The Waves are rolling in to Jacksonville.
Northeast Florida’s professional women’s basketball team in the new Upshot League will be known as the Jacksonville Waves, with Jessica Bogia as the inaugural head coach, rolling out name, coach and logo on Oct. 1 inside VyStar Veterans Memorial Arena.
League commissioner Donna Orender said the Waves’ name and colors — deep teal, coastal blue and white — reflect Jacksonville’s ocean life as well as the city’s military tradition.
Orender called the Waves “fluid in motion, relentless in force, boundless in energy.”
The new league is scheduled to launch in May 2026 with four franchises in Jacksonville; Savannah, Ga.; Charlotte, N.C.; and Greensboro, N.C. The Savannah franchise announced its name, the Savannah Steel, and its head coach, Coretta Brown, on Sept. 30. The two North Carolina teams are expected to do the same on Oct. 9 and 10.
The Waves will play a 34-game schedule from May to August 2026, with 17 home dates at VyStar Veterans Memorial Arena.
Zawyer Sports and Entertainment chief executive officer Andy Kaufmann, who also operates the Jacksonville Icemen in ECHL hockey, said he expects the new club could draw “more and higher attendance figures than several WNBA teams.”
Kaufmann also said the league targets further expansion to eight teams by 2027.
Jessica Bogia: Inaugural head coach
“Fast, fierce and focused.”
That’s the planned hoops style for Bogia, who previously worked at Jacksonville University for two years in a stint alongside Darnell Haney.
“Just being in the same room with her, you feel it,” Kaufmann said. “Sometimes there’s that ‘it’ factor. I would say that Coach Jess has the ‘it,’ and we’re pretty excited about her bringing that to Jacksonville.”
Bogia has also held assistant coaching posts at Eastern Illinois, Memphis and most recently Hofstra.
“My first call with Taj [McWilliams-Franklin, Upshot League vice president of basketball operations], she just brought a power and excitement and energy that just radiated,” Bogia said. “And when I came down here and met Donna, who is a pioneer in this, I knew they were doing something special. To be a part of that was a tremendous opportunity I could not turn down.”
The process now begins for assembling a staff and scouting for the 11-player roster. In addition to players directly from the NCAA ranks, Kaufmann said the Waves could also add talent from the overseas ranks as well as those squeezed out by the WNBA numbers game.
“We’re going to see some first-round draft picks in next year’s WNBA Draft actually playing here in Jacksonville,” Kaufmann said. “There’s just not enough roster spots [in the WNBA] right now. It’ll be a nice mix.”
This article originally appeared on Florida Times-Union: Jacksonville Waves, new women’s basketball squad, introduce first head coach
Reporting by Clayton Freeman, Jacksonville Florida Times-Union / Florida Times-Union
USA TODAY Network via Reuters Connect
