Team Owners, Female

Women's Sports Teams a Key Factor

As a rule, it is predictably women's sports that have proved most welcoming to female team owners. In 2005, Shelia Johnson, a spa owner who cofounded the Black Entertainment Network (BET) with her ex-husband Robert Johnson (who owned the Charlotte Bobcats), became the first female to own a Women's National Basketball Association (WNBA) team. As a member of a group of financial backers known as Lincoln Holdings LLC, which purchased the WNBA's Washington Mystics, Johnson also became the first African American woman in history to become part owner of three professional sports teams, since Lincoln Holdings also owns the National Hockey League's Washington Capitals and has a minority interest in the NBA Washington Wizards. Johnson is most actively involved with the Mystics, serving as team president, managing partner, and governor. She sees her involvement as a major gain for African American women and believes that her participation will open doors for other African American women interested in owning sports teams.

After Johnson entered the field, Michelle Williams, a member of the singing group Destiny's Child, bought a minority share in the Chicago Sky. Elsewhere, four Seattle businesswomen took over the WNBA's Storm in an effort to keep the franchise in Seattle after that [Page 1443]city's men's basketball franchise had moved to Oklahoma City.

Two years after her husband Garry died of cancer in 2007, Atlanta businesswoman Kathy Betty decided to buy the Atlanta Dream, the local WNBA team. She announced that her move was motivated by both her interest in sports and her desire to provide the young people of Atlanta, particularly young women, with positive role models. She believes that encouraging woman-to-woman networking is necessary in teaching women to become more aware of their power to influence the business world. Betty's interest in basketball has long been evident through her support of Georgia Tech's basketball program.

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