering the championship.
With the Crown, Kelly believes she’s improved as a passer and has set herself up for future opportunities playing professional basketball. When the Upshot season is over, she’ll head abroad for the first time after signing with Panthers WBC, a team in Greece’s top pro division.
“I know I can score,” Kelly said. “That’s kind of been my thing my whole career is being able to go get a bucket, but I really wanted to grow at being a true point guard, balancing the scoring and elevating my teammates around me.”
Kelly’s opportunity in Greece is part of the proof-of-concept that the Upshot League has realized in its first season. Throughout the summer, the league has seen two of its players sign contracts with WNBA playoff teams, with Michelle Onyiah joining the Indiana Fever and Christyn Williams jumping onboard with the Dallas Wings.
Filling this hole in the women’s basketball ecosystem – providing a U.S.-based developmental league that runs concurrently alongside the WNBA – was all part of the vision that Orender and Upshot vice president Taj McWilliams-Franklin had for the league.
“It’s definitely a validation,” Orender said of Upshot players earning WNBA contracts. “That proved a key premise of who we are, where we are and why we are. Not every one of our players is going to be a WNBA player – maybe every one of them could be – but if they weren’t playing in our league in this timeframe, where would they be? They’d be training with a trainer or coach, and that’s not bad, but you need to be game-ready. You can step off the court from one of our games and walk right into a WNBA game.
“That’s why we call ourselves an opportunity league. We create opportunities for players, for coaches, for people in the front office, and also opportunities for communities to have world-class athletic entertainment and female role models. I think it’s special and important.”
WNBA president Donna Orender addresses the media before game one of the Finals between the Atlanta Dream and the Seattle Storm at Key Arena on September 12, 2010 in Seattle, Washington.
In addition to the teams in Charlotte and Jacksonville, Upshot also had squads based in Greensboro, North Carolina and Savannah, Georgia this season. Next year, the league will expand its footprint with teams in Baltimore, Maryland and Nashville, Tennessee.
And still, Orender says there is “potential” for more teams to be announced before the start of next season.
“We want to get through the championship and then we’ll figure out what the timing is,” Orender said. “But there’s a tremendous amount of positive activity and there will probably be another team or two. … Now, we can capitalize on the fact that we have a record of elite competition, of entertaining and exciting basketball in great arenas, of community engagement. I think that will help in every market we go to.”
Perhaps the question that Orender fields most often is what the Upshot League’s relationship is like with the WNBA. Could the two women’s basketball leagues be partners down the road? Will WNBA teams have affiliates in the Upshot similar to the system between the NBA and G League?
For now, the Upshot is independent of the WNBA and focusing on growing and improving, but there is a line of communication between the two leagues.
“They know who we are. They know what we do. They’re watching us,” Orender said. “And in good time, I think that conversations will continue to evolve in a way that could help define a more formal relationship.”
What’s clear is that the Upshot League has filled a void in the landscape of women’s basketball. More players are getting paid to play in a team environment, and they’re parlaying their performances in the Upshot to opportunities with the WNBA and overseas. That’s a win for the fledgling league.
This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: How the Upshot League filled a gap in U.S. women’s basketball
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