For the first four games of their WNBA Finals series against the Minnesota Lynx, the entire Los Angeles Sparks team has remained in the locker room -- even staging a collective walkout before Game 1 to a clatter of boos.
The defending champion Sparks will likely repeat the gesture to raise awareness of racial injustice for tonight's deciding Game 5 in Minneapolis, while Lynx players continue to link arms in solidarity.
"Their efforts are sometimes overshadowed by the men, but I think it's important that we recognize and credit them," Kristen Clarke, the president of the National Lawyers Committee for Civil Rights, told CNN Sport.
"The WNBA has a fair number of African-American women who understand what it means to be discriminated on the basis of their race and gender, so they lie on the intersection of a lot of the problems that have beleaguered our country," she says.
"They have something to say about many of the crises that are unfolding across our country, and some of what they have to say is informed by their own personal experiences with injustice."
'Not even about the flag'
Ahead of Game 2, Sparks guard Essence Carson said that people had forgotten what sports stars' protests -- be it men and women -- were reallyu about.
"You're standing for what you believe in, bringing attention to something that needs attention brought to," Carson told TMZ Sports.
"I felt like everyone is so focused on the flag, and it's not even about the flag. It's about racial inequality, criminal justice reform, police brutality, and everything along those lines."
Although WNBA Commissioner Lisa Borders must be mindful of her players' potential to alienate the league's niche fan base, she has been supportive of their right to protest thus far.
"Our players are some of the most socially conscious that you will ever find," Borders told reporters in anticipation of the protest before Game 1 of the Finals. "You have seen that in the years before I got here, and I'm sure it will continue in the future."
'Impactful'
Indeed, the movement is nothing new for the WNBA.
Kneeling or linking arms during the national anthem is not an unusual scene before games, with momentum for protest gaining popularity after each racially charged incident of note.
The WNBA's continued protests, along with those in other sports, are playing a valid role in society according to Clarke.
"I absolutely believe the protests have been impactful," says Clarke, who has worked closely with the New York Liberty.
"They have helped to keep these issues front and center, and sustain a real dialogue in our country about police brutality and other crises."
'We want to use our platforms'
NFL players began to kneel...
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