The 2026 WNBA Finals between the Golden State Valkyries and Atlanta Dream will begin in less than a week, but the Dream and the league have still not made a final decision on where Atlanta's home games (Games 3, 4 and, if necessary, 6) will be played. The most recent public comment from the organization came last week, when Dream president and chief operating officer Morgan Shaw Parker said they were "finalizing details on their home venue and where we will be playing." The Dream, who reached the Finals for the first time since 2013 with their sweep of the New York Liberty in the semifinals, typically play their home games at Gateway Center Arena in College Park, which only holds 3,500 people. That is the smallest arena in the league, and would not be an ideal site for Finals games.
But the Dream have struggled to find an alternate venue. State Farm Arena, home to the NBA's Atlanta Hawks, hosted five of the Dream's regular-season games and their first three playoff home games, but there are conflicts for all three of the Finals dates in Atlanta. A Sombr concert is scheduled for Oct. 22 (Game 3), while the Hawks are set to play the Houston Rockets on Oct. 24 (Game 4) and the Cleveland Cavaliers on Oct. 29 (Game 6).
The WNBA has often dealt with arena conflicts come playoff time when the NBA, NHL and college basketball are back in swing. Just last season, the Valkyries had to play the first playoff game in franchise history at the SAP Center in San Jose, rather than at their home arena, the Chase Center in San Francisco, which will host all of their Finals games this season. In each of the last two Finals, NBA teams have adjusted their preseason schedule to accomodate WNBA Finals dates.
The Minnesota Timberwolves changed the date of a preseason game in 2024 to make room for the Lynx, and in 2025 the Phoenix Suns played a preseason game in the afternoon to give the Mercury the arena at night. Of course, it's much easier to move around a largely meaningleess preseason game than it is to move a regular-season contest -- especially the Hawks' home opener on Oct. 24. Plus, unlike many NBA and WNBA teams that play in the same city -- including the Timberwolves/Lynx and Suns/Mercury -- the Hawks and Dream are owned by separate groups, which means the Hawks do not have the same incentive to work around the Dream's schedule.
Ironically, State Farm Arena -- then Philips Arena -- was the Dream's original home from 2008-16, and the last time they made the Finals, they were forced to move Game 3 of that series to the much-smaller Gas South Arena -- then the Arena at Gwinnet Center -- due to a conflict with Disney on Ice. Gas South Arena, which is located in Duluth, Ga. and now holds just over 13,000 people, could be an option for Games 3 and 4, but whether the Dream want to play their most important games of the season in an unfamiliar arena out in the suburbs remains to be seen.
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