WNBA Power Rankings: Liberty, Valkyries come out of opening weekend strong as league kicks off 30th season

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Just before the 2026 WNBA season started, Minnesota Lynx star Napheesa Collier, who is out until at least June after undergoing double ankle surgery in the winter, criticized the league's level of physicality.

"The game is too physical right now. I think that's been a complaint of players and coaches alike for the past several years," Collier, who tore three ligaments in her left ankle and a muscle in her left shin during a controversial collision with Alyssa Thomas in the playoffs last season, told NPR. "We've been compared to the NBA of the '80s, in just our physicality. And I do think that hinders the players, obviously. You come to watch players play offense and to score. When it's so physical, the game is not fun to watch and it's not fun to play."

Collier is not the only high-profile figure who thinks that way and, during the offseason, the league made an effort to "clean up the game, make it a more fluid game," Las Vegas Aces coach Becky Hammon said last week. "I think across the board, everybody from league executives to coaches felt like it was too physical," Hammon continued, adding that "freedom of movement" was one of the points of emphasis for officials.

The first weekend of the season showed that it's going to take some time to find the right balance in how the game is being called. In 11 games, there were 491 fouls called and 508 free throws taken.

The Aces, in their blowout loss to the Phoenix Mercury, were the only team that didn't shoot at least 15 free throws in a game, and there were five instances of a team taking at least 30 free throws. For comparison, there were only 25 instances of a team taking at least 30 free throws all of last season.