We love watching our favorite athletes play and with an exciting WNBA season coming back later this year, we've all been introduced to Unrivaled League, a 3X3 format. In today's issue, we sat down with Washington Mystics' Shakira Austin who also plays on the Lunar Owls BC! We took some time to talk about her love of the game, what it's like playing for the Mystics and also playing on Unrivaled. We also talked about how she has been recovering from her surgery and her goals as she is back to playing on the court!
As part of TYLENOL® Greatness Hurts campaign, the brand has partnered with the Women's Sports Foundation®’s ‘Athlete Recovery and Care Commitment Grant.’ THis provides much needed support and 10 elite women athletes were awarded this.The aim to help women athletes overcome pain and recover from setbacks to their career caused by injury, ultimately helping them achieve their career goals.
The grant continues the long-standing commitment to demonstrate Care Without Limits, not only providing support for the physical pain but also the mental and financial hardships women athletes face in the hopes of positively impacting the outcome of their journeys.
ATHLEISURE MAG: When did you first fall in love with basketball?
SHAKIRA AUSTIN: I would say probably around 9th grade, I started, when I was about 13/14. My dad actually tried to put me in when I was like 7 and he said, I did not like it! You know, I come from a basketball family. My uncle had played, my dad kind of caught him, so he didn't force it on me. But, you know, I eventually made my way back around 8th grade and by 9th grade, I was like, yeah, this is it.
AM: And that’s also when you were like, if I can, I'm definitely gonna go pro!
SA: Oh yeah! By 9th grade, my dad was convinced that I would be the #1 draft pick.
AM: Wow, that's amazing! You've been playing for the Washington Mystics since you were drafted in 2022. What does it mean to you to play with this team?
SA: It's amazing. The opportunity to be back to, you know, your hometown team. It’s definitely a once in a lifetime the opportunity, so I'm grateful! It hasn't gone the way I would like it to go. But, you know, I know my future is going to be a lot better. So I'm excited to see, you know, what happens.
AM: I know you've been recovering from an injury from last season. What takes place as an athlete, when you know that you're injured? Do you still work out on some level? How do you realize what you're going to do in terms of not playing for the rest of the season, but getting yourself prepared to play again?
SA: You know, it's been my first big injury. I've never had surgery, never really sat out more than a few days, so it's been a new adjustment of when you're not supposed to do anything, when you're supposed to, you know, sit and rest and when you're able to kind of crank it back up. So for me it was all about the timing of which part of my rehab process, I was in. When I first had my surgery it was shut down for 2 months at least.
It wasn't until month 3 that I was actually able to slowly start building up and that went into the season. I entered my month 4 right when training camp started. So it was like, I had to balance rehab while also trying to get prepared for the season and get prepared for games. I had a new role with the team, so it's been a long journey of trying to understand my body and figure out okay, when should you know to work out more or should you allow yourself to recover. So that's pretty much been the process.
AM: How has Tylenol assisted in that recovery process for you?
SA: Yeah, I mean, it’s allowing me to have a grant like this. It's going to just open the door for, you know, everything that I've been wanting for my future, for my career. It's an amazing opportunity for me to continue to kind of just vibe more into my rehab process. Just to kind of figure out how to get back to where I want to be, you know, being injured for the first time, I've had to figure out how to be a professional honestly.
AM: Yeah.
SA: Before, I would just wake up, not practice.
AM: Yeah.
SA: I was just feeling great. So that's no longer my life. So, having opportunities with Tylenol, and with Women’s Sport Foundation, this grant it's just been able to open up new doors like I said and to figure out what, what more can I help myself with my body, with my mental, and things like that. Just make me better overall.
AM: What are 3 workouts that you've been doing in terms of your recovery that our readers can know about? Maybe if they have the same type of issue that can help them as well.
SA: So you know, having a hip labrum tear, it's a really big surgery. It's a lot to recover from and for me, it's just been about really being in the weight room and building those small muscles that you might ignore, you might, you know, neglect in a sense. So now I'm just able to build my hip flexor strength, focus on my glutes, and figuring out, let's see how everything is just really connected. For me, it's really just been about staying in the weight room. Understanding how to warm up properly. My hip takes a lot to warm up right now. So, just being intentional and figuring out how to prepare, but also just recover it, the best that I can.
AM: So obviously the WNBA season, starts back up in May of this year, but in looking at your IG, you're on the Unrivaled League, which just started on Jan 17th of this year which is amazing. Tell us about the league because I know our readers are excited and you're also playing for the Lunar Owls BC. So we'd love to hear more about that.
SA: It's a whole new style game that you know, no one has seen before. It's 3 on 3 full court, it's super fast - 1-on-1. It's just been fun you know to be in this inaugural season and be a part of something new for just women's basketball but also just women's sports in general you know? This arrival, it just offers a new opportunity for us specifically women's basketball players. We typically have to play year round. We have to go overseas and go straight into our WNBA season. So, you know, this is a great opportunity for the best players to come in. We have free agency starting. It's kind of neat because we're kind of recruiting in the same time.
AM: Yeah.
SA: It's been a super dope process so far, and I'm just really happy that this is kind of the next step for me. Coming off of my injury.
AM: It runs for 9 weeks and I guess that takes you almost into training camp before you go back to the league?
SA: So yeah, we will have a little bit of a break. So, that's the cool thing about this gig. It's like eight weeks or about two months. We'll still have a gap period before the next season.
AM: Oh, nice.
SA: So it's really unheard of! Normally depending on where you go, you play year round. It’s amazing for us to be in Miami, it’s warm.
AM: That's good too. We’re in New York and it's so cold.
SA: When I left to come here it was freezing so I’m glad to be here.
AM: What are you looking forward to in terms of once the WNBA season comes back again and you're playing with the Mystics?
SA: Well for me, it’s about playing to my full potential. I've been taken away from the game with my injuries. I haven't been able to showcase honestly, the type of style that I'm wanna play. So, I've been focusing on getting my health and really just going out and showcasing what I can do.
We wanted to know more about the purpose of the Women's Sports Foundation as well as their initiatives for the range of athletes that they work with! We were able to find out about this as well as the history of this organization via Danette Laighton who is the CEO of this advocacy group.
ATHLEISURE MAG: After the pleasure to speak with Shakira, we got to hear a bit about Women's Sports Foundation. We felt that it would be great to find out more and it's so incredibly amazing. Can you tell us a little bit about who you are, your background prior to coming to WSF and of course, we'll be digging into the foundation itself.
DANETTE LEIGHTON: It's lovely to be here. So thank you for having me. So I feel very fortunate that I have had a long career in the sports industry as you have probably seen!
My experience has been that you know I have worked with athletes, teams, and leagues my whole career. I have been very much so exposed to recognizing the resilience of remarkable athletes both on the men's and women's side, but I really spent a significant amount of time on the women’s side. So, part of the very beginning of the WNBA, with one of the original franchises was the Sacramento Monarchs running the business side, where I spent almost a decade there. You know, I was able to really understand and see the ins and outs of what it takes. Not just to run a franchise for a business perspective but also what the athletes go through.
AM: Of course.
DL: It’s about really spending a lot of quality time with our athletes and the challenge. We have always known at WSF that one of the greatest gifts you learn from sports is resilience.
AM: Sure.
DL: I think nothing is more true to that than when you watch athletes perform at the highest level and they go through challenges which is also another reason why we are excited to partner with Tylenol in this program. That was one of my experiences.
I spent a significant amount of time in Collegiate Athletics as a CMO for the Pac-12 Conference that used to represent universities, like USC, UCLA, Stanford, Cal obviously lots of changes in the collegiate landscape which is also another area of focus in our advocacy work that we prioritize in the WSF, we really have cared and worked on the entire women's sports ecosystem. Since we are founded by Billie Jean in 1974. So we're 51 years old this year so my experience is in Collegiate Athletics, Professional sports, and I've spent time on University campuses. Very early on, I ran the Women's Basketball Final Four which is really fun and exciting for me to see the trajectory and the momentum in that sport. Obviously, it's been a lot of my career in women’s basketball and then I've spent time on the brand side working, very closely with brands and why they invest in sports and sports properties. And I had a chance to do that during my time at Sony and particularly in the area of golf – PGA golf. So, I feel very fortunate. I clearly have a passion for sport.
AM: Clearly.
DL: And I've had a great career and this was three years ago, I took the opportunity to take over this position as CEO of the WSF because even though I never was an elite athlete myself, I know what my youth sport, participation taught me, and I don't think I ever would have been a C-Suite leader without it and the principles that come with sport and this is just another example of why it's so important to invest in girls and women playing sports.
AM: It’s an incredible career and how it has led you to this point!
What is the WSF and how do they work with athletes?
DL: Sure. So the WSF, like I said was founded 51 years ago by Billie Jean King. We like to say we're not sure Billie Jean ever slept. Because when she founded us, she was also beginning to create the Women's Tennis Association, equal pay at the US Open - she just was doing so many monumental things that now today for many of us, none of us would have the careers that we have without the work that Billie did very early on. But the WSF is primarily an advocacy research organization. We really were one of the first champions and leaders of the entire women's sports ecosystem. But we’ve really been able to make the connection through data and research and our advocacy work and community programming, which is an example like this grant program, we do with Tylenol to prove the important and vital role that sports plays for girls and women - from a societal perspective, cultural perspective, and economic impact perspective. So we've seen this for decades, I feel very fortunate to take over the reigns three years ago, but really we like to say sports is not a nice to have for girls women, it's a must-have.
AM: Absolutely.
DL: Because you know when girls play sports they lead and we all win and that’s really what the WSF is all about.
AM: As a CEO, what is your role? What are some of your day-to-day or month-to-month focuses that you have?
DL: Well, as any CEO of a not-for-profit, most of my time is to make sure that we can be funded to do our great work. We have been as part of our DNA, we don't do anything without research and data. So, one thing I've always really appreciated about this organization is it's always led by research. So we have hundreds and hundreds of research projects that have proven through the years of different areas of why sports matter, why they matter from an economic perspective, why they're matter from a leadership perspective, why they matter from a health and well-being perspective for girls and women where that aren't access points for girls and women, so overseeing obviously our organization and all of our core areas, so our advocacy team can do their advocacy work. Our research team can do the research as necessary, to prove the model and then all of our great community programming that we do, which are essentially outputs of that research and data, which an example is obviously this great program we have with Tylenol.
So we've been doing that for decades and as it relates to Elite athletes, I mean obviously being founded by one of the probably most iconic female athletes of our day, we do a lot with elite athletes even from the very beginning. One of the most important things for Billie was to make sure that Elite athletes serve on our board. So we had Elite female athletes since the day of our existence serving as part of our Board of Trustees, which is why I'm the CEO and we always have an Elite athlete president which currently is a Paralympian athlete named Scout Bassett. And we always have that as a part of our DNA and part of our structure, really important to give women at a very early parts, of their careers opportunities to have board service, which we know is parallel to society.
At the same time, we've worked for many, many years with different programs, like our Travel and Training Grant, which really helped women athletes and Elite athletes, prepare for elite competition, and have some of the funding that's needed and not a lot of people understand that we're very thrilled about the momentum in women's sports.
AM: Right.
DL: But it's been decades in the making and this is not a coincidence because our job has always been to protect Title IX and we recognize and all of us know that none of this would be happening if it wasn't for that piece of legislation and now you're seeing 5 decades of women that have had the ability to play sport. And that didn't start until Gen X.
AM: You've been speaking about the core initiatives, can you dig a little bit more and tell us about the advocacy, the research and the community programming?
DL: So, you know, one of the primary roles that we play in advocacy is obviously the protection of Title IX and the importance of that legislation, and an example of that will be a program that we co-founded 39 years ago, that's called National Girls and Women's Sports Day. It's now an iconic day for everybody that supports and celebrates girls participating in sports and women. You see it kind of across the country. We spend time in Washington DC putting together a community programming event in a clinic, with young girls, to expose them to different sports, we spend time actually working on key issues. This year, we'll be spending a lot of time in the Collegiate Athletics space talking about the changing landscape there to make sure that we can sustain, have the opportunities for both men and women to continue to have great sport opportunities and go to college in our current system. And so programs like NGWSD, in addition, to spending time meeting with different policy makers and legislators and talking about the importance of why sports should be not seen as a nice to have and protecting legislation like Title IX are some of the advocacy work that we do, but we really focus in on where we see challenges and barriers, which is really what our research does.
Our research will point out different types of areas of need. So one of the biggest focus we play on is the access point for girls to play sports. So some stats that people don't recognize even in 2025, is that the high school girl participation number is exactly where the boys were in 1972 sitting here in 2025.
AM: Oh wow.
DL: You don't realize we still have a long way to go, which is why we care about the whole ecosystem, which is from the access point for young girls and women through the high school and Collegiate side, all the way to the Elite competition and recognizing some of the barriers that our Elite athletes have had especially in the one that we're so proud of to partner with Tylenol because of the importance of recognizing what happens when you get hurt and what they need to do to get back to their greatness and it is a hard journey, and for a partner like Tylenol to understand that this type of program would be a necessity and I'm sure you heard this from Shakira, it is one of those things that a lot of people don't realize is very different from women, because they have had, less opportunities have had less investment, and so, this is an area to help them get back on their feet, literally and figuratively, and make sure that they can continue on their Elite sport journey.
AM: Exactly.
Can you talk a little bit more about the program? I mean, she talked about it briefly. How did this come into being and why is this important as we know that you gave it to 10 athletes.
DL: You know, I think this is one of those great examples of finding a partner like Tylenol and collaborating on alignment of issues that we recognize and that we both carry deeply about. I think that's where this all started. I think there's a lot of parallels to what happened in sports and for women, to the greater kind of gender and women in society.
This is one of those areas. We know it's incredibly important to go through hard times. We know what resilience teaches you. But when you're an Elite athlete trying to compete, sometimes you run into real barriers that you don't have the funding mechanisms or the support that you need to get yourself back up and to be able to continue that journey to try to really get to the highest level you possibly can in your sport. And what I love about this program is the diversity of sports and athletes it represents. It gives a really great example of how many different sports opportunities are out there for girls and women, and the different sports that were obviously, and the athletes that were going on their different journeys. And I think that is a really great example of just what sports has been for so long for both men and women. It's a broad-based nature of the opportunities that you can find your passion and you have lots of sport opportunities and as long as there's that access point for girls and women, to be able to start to play and then through their journey, they have programs like this with Tylenol, it's really been a game changer and a first of its kind and we're thrilled to partner with Tylenol. We're really looking forward to continue this program into the future. It's the first of its kind for us.
AM: For those, that they may not be athletes, whether it’s Elite, semi-pro, or recreational how can we support WSF, whether it's an individual or even like a brand like Athleisure Mag? We've actually wanted to reach out to the organization for years because I think it's really cool. I was a cheerleader and I know some debate on whether that’s an athlete and did it through a couple of seasons for MLS NY/NJ Metro Stars which became NY Red Bull. I was in a tennis rec league with a company that I worked for and we even did charity runs so training, competing, and using those skills is always something that I have believed in. So how can people support?
DL: Well, you know, I like to say cheerleading is a sport too. I know what cheerleaders did so I would not count yourself out as an athlete!
I think you know for us obviously, we want everybody to support girls and women in their communities in whichever way they can. You can do it from the most basic fundamental level of supporting and coaching a youth sport. It's really important for girls to see women coaching girls. Some of our other research we recognize this as a critical component. If you can see her, you can be her! Understanding the nuances of coaching girls to boys and there's differences encouraging your daughters and your sons to play sports and realizing the power of it. Supporting a local high school, supporting your local professional team, buying a jersey of your favorite professional women’s sports team. It's really, really simple to support women's sports. Everybody can invest it in their own way and also gain the benefits of recognizing the power of it. But like many of us, I was never an Elite athlete. What I think is really important for everybody to understand is that when girls play as long as possible - the biggest barrier that happens with girls is they quit in Middle School for all the reasons that you can imagine.
We need to continue to push them to play as long as possible, it doesn't matter what level they play at because when they do, it impacts them from a physical health, and well-being, and mental health, and well-being. It's a very preventative, way where their life will continue in a great journey as adults, but it also drives them to be the next leader. And I think that's one of the things that we see is so powerful and one of our latest research reports that we did last year, which is called Play to Lead – 71% of women cross-generationally from their 20s, 30s 40s, 60s, 70s - all of had a position of manager or hirer. All recognize what is applicable and the intangibles that they learn when they play sports. It’s discipline. It's competitiveness. It's resilience, it’s all these things and those are not what you get taught in school. What makes you a powerful leader and no matter what profession you choose. That's why we like to say women's sports is not a nice to have for girls. So for us you can support us in many ways. Obviously we're always looking to have people who want to have the treasure or the time to support us. We're looking for as many people as possible to support us in our fundraising efforts, but really also to engage and amplify our work. That's important to us. I always like to share with everybody who may not have the means to support a not-for-profit, yet amplify, our work talk about us, share, why this is so important. Engage your community and be one of those role models that other girls can follow because we have a lot of challenges for young women still not having the access that they need to play sports.
AM: What is the Annual Salute?
DL: So our Annual Salute is our largest fundraiser, but it has been one of these and very early on where it’s one of the places that we support and celebrate the women’s sports community and Elite athletes from every single sport imaginable. One thing I love about the WSF, which is similar to the recipients of the Tylenol Grant is we showcase every sport, every type of from Paralympians to Olympic, to Elite athletes in Track and Field to professional athletes in the WNBA and NWSL you name it, we support it. But we talk about it and we celebrate them. And we showcase what's so important about sports for girls and women. At the end of the day, you may never ever get to that Elite level and we know it's incredibly hard, it’s a less than 1% that these types of athletes ever get to that level but 99% of us are all athletes if we have the ability to play throughout our youth, middle school, high school and those lessons will give us the greatest gift throughout the rest of our life. And I know it's done it for myself, and I wouldn't be sitting talking to you today if it didn’t.
AM: Is there anything that you would like us to keep an eye out for that WSF is doing or any initiatives?
DL: What I think is just helping people understand who we are and what we've done. We like to say we've been around a long time. We’re very proud of that being a not-for-profit that's 51 years old and have had the success that we've had. But like any not-for-profit, we all know it's really, really important for people to not just support us financially, but support our work again, by amplifying and promoting us and just being able to share our stories and what we're doing and to find a way that they can do it in their own Community. We're a national organization. We have many programs, you know, just like National Girls and Women's Sports Day, you'll see us all throughout the year across the country doing different clinics.
We have incredible Grant programs like you're learning about with Tylenol and I think it's just one of those things that we want to continue to make sure that girls are invested in and that people understand the power of sport and how transformative it is for women throughout their whole lives. And we want people to invest in girls and women and make sure they have the access to both sports.
PHOTOGRAPHY CREDITS | PG 62 - 74 Unrivaled | PG 76 Tylenol
