Marina Mabrey of the Toronto Tempo reacts
Marina Mabrey of the Toronto Tempo reacts after scoring a three-point basket during the fourth quarter against the Washington Mystics at Coca-Cola Coliseum on May 8, 2026 in Toronto.
One WNBA season in Toronto is officially complete. And since it was a new country for most of the Tempo players, there’s a lot of adjusting for players not named Kia Nurse, who was born and raised in Hamilton, Ont.
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Coming to Toronto on its own was a huge change for international players, those who never had to worry about the nuances of Canada. And so when so many stars like Marina Mabrey and Brittney Sykes come to a whole new country, it takes some adjusting,
Mabrey, in particular, went viral for voicing her opinion about Rogers and its Internet reliability and customer service — a growing pain from moving to Canada from the United States.
But after the Toronto Tempo’s cross-Canada series, which sent the team to Vancouver and Montreal in a nationwide celebration of basketball, a lot of the players got a bigger picture of some of the major cities and learned a little something about their new home land.
“Those were some of the best environments I think we played in all season,” Kiki Rice said. ”It was super cool to just get across the country to play in different areas.
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“Obviously, I didn’t get to play in Montreal, so that was tough, but it was really cool just being in that environment. The crowd was crazy. We have the attendance record and just seeing the support that we have, and being able to like grow the W across Canada is very special. Hopefully, we’ll continue to do that over the next few years.”
Izzy Harrison, who came to the Tempo partly because of her previous WNBA experience with the New York Liberty, felt a similar desire to bring women’s basketball to a new country.
”To finally have a team represented for Canada, I’m excited to be a part of that,” she said earlier this season. “And I just feel like the fans are super excited. I’ve been getting a lot of DMs from everybody feeling their excitement about it, but I just wanted to be first.”
Mabrey spent her off day in Montreal going shopping with some teammates and the team used the few days of downtime during the Cross Canada series to explore the different neighbourhoods, go shopping and try different restaurants.
“In Vancouver, the girls went out to eat near the waterfront beach area. It was super pretty,” Rice said. “I didn’t know Canada has beaches like this. It was like giving L.A. a little bit. It feels like Santa Monica.
“Vancouver was gorgeous and then Montreal was really cool. It’s a very different culture and obviously a lot of people speak French there, so that was different. You feel like you’re in a different country. I really really enjoyed it. The food was great. Just walking around, getting to Old Town Montreal, was very cool as well.”
And since the WNBA’s future expansion plans don’t include Canada at the moment, the Tempo may have many more cross-Canada games — and a lot more exploring–in their future.