Brittney Griner and wife Cherelle expecting first child
By Susannah Cullinane, CNN
(CNN) — WNBA star Brittney Griner and her wife, Cherelle, are expecting their first child, the couple announced in an Instagram post on Saturday.
“Can’t believe we’re less than three months away from meeting our favorite human being,” they captioned a picture of them holding hands over an ultrasound of the child, adding the hashtags, “#BabyGrinerComingSoon” and “#July2024.”
Griner, 33, re-signed with the Phoenix Mercury ahead of the 2024 WNBA season earlier this month.
In 2022, she spent nearly 300 days in custody in Russia after being wrongfully detained.
The two-time Olympic gold-medalist – who had played in the off-season for a Russian women’s basketball team for years – was arrested at a Moscow airport in February that year after authorities found cannabis oil in her luggage.
Despite her testimony that she had inadvertently packed the cannabis oil, she was sentenced to nine years in prison for drug smuggling.
The US State Department deemed Griner had been wrongfully detained and after negotiations, she was released in December 2022 in a prisoner swap that involved Russian arms dealer Viktor Bout.
Her detainment spotlighted the salary caps WNBA players face in the United States – which has pushed athletes to go overseas to earn more during their off-seasons.
In 2023, Griner averaged 17.5 points, 6.3 rebounds and 2.2 assists, while ranking second in the league in field goal percentage (56.0%) and third in blocks (1.6). She is third on the WNBA’s all-time blocks list.
Griner, who will enter her 11th season this year, is a nine-time WNBA All-Star, winning a WNBA title in 2014.
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