Tunnel Fits Podcast

Charlotte left with the trophy. Jacksonville might have proved the bigger point.

It hit me at the airport.

Signage everywhere. The Waves greeting you before you even grab your bag. And it did not stop there. All weekend I talked to people, drivers, folks in line, strangers who clocked my credential, and every single one of them knew the team, knew the league, knew a championship was in town.

That is not a first-year league begging for attention. That is a city that already fell in love. I want to sit in that for a second, because that is the whole story. Everything else this weekend, the fits, the comeback, Deja, Fan Fest, Shaq courtside, becomes evidence of the same thing. UPSHOT made its first championship feel like it mattered to the city hosting it. And Jacksonville answered.

Why I Was in the Building

I got brought in to cover the first championship in this league’s history, and that is not lost on me. Fashion is my lens, the way I read a room and a moment, but it is not the only reason I belong courtside. I came to document all of it. That said, you already know where my eyes go first.

The Tunnel Was smoking

Deja Kelly. She pulled up to the Fitcam in all black, Louboutins on her feet, a YSL bag on her arm, the whole thing screaming that she came to handle business. No notes. When somebody shows up like that, believe them.

LeLe Grissett, Reigan Richardson, and Schaquilla Nunn walked through and gave me plenty to shoot too. The tunnel has been a runway all season, and the finale earned the looks it got.

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Then the Game Rose to Meet It

Cheryl Miller. Ann Meyers Drysdale. Tamika Catchings. Three generations of women’s basketball royalty, sitting shoulder to shoulder to watch a first-year league crown its first champion. And these are not celebrity drop-ins. All three helped build this thing, lending their names to the league as advisors and investors, and then showing up in person to see the season they believed in reach its biggest night. Yes, Shaq was there too, courtside and locked in the whole game. But the real weight on that floor was the women who paved the road, watching the next generation run it.

For most of the night, it was Jacksonville’s show. The Waves were the best team in the league all season, and they pushed the lead to 14 like they were closing the book on it.

They were not closing anything.

Charlotte would not go away. The Crown chipped it down through the fourth, and the final minutes turned into the kind of stretch where nobody sits. Jacksonville got it to one, and I felt the whole arena hold its breath. Then Deja Kelly walked to the line ice cold and buried the free throws that mattered. Jacksonville’s last look to tie it would not fall. Charlotte closed it out.

Charlotte 81, Jacksonville 76. Your first UPSHOT champion, a team that started 1-6 and then went on a run nobody saw coming. Kelly finished with a game-high 29 and took Championship MVP, Commissioner Donna Orender handing her the trophy. “The championship MVP means a little bit more,” she said. I believe her.

The Whole Weekend Was the Point

Fan Fest filled out the weekend. Good music, kids running around, people hanging out before the game. It did not feel like something added to the schedule just because a championship needed extra programming. People were actually there for it.

And that was probably my biggest takeaway from Jacksonville.

This is UPSHOT’s first season, but Jacksonville did not treat the championship like a first-year event. From the airport to the arena, people knew the Waves. They knew what was happening that weekend. They showed up.

Charlotte came in and took the trophy home, but Jacksonville showed what this league can look like when a city gets behind it.

I went down there to cover the fits, the game and the first UPSHOT championship. By the time I left, I was already thinking about season two.