DALLAS — This is Zia Cooke’s first season playing Athletes Unlimited (AU) basketball, but the Toledo native is already turning heads.
Now in its third season, AU is a four-week league which features the top women’s basketball players, most of whom currently play in the WNBA like Cooke, playing in a unique format.
Players take part in three games a week and receive points for everything imaginable, including team wins. Those with the four highest point totals each week are named captains and pick their teams for the following week each Monday. It’s a format players love, especially getting new teammates almost every week.
Cooke, 23, averaged 20.7 points per game in Week 3 of the event, including a career-high 32 points. For the season, she had three 20-point games, one 30-point game and was a contender for Newcomer of the Year honors, finishing 18th with 3,642 points.
“AU’s been super cool. Been able to play with a lot of great players,” said Cooke, a Rogers High School graduate. “They change teams every week, so I’ve been on some different teams with amazing people, getting an opportunity to showcase my talent and the hard work I’ve been putting in. Then, I was able to enjoy myself and have a good time, as well.”
The first player Cooke enjoyed playing alongside was fellow Ohio native Kelsey Mitchell, who picked her in Week 1.
One unique aspect of AU, which concluded last weekend, is that each player competes for a charitable cause, an organization to which they will then donate part of their season bonus, a donation matched by AU. Cooke plays for the Boys and Girls Clubs of Columbus.
“It means a lot to me,” she said. “... I have family members that were in them and have worked with the Boys and Girls Clubs. Boys and Girls Clubs are great for kids. It’s a great way to keep them out of things they don’t need to be into. It might help a kid find themselves and they might be able to figure out a sport they’re really good at. You might meet your best friend there.
“I’m big on being able to find yourself and understand what you need to do in life. The Boys and Girls Clubs are great for that.”
AU has four teams with 10 players each. Each team also has a facilitator, or coach.
Briann January, who played 14 WNBA seasons and won a title with Indiana in 2012 before hanging up her sneakers to become an assistant coach with the Connecticut Sun, is one facilitator, and Cooke is a player she knows well.
“I can see the work she’s put in,” January said. “As a point guard, it’s learning the game, seeing the game, all those other things. She can go out there and play this game. Now, it’s seeing the game from a point guard’s perspective, setting up her team, knowing what to run, really controlling the game. I’m excited to see what she does this season.”
Following a standout collegiate career at South Carolina during which she helped lead the Gamecocks to Final Four appearances in 2021, 2022, and 2023, including a national title in 2022, Cooke was the 10th pick in the 2023 WNBA draft by Los Angeles.
As a rookie, she played 39 games for the Sparks and made four starts, averaging 4.8 points in just over 14 minutes a game, a year which was a great learning experience.
“My rookie year is behind me at this point,” Cooke said. “It wasn’t the year I wanted to have, and that’s why I worked so hard in the gym to make sure this year is a little different.
Of course, the end goal is to be playing more than last year, being more effective on the court, building my brand, and being able to be that player I know I am. Last year was definitely a rookie year for me. That rookie name is no longer under me. Now it’s time to build myself into the vet I want to be.”
The Sparks open their 2024 season May 15 against Atlanta, and Cooke knows that when she and her teammates convene for the start of training camp in several weeks, there will be some new faces. Franchise icon Nneka Ogwumike is now in Seattle, and Jordin Canada, another regular starter, is in Atlanta.
The Sparks also have a new general manager in Raegan Pebley, a former college coach at Texas Christian who has been attending AU games in Dallas.
“It’s definitely a clean slate — something that’s new for me,” Cooke said. “I’m not used to seeing so many new faces around me. A lot of the programs I’ve been in, the coaching staff has stayed, so this is something new. We’re doing a good job of bringing the right people around.”
One experience she especially remembers from her rookie campaign in the WNBA was getting to play against and interact with fellow Toledo native Natasha Howard, a Waite High School product who signed with Dallas prior to last season.
“I definitely look up to her,” Cooke said. “We got closer after my rookie season. That was good for me. I was able to talk to her about a lot of different things. She’s a big supporter. She wants to see me be great.”
Cooke is also doing her best impression of a sponge with AU, absorbing all she can from veteran teammates like Mitchell and Odyssey Sims, two WNBA regulars.
“I’ve looked up to a lot of these girls, so to have the opportunity to play with some of them has been incredible,” she said. “To be on the court with some of them, get to pick their brains, see the way they play, hear some of the things they say on the court, and then just being able to soak up some knowledge from a lot of them is a blessing.”
And for Cooke and many of her WNBA colleagues, playing AU is a great way to ensure they’re ready for the start of training camp.
“It’s perfect, because I’ve put a lot of work in my whole offseason and didn’t really get a chance to go up and down [the floor] a lot,” she said. “The competition is really good, so I don’t feel it’s a waste of time. I’m getting better and able to showcase myself. My coaches for the Sparks are able to watch me play. There are gyms provided for us. It’s the perfect way to go into training camp. I’m feeling very confident. It’s definitely prepared me.”
First Published March 26, 2024, 4:40 p.m.
