Wright Rogers’ WNBA experience made her obvious choice for Tempo GM
It’s too early in the Tempo’s franchise-building process to establish what shape the team is going to take for their first season. But hiring a general manager is the first step, and for team president Teresa Resch, Monica Wright Rogers emerged as the obvious choice.
TORONTO — Leaving sunny Arizona for frigid Toronto in February isn’t everybody’s first choice, but for Nick U’Ren, there was no other.
U’Ren is the general manager of the Phoenix Mercury of the WNBA, taking over the role in 2023 after previously working for the Golden State Warriors, but he made the trip to Toronto out of respect for Monica Wright Rogers who was announced Thursday morning as the first general manager for the Toronto Tempo, the WNBA expansion franchise scheduled to begin play for the 2026 season.
“It was a no brainer,” said U’Ren. “When I took (the general manager job with the Mercury), Monica was in place already as the assistant general manager, and I couldn’t have done my job without her.
“She was a friend, she was a confidant, and as someone new coming into this league — she has way more experience in this league than I did — and so to have her by my side, I learned so much more from her than she did for me … so for everything Monica has done for me, I’m just so incredibly happy and proud, happy for her and proud of her, that it was just the smallest thing I could do just come and cheer her on.”
It’s too early in the Tempo’s franchise-building process to establish what shape the team is going to take under Wright Rogers’ watch. The expansion draft hasn’t happened yet, the team doesn’t have a head coach, and the league will have to negotiate a new CBA before the Tempo hit the floor at Coca-Cola Coliseum for the inaugural season in the spring of 2026.
But hiring a general manager is the first step, and for team president Teresa Resch, Wright Rogers emerged as the obvious choice.
Often teams use executive search firms to narrow down a short list for new hires, but in this case, Resch — a long-time executive with the NBA’s Toronto Raptors before leaving to take the new job with the Tempo — wanted to roll up her sleeves and dig into the process herself, and it seemed wherever she began focussing, one name continued to emerge.
“For me, it was really important that (I do the search myself),” said Resch. “Executive search firms, what they do is a great job of bringing you the top five (candidates) but then you don’t have an understanding of what that list of 20 and 25 looks like. And for me, it was really important to learn the league. So I used it as an opportunity honestly. So I talked to a ton of people that are candidates, but also just a ton of people in the women’s basketball world, and her name came up with pretty much every single person I talked to.”
Wright Rogers’ background would certainly get her on most shortlists: The 36-year-old was a two-time WNBA champion with the Minnesota Lynx after being the second-overall pick in the 2010 draft following a decorated career with the University of Virginia. Knee injuries ended her professional career after seven seasons and Wright Rogers almost immediately got into coaching, first as an assistant with Liberty University and then at Virginia for four seasons before joining the Mercury as the assistant general manager for the 2023 season.
She had only a passing acquaintance with Resch, but they had friends in common — U’Ren among them — and after a lengthy interview process, Wright Rogers jumped at the chance to have a WNBA team to build from the ground up.
“I could not be more honoured to step into this role with this team at this time,” Wright Rogers said. “Of course general manager roles are always special, but I truly believe there is no better general manager role in the league than this one.”
She was understandably short on the specifics of how the team building would begin, or what shape it would take. Her first hire will be a head coach, and she said leans towards an up-tempo style of play with a focus on defence — no surprise given Wright Rogers was the national defensive player of the year in her final year at Virginia — but for now it’s about listening and learning and building relationships.
For Resch, it’s what Wright Rogers knows about player experience, calling it her new general manager’s ‘super-power’ — the top of a long list of strengths.
“There’s a reason why they’re called general managers, right? You gotta be a little bit good at everything,” said Resch. “But for me, the thing that stood out (about Wright-Rogers) is she knows the league incredibly well as a (WNBA) player, playing internationally, and then also on the team side, and that’s a place where I am weak. So her strengths, understanding the league are very complimentary to mine.
“And then the other thing that was very evident from talking to so many people is her ability to build and maintain relationships, which is so important in this business,” Resch said. “… There are the necessary skills you have to have [as a general manager] but the values you bring to that, and why people respect you, and why people are continuing to stay in touch with you are, you know, bigger than that, so who she was as a person really brought her to the top of my list.”
