Diana Taurasi, a three-time NCAA Champion, six-time EuroLeague Champion, three-time WNBA Champion, three-time Women’s World Cup gold medalist and six-time Olympic gold medalist, announced Tuesday that she’s played her final game of professional basketball in a profile written by Time magazine’s Sean Gregory. She described feeling content “mentally and physically full” when discussing her decision to retire. But there are elements of the game she’ll miss.
I’m going to miss the locker room, the things that come with being on a basketball team. All those things, I’ll deeply miss.
DIANA TAURASI
“I’m going to miss the competition,” Taurasi said. “I’m going to miss trying to get better every single offseason. I’m going to miss the bus rides, shootarounds. I’m going to miss the inside jokes. I’m going to miss the locker room, the things that come with being on a basketball team. All those things, I’ll deeply miss.”
During her 20-season professional career and four-year college career at UConn in the early 2000s, all she did was win. She played her entire WNBA career for the Phoenix Mercury, which drafted her first overall in the 2004 WNBA Draft.
She retires from the sport as the WNBA’s all-time leader in scoring (10,646 career points) and in three-point shooting (1,447 three-points made). Many talking heads in the sport have her ranked in women’s basketball as the greatest of all time, the GOAT.
Taurasi wasn’t just great at what she did; she was leaps and bounds ahead of her time.
With her impeccably smooth three-point jumper and precise court vision that allowed her to find teammates in places defenses didn’t expect, Taurasi was a combo guard before there was such a thing in the WNBA.
As importantly, she presented a new model of what women players could be in a world that saw them as second-class athletes.
When Taurasi’s teammates, coaches, opponents and fans are asked to describe her, the word competitor is often the first term out of their mouths. In 2025, that’s a badge of honor for women in sports, but it wasn’t always the case when Taurasi was starting her basketball career.
Consider the study from economics professors entitled: “Do Women Shy Away From Competition? Do Men Compete Too Much?”
Consider the 2007 study from economics professors Muriel Niederle and Lise Vesterlund entitled: “Do Women Shy Away From Competition? Do Men Compete Too Much?” They found that women “often shy away from competition and men embrace it.” These stereotypes were far more prevalent a generation or two ago, when WNBA players were expected to project femininity and were judged for any trash talk or chippiness.
Taurasi defied gender expectations and taught future women athletes and women in leadership to embrace their competitiveness and bold personalities.
“I first saw [Taurasi] play on TV when she was at UConn, I was 10 years old,” Los Angeles Sparks Guard Kelsey Plum wrote Wednesday on Instagram. “I’d never seen a woman with that much confidence and swag, fearlessness and just unapologetic competitiveness. That was who I wanted to be.”
Her competitiveness often translated into her many arguments with officials on the floor. Taurasi left the WNBA with 105 technical fouls, the most of all time as well.
She famously barked at an official during the WNBA’s bubble season (players, coaches and officials all lived in the same hotels in Bradenton, Florida) after she felt like she had been assessed an unfair foul. “I’ll see you in the lobby later,” Taurasi told that official.
Her comment, picked up by the broadcast audience, became such a viral and humorous exchange that “See You In the Lobby” T-shirts were made.
That wasn’t her last viral moment. Taurasi led the Phoenix Mercury to the 2021 WNBA finals after upsetting the Las Vegas Aces in the semifinals. But after losing to the Chicago Sky in four games, out of frustration she reportedly broke a locker room door inside Wintrust Arena by repeatedly slamming it. Sports are entertainment and Taurasi understood that better than most. The Sky trolled Taurasi by bringing the broken door to their championship parade. When asked about reports that she’d broken that door, Taurasi said cryptically, “There was a lot of doors in there.” Sports are entertainment and Taurasi understood that better than most. She entertained with her clutch-shot making and no-look passes, but also with her quick wit. She joked often during in-game interviews and during alternative broadcasts of NCAA Women’s Final Four games with her peer and friend Sue Bird. But she also earnestly shined a light on the gender stereotypes that she continued to deal with even in the twilight of her career. “Only a woman would have 20 years of experience and it’s an Achilles heel instead of something that is treasured and used as a way forward for our sport and for women,” she said while answering questions about her being chosen over younger players for the Paris Olympics in 2024. In a one-on-one interview with UPROXX in June, Taurasi she talked about how women in all walks of life are judged harshly “on appearance over quality of work.” Diana Taurasi, the goat of women's hoops has called it a career. What a career it was. Taurasi helped raise the ceiling for future generations in women’s basketball. When she appeared on ABC’s “The View” on Wednesday to discuss her decision to retire she said, “This next generation is bullish. They don’t shut up and dribble like we did.” But is that really true? She, too, was bullish, and she showed women young and old what they can be when they defy society’s expectations. Diana Taurasi, a three-time NCAA Champion, six-time EuroLeague Champion, three-time WNBA Champion, three-time Women’s World Cup gold medalist and six-time Olympic gold medalist, announced Tuesday that she’s played her final game of professional basketball in a profile written by Time magazine’s Sean Gregory. She described feeling content “mentally and physically full” when discussing her decision to retire. But there are elements of the game she’ll miss.
Jackie Powell
Jackie Powell has covered women's basketball since 2019, including college basketball, the WNBA and international and high school prospects. Her work has appeared in Bleacher Report, Yahoo Sports, The Next, Sports Illustrated, the Hartford Courant, SLAM and Harper's Bazaar, and she hosts the "Locked on Women's Basketball" podcast every other week. She also is a Lady Gaga stan, a connoisseur of pop music and a mental health advocate. 
