On Tuesday night, Aubrey Plaza, the star of the acclaimed series The White Lotus, was spotted courtside at the Barclays Center, cheering on the WNBA team, the New York Liberty, as they faced off against the Minnesota Lynx. Plaza's presence at the game was notable not only for her celebrity status but also for the stylish T-shirt she wore, which quickly gained popularity and almost sold out within hours.
Plaza sported a distinctive T-shirt from Watch Party PHL, which boldly proclaimed, “Philly is a Women’s Sports Town. Est. 2030.” This shirt was a nod to the recent announcement that Philadelphia would be getting its own WNBA team by 2030, aligning perfectly with the organization’s mission to support women’s sports. The founder of Watch Party PHL, Jen Leary, a firefighter from Philadelphia, expressed her excitement over the unexpected surge in demand for the shirt, stating, “It was the coolest thing ever.”
The T-shirt was launched just last month, coinciding with the excitement surrounding the future of women’s basketball in Philadelphia. “I hoped it would blow up,” Leary remarked on Wednesday morning, “but I’m pleasantly surprised that it blew up like this.” The shirt features a unique design with a scoop neck in graphite gray, accented with vibrant orange lettering, cleverly incorporating a basketball as a stand-in for the letter 'O' in the word “women’s.”
Leary's encounter with the Plaza sisters was serendipitous. She wore the T-shirt during a meeting with Natalie Plaza, Aubrey's sister, at Rival Bros Coffee Roasters on a Friday morning. The sisters, who hail from Wilmington and are passionate fans of women’s sports, were discussing potential investment opportunities for a space that Leary hopes to open. This future venue will serve as a café during the day and a bar at night, designed specifically for women’s sports fans.
During their meeting, Natalie mentioned that Aubrey would be attending the Liberty game on the 19th and suggested it would be great if she wore the Watch Party PHL shirt. Leary was thrilled, but there was a catch—the shirts had sold out. In a spontaneous moment, Leary decided to remove her shirt right outside the coffee roaster, despite the sweltering 100-degree heat, revealing a tank top underneath. “I told her she better wash it,” Leary recalled, laughing about the situation.
On the night of the game, Aubrey Plaza indeed donned the shirt, much to the delight of Leary and the Watch Party PHL community. Leary quickly notified the team at Go Hamm, the Philadelphia-based women’s T-shirt printing company responsible for the shirts, to prepare for a new round of production in light of Plaza's appearance. A portion of the proceeds from these shirts will directly support the funding of the Watch Party PHL meeting space.
As the Liberty-Lynx game commenced, Leary's excitement soared when one of her colleagues, who was at the game, sent her a text with a photo of Plaza cheering in the shirt. Moments later, Plaza's image appeared on the jumbotron, and the New York Liberty featured her sporting the shirt on their Instagram stories. “And it went crazy from there,” Leary exclaimed, capturing the whirlwind of attention that followed.
