No legacy, no playbook, no problem

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TERESA RESCH: Bob, that game. I’ve seen a lot of basketball games. That may be the most exciting, euphoric basketball game I’ve ever been part of. Nothing has played out the way we expected. You talk to a fan in the stands who never thought that the WNBA would exist in this country, and they’re just happy to be there, right? They’re just happy to exist, to have a place to go. So yeah, it’s pressure, but man, Billie Jean King has said it best: “Pressure is a privilege.”

BOB SAFIAN: That’s Teresa Resch, president of the WNBA’s Toronto Tempo, a new team just halfway through its first season. As the WNBA closes in on its All-Star break, I wanted to talk with Teresa about the pressure and opportunity of launching a women’s professional franchise amid intense scrutiny and chaotic uncertainty. She talks about what makes the Tempo a distinctive startup even among WNBA teams, and how she thinks about delivering on expectations today versus long-term goals. Teresa is unusually open about what she and the Tempo are learning on the fly, as well as what distinguishes the WNBA and the NBA. So let’s get to it. I’m Bob Safian, and this is Rapid Response.

[THEME MUSIC]

I’m here with Teresa Resch, president of the WNBA’s Toronto Tempo. Teresa, great to see you.

RESCH: So great to see you. Thanks so much for having me.

Copy LinkInside Toronto Tempo’s early momentum & chaos

SAFIAN: We are about midway through the WNBA season, with the All-Star Game approaching. It’s the Tempo’s inaugural season in the W, a true startup. And while you’re not at the top of the standings, you’re doing pretty well. You’ve won some big games, you’ve got a player on the All-Star team, Marina Mabrey, and you recently set a WNBA record for the highest attendance ever for a regular-season game. Are you feeling like, “Okay, I’ve got this”?

RESCH: That would be a stretch, but I do feel like when we started, the timeline, because of the collective bargaining agreement between the players and the owners, really condensed everything we were doing, and it felt like chaos for so long. And now, like you said, we’re over halfway through the season. Things we’re doing are no longer happening for the first time, so it feels a little smoother. But to say we’ve got it under control would be a stretch.

As you mentioned, we just set a record for the highest-attended WNBA game in history. And what’s unique about that is that game actually happened in Montreal. So Toronto is where we have most of our games, but we went to Montreal for two games, a city that’s never had a WNBA team, that’s never had a WNBA game, and we set a record for the most attendance. We’re Canada’s team. We’re the Toronto Tempo, but ultimately, from the moment that we actually put in the pitch and the bid with the league, it’s always been Canada’s team. So to have an entire country rooting for this team is really unique. We believed there’d be a big return on the other side.

SAFIAN: You and I sat down together back in mid-March, a few months before the season began. And at that point, you didn’t know who was going to be on the team because the expansion draft hadn’t happened yet. You didn’t know what your budget was because the owners and the players union hadn’t yet agreed on a collective bargaining agreement. You seemed both excited and anxious. Now you describe it as a little bit of chaos, huh?

RESCH: Yeah. I’m really glad that the CBA got agreed upon. If we didn’t have a deal done in the next couple of weeks, we probably weren’t going to be able to have a season. And as an expansion team, there’s so much hype around this inaugural season. To not have that happen would’ve been a really incredible blow to everything that we had built over the last two years leading up to it.

So first and foremost, I’m glad that we got an agreement done. And not only that, it was transformative. It’s the largest increase in salaries of any professional sports league ever in history. Last year, the highest-paid player was about $250,000, and now the minimum player gets $270,000, with maximum players getting upward of $1.5 million a year. So to say that it’s transformative and it’s made history is an understatement. All that to say, at that point, we didn’t even know if we were going to have a season. Now all of a sudden, this transformative agreement gets done, and we’re operating at a level that has never been in place for women’s professional sports before. The only issue with that was that we then had to lift up this entire team in such a condensed time.

So in 16 days, we put together a team that usually comes together over about six months. And when you’re doing everything for the first time in a new country, it’s very difficult. But man, our team was incredibly resilient, and we got off to a great start. Injuries have been really tough for us. We have never had the same starting lineup through our first 20 games. Marina Mabrey, Brittney Sykes, call her Slim, really were leading the team to start the season. Incredible players, incredible humans. And Slim went down. She was performing at an All-Star level. She went down about 10, I think it was 12, games into the season. Otherwise, I think we would’ve had two All-Stars, which is pretty incredible for an expansion franchise.

Copy LinkHow the new CBA agreement changed the WNBA overnight

SAFIAN: When you talk about the CBA agreement, it’s great, but I guess your budget has to go up, right? From a business point of view, it’s going to be more costly for you to build and maintain a team.

RESCH: Yeah. So what’s great about the league is there’s been exponential growth commercially. The league entered into a new media rights agreement that covers that influx, or a lot of it, and then also distribution from the league through sponsorship. So the league’s been growing exponentially, and a lot of that growth is now being returned directly to the players. Another piece of the agreement that was really important for the players, and that the league was able to deliver on, was that they now share in the growth of this league. There’s a revenue split, so I think it was a win-win. But now it’s up to us in our local market to deliver sponsorship and ticketing, to really help us find ways to differentiate ourselves and get that competitive advantage against the rest of the teams in the league.

SAFIAN: It must be hard to calibrate expectations when it’s your first season, right? You’re balancing being realistic with being ambitious.

RESCH: Yes. And it’s also within our own house. Like I said, we have an All-Star. These are not bottom-of-the-barrel players. These are incredibly talented athletes who have been in this league for years, 10 years, and competed at the highest level, who come in and want to win. Our coach has won multiple championships in the WNBA. She’s Australian, has coached their national team for a long time. Sandy Brondello won championships with the Phoenix Mercury and with the New York Liberty. So we’re very privileged to have her leading our team. And she doesn’t come in thinking that losing, or just competing at a high level, is okay.

So there’s a lot of pressure from the basketball side. But then you talk to a fan in the stands who never thought that the WNBA would exist in this country, and they’re just happy to be there. They’re just happy to exist, to have a place to go. So I think it’s balancing all those things. But ultimately, we’re in professional sports. We’re competitive people. So there is this level of competitiveness that we wanted to make sure we delivered, and we’re still in the hunt for the playoffs. The season’s not over. We’re just at the All-Star break. So that was our goal to start, and it still is.

SAFIAN: The All-Star Game itself, are you personally going?

RESCH: Absolutely.

SAFIAN: Does it provide opportunities for a young franchise?

RESCH: Yeah, All-Star is a great gathering across all facets of the business. So you have the basketball side, the best in the business, the best on the court. You have those who represent them, the agents who are the power brokers. You have corporate sponsors, and you have all of our media partners. That’s where a large share of the funding for this entire organization comes from. And then I have my colleagues, my peers, all the team presidents are there. We have meetings throughout the weekend. And then you have fans. None of this happens without the fans. So it’s an incredible point of connection. I really look forward to it.

SAFIAN: And when you’re there and you’re meeting with sponsors or prospective sponsors, are the other teams competitors for that the way they are on the court, or is that something you do collectively?

RESCH: I’m still navigating that. This is all new to me. What I would say is there are those partner brands that are already committed, and some of them are at the league level, and we’ll be hosting some of our local partners there. So it creates an opportunity for them to see it on the national stage, or international stage, the highest stage there is for the WNBA. Sometimes there are synergies, and sometimes it’s competitive. For us, it’s really unique because we’re in a different country. So for instance, Sephora Canada is one of our founding partners. We wear their logo on our shoulder, on our jersey. Meanwhile, the Golden State Valkyries have a deal with Sephora as well. They did their deal with Sephora U.S. So we’re actually talking to two different groups. It’s a great opportunity within Canada because sometimes you can leverage different budgets. Sometimes it’s global, so you are having those conversations.

And then it’s also interesting at the league level. They’ll have league partners that then sometimes also do deals at the team level. So it’s a combination of everything across the league. We all know that we are only as strong as our weakest link, so we want to lift each other up as much as we can to help grow. And I think as there are more expansion teams coming down the pipe, we have Cleveland coming up in ’28 and then Detroit in ’29 and Philadelphia in ’30, I’ve talked to leadership at all those teams already, and we want to make sure that they’re successful as they’re coming in as well.

Copy LinkBuilding an expansion franchise without inherited infrastructure

SAFIAN: Before you went to the Tempo, you’d worked in the NBA for a while with the Toronto Raptors. You were offered the Tempo opportunity by the primary owner, Larry Tanenbaum, who had been part of the Raptors ownership team. But unlike the Golden State Warriors and the Golden State Valkyries, which was a breakout success as a W expansion franchise, the Raptors and the Tempo are not linked. Correct. So you had to build your own infrastructure and organization. Not all expansion teams are created equal.

RESCH: No, not at all. But I think that’s what makes us unique. We’re all bringing something unique to the table. So it’s been challenging, to say the least, but it’s also been incredibly rewarding. I worked within the Maple Leaf Sports and Entertainment structure for 10 years, and so did my CFO. I was on the basketball side, on the team side. He was on the finance side. As we’ve been building out the Tempo, we’ve been able to take a lot of the learnings we’ve had and apply them in two ways.

Number one, if we could start from scratch, it’s what we want it to look like. And then number two, we had no legacy. It takes the chains and the weights off of you. We get to start from scratch and really mold this in a way, and into what we feel can be the best. But along with that comes the challenge of doing it from scratch.

SAFIAN: You’ve got to create it, right? It’s a lot of choices, of everything.

RESCH: Yeah. There are so many things that you don’t even realize you rely on — just processes, things that have been in place so long that they’re second nature. You don’t even think about them when you’re in it. Then you leave it, and all of a sudden you have to recreate those things. The biggest barrier right now for women’s sports is infrastructure, both in performance centers so athletes can train at the best level, and now in the actual performance venues. Rarely is a women’s sports team the number one tenant or in control of its facility, and that leaves a lot of money on the table. There are a lot of venues and organizations profiting off women’s sports without necessarily the women’s sports teams getting that return.

SAFIAN: Yeah. I had a discussion about that with Jessica Berman at the NWSL, about how critical that is to their plan for expansion. I guess this is one of those areas where the relationship between the W and the NBA becomes a little complicated, because it’s the same arena for a reason — it’s the same folks who own them — but that removes a little of the incentive to create your own.

RESCH: Yeah. It’s interesting. There’s a huge benefit. I think the Valkyries-Warriors partnership has been a great one. I don’t know the details of it, but the opportunity to optimize all the premium spaces there, the sellout of 18,000, even the digital boards — everything. As a tenant in our building, we don’t have that opportunity at all. So all that to say, not all teams in the WNBA are created equal, but that doesn’t mean any are lesser or greater than the others. It’s just that each one approaches it in a unique way, whether because of your ownership structure, your marketplace or how long you’ve been in the league. I think that’s what makes us really special and somewhat unique within the overall sports ecosystem.

SAFIAN: And the advantages of being able to start from scratch — can you give me an example of the kind of thing that gives you the freedom to do? Is that about brand? Is that about process?

RESCH: It’s a whole treasure trove of things, Bob. The fact that we’re able to start as Canada’s team is a really unique position. Then the second piece of that is the actual brand: name, logo, colors, how we position ourselves, what’s important to us, our values, how we’re connecting with the fans. To be able to start from scratch and build that is really powerful, especially in today’s media environment. To stand for something, to put ourselves out there as a brand, and to have that connection with our fan base from day one.

SAFIAN: I really appreciate Teresa’s candor, her transparency about what she’s still navigating and what’s new to her and the Tempo franchise. So how is the Tempo building out a new fan base, and how important was a Tempo player’s league-record 53-point outburst in late June? We’ll talk about that and more after the break. Stay with us.

[AD BREAK]

Copy LinkTurning a local team into a national brand

Before the break, Toronto Tempo President Teresa Resch talked about pulling together a new WNBA franchise under chaotic conditions, including building an on-the-court team in just 16 days. Now she talks about building a fan base not just in Toronto, but across Canada; whether Canada’s political clashes with the US are a plus or minus; and why having team owners like Serena Williams is so valuable. Let’s dive back in. We talked back in March about who the Toronto Tempo fan would be, how they might be different from a Toronto Raptors fan. And I’m curious whether that’s played out the way you expected.

RESCH: No. Nothing’s played out the way we expected. We’re a start-up. We have invested greatly in learning about our fans, but the implementation of that takes a while. We literally just started our ticket renewal campaign. We sent out the invoices today. So that’s also going to tell us a lot about, OK, these people, these different demographics who originally signed up — which ones are now renewing at the top rate?

SAFIAN: You play most of your home games in Toronto. As you said, you also host games in Montreal, where you set the attendance record. You’ll have some games in Vancouver later in the season, I think.

RESCH: Absolutely.

SAFIAN: But you’re building a sort of national fan base and a local Toronto base at the same time. It sounds tricky, like you might have to divide your attention, divide your resources.

RESCH: Yes. We’re definitely spread wide, but we believe that by investing in that, we’re going to have great returns. Right now, as an expansion team, it’s about exposure. It’s about making sure people know who we are, just getting our name out there. We also think — and this is very common across all sports — that a very small percentage of your fans actually ever come to a game in person. So we want, and believe we can build, this robust fan base that maybe isn’t connecting with us in person but is still super engaged, viewing through media channels, buying our merch and building communities within their communities that we hope to continue to grow and leverage over time, because this franchise isn’t going anywhere. This is halfway through season one of hundreds of seasons in the future, hopefully.

Copy LinkUsing sports to unify rather than divide

SAFIAN: Defining yourself as Canada’s team, against the political backdrop around the U.S. and Canada and strains over tariffs or trade or whatever — does that make things more complicated, or does that help attract Canadians to be fans?

RESCH: We never did this to be political. I think that’s one of the incredible things about sports: It’s unifying, and that’s why sports are so great. It’s something our owner, Larry Tanenbaum, says all the time: sports are an incredible community builder, and they’re good for society and good for people because they connect them. I couldn’t agree more. This team is really about connecting Canada and giving people something they can rally around and support and find commonality in. And I do think that’s the case. You enter an arena and everybody’s there, connected by the same goal, and that is to cheer on a team they feel can win that game and that they’re proud to support.

SAFIAN: Yes, it becomes your national team, right? Effectively.

RESCH: Yeah, absolutely.

SAFIAN: In the W.

RESCH: Absolutely.

SAFIAN: As you’re talking, I’m thinking about how the W’s never had more visibility than it has right now. In some ways, I could see that making your job easier. In some ways, I could see that making your job harder. You end up being a bellwether as a new franchise, too, for the whole league, because everyone needs you to succeed to prove the value of the league and its promise and momentum.

RESCH: Yeah. I think the league was very smart — and I’m very biased here, standing as the president of the Toronto Tempo — in the different organizations, ownership groups and marketplaces where it chose to expand. The Valkyries started and literally set a new level for the WNBA, but I would say even for sports franchises as a whole, expansion-wise. And we are all being held to that same standard. Every single one of those markets and ownership groups was selected because they’re additive to the league, and it’s our job to really live up to that expectation. So yeah, it’s pressure, but pressure is a privilege. Billie Jean King said it best. Every single person we’ve brought on board knew what they were getting into. They knew the high standards we were going to keep. In 2024, we had five employees. At the end of 2025, I think we were at 25 employees, and then we launched with 65. It’s been incredible to see the resilience and also what we’ve been able to accomplish together.

Copy LinkCapitalizing on Marina Mabrey’s 53-point game

SAFIAN: You mentioned that, for some of the fans, winning isn’t everything in the same way it might be for players, but stars matter. I know Marina Mabrey matched the WNBA record by scoring 53 points in a single game a few weeks ago. It’s an individual achievement, but is it significant for the franchise? Do you capitalize on it? Were you there that night?

RESCH: Bob, that game — I’ve seen a lot of basketball games. That may be the most exciting, euphoric basketball game I’ve ever been part of. And I was there when we won the championship in 2019. Very different, but to see 53 — she tied the WNBA league record with 53 points. She tied a league record for nine 3-pointers. This was 53 points in 40 minutes. You talk about NBA games — that’s 48 minutes. So it was incredible to experience. Marina has been an incredible player in this league for a really long time. I believe we’ve given her an opportunity she maybe hasn’t gotten before, which is to be a true leader on a team and to be the face of it. Between her and Slim, Brittany Sykes, those two players are truly the face of this expansion team. It may have been an individual accomplishment, but that got not just Marina, but the Tempo, in front of fans who probably had never heard of us before.

The same can be said when we set the tenant record. Moments like that, milestones that are beyond your circle, are how the Tempo and the WNBA are ultimately going to optimize the opportunity we have. So kudos to Marina — an incredible individual accomplishment — and we look for more of those. But that also was a hugely valuable time and moment for the Tempo as an organization as well.

SAFIAN: Your ownership team has added some boldface names that maybe also can provide some of that extra attention. Serena Williams is a part owner, and Toronto Raptors icon Kyle Lowry and his wife are involved. What role do those kinds of owners play? Are they active? Are they assets beyond their funding?

RESCH: Yes. Owners play a role beyond their money. And Larry was very strategic. He has full control of this team, but he said, “I want to add more people to the cap table, but they need to be strategic. How are they connected? How are they going to provide for this team as well?” And they have to be people who are passionate. Lily Singh is an incredible owner for us in the way she’s leaned in. She grew up in Toronto. She was one of the first people to really utilize YouTube as an influencer. And she’s a chief hype officer for us. So she said, “I want to lean in, and my role is going to be to spread the Tempo to my fan base, all the people who are following me, but then also bring people along.” So she brings different people to every single game.

Some of them have never been to a game before, and some of them are superfans, but she’s also doing content, and it’s been incredible to see how she’s leaned in. Now, Masai Ujiri — I worked for him at the Raptors for 10 years. He’s now the president of the Dallas Mavericks. I have a monthly call with him just to talk about building this team and leading. It’s very different from what Lily’s doing, but still very impactful. And Serena — the launch itself, talking about spreading to different audiences, her impact — she’s a one-name person in this world. Serena, everybody knows who that is. So exposure-wise, it was incredible for us.

Copy LinkWhat women’s sports can borrow from established leagues

SAFIAN: Women’s sports investment has gone from sort of a niche conversation to a mainstream one. You’ve been inside this shift. And I know you said that you hope eventually there won’t really be a delineation between men’s and women’s sports, but are we anywhere close to that?

RESCH: No. Men’s sports has such a head start on women’s sports, professional sports at least, in investment and business sophistication. What I will say is women’s sports is catching up a lot faster than it took men’s sports. Because we have this blueprint that men’s sports has laid out as far as how to optimize and commercialize, we get to benefit from all those learnings. The other thing is, there’s an evolution going on. Think about media and how people consume sports even five years ago, much less 10 years ago — it’s completely changed. There’s engagement with fans, being able to understand the role that content plays and how to optimize that. And then I think on the back end, there are a lot of systems, like technology, how you set it up, and how the tech stack looks and is formulated. It gives us a lot of flexibility and nimbleness. Little things like that make a difference in how you’re able to evolve your business. So don’t get me wrong, I would love to have the Maple Leafs’ five million followers, but there are things that come along with that.

SAFIAN: Yeah. I mean, how is working in the W different from the NBA? I know you have obviously different roles in both places. I’m just curious: Are there things the W could learn, or is learning, from the NBA, and vice versa? Are there things the NBA could be learning from the W?

RESCH: Yeah, absolutely. The NBA has a large ownership stake in the WNBA, so they have been heavily invested in this league for 30 years. A lot of people would say we wouldn’t be here without the NBA, and I think in some cases that’s very true. But there are also things that the NBA can learn from us. The WNBA had an in-season tournament — it’s called the Commissioner’s Cup — before the NBA did. And now they have the Emirates Cup, and it’s literally the same thing we’ve been doing in the WNBA well before them.

So there are definitely things that go both ways, but I think the W has done a great job of building a unique brand in and of itself. Something we can actually learn from the NBA is how they’ve become really global. That’s really the next step for the W. And I think the Tempo being in Canada, as the first team outside the United States, is an incredible first step. We really feel like the Tempo can be the gateway to the globe for the WNBA.

Copy LinkDefining success for a new team

SAFIAN: I know you’re only a few months into the actual operation of the team, although you’ve been working on this for a couple of years. What does success look like for the Toronto Tempo in one year, in three years, in five years?

RESCH: We’re very high-level, but very clear: Be Canada’s team and be a championship team. What are we doing to create an environment where those things are taking priority and the decisions we’re making will lead us there? And as you drill down, it becomes very nuanced. It’s also about proving that women’s professional sports, and the Toronto Tempo specifically, is good business.

We can turn a profit, we can operate well, we can increase valuations, and we can optimize revenue opportunities. That is a huge part of what we’re trying to prove. This is how investing in the Tempo has returned a profit for your business, increased the number of people who are brand loyal, and led to more signups, more customers, and all those different metrics that our partners are trying to reach. Then you look at the ownership and say, oh, the valuations have increased. Those are real numbers, and those are real demonstrations of how this is good business.

And that’s something we want to continue to prove because we don’t want to just be viewed as a fluke. We’re now in that hockey-stick phase — good Canadians love that term, hockey stick — but for so long we were kind of flat, and now we’re a rocket ship. It’s really fun to be on it and to continue to prove that investing in the WNBA and in the Toronto Tempo is good business.

SAFIAN: Well, Teresa, this has been great. Thank you so much for doing it.

RESCH: Oh my gosh, of course, Bob. I’m so honored and privileged to be a guest and talk women’s sports. More than anything, I can’t wait to see you have more women’s sports leaders on here to talk about the incredible jobs they’re doing, because this is an incredible business opportunity, and we have some of the best and brightest working in the space who are really moving the needle.

SAFIAN: Teresa is clearly a champion, not just for the Toronto Tempo and the WNBA, but for women’s sports overall. She’s a former college volleyball player herself, and she’s both patient and impatient about leveling up the business of women’s sports with that of men. One thing I keep coming back to is how different the structure of different WNBA franchises is, comparing the Golden State Valkyries and the Toronto Tempo. It’s a reminder that in all businesses, while looking at competitors is useful, we need to build a bespoke strategy based on our own advantages and opportunities. Whether we’re building from a base or we’re building from scratch, it’s what we’re building toward that matters most.

I’m Bob Safian. Thanks for listening.