Co-owner Renee Montgomery always saw the Atlanta Dream’s potential.
The Atlanta Dream drafted Montgomery from the University of Connecticut with the fourth overall pick in 2009, according to the WNBA. She played 364 games for teams including the Connecticut Sun, Seattle Storm, Minnesota Lynx, and Atlanta Dream. The league ranks her among the WNBA’s all-time three-point shooters. She retired in 2021.
“I bought a home in Georgia nine years ago and I retired as a member of the Atlanta Dream,” Montgomery said in a news release shared by the WNBA. “I’ve always known I wanted to be here and now I feel intertwined in the Atlanta fabric and culture. Blessed to call this home. True to Atlanta.”
Investing In Atlanta Dream
Montgomery joined the team’s investment group that year led by real estate investor Larry Gottesdiener, ESPN reports. Also part of the group is Suzanne Abair, president of Northland Investment Corp., a firm Gottesdiener founded.
At the time of the investment, Sportico reports the team was purchased for between $7 million and $10 million. The team’s valuation has since soared to $280 million in 2026, according to a separate Sportico report.
Montgomery told Front Office Sports News, “It’s a tremendous investment.”
She also serves as the team’s vice president, according to her LinkedIn. As AFROTECH previously reported, she made history, becoming the first former player to become an owner and executive of a WNBA team.
Reflecting on her involvement in 2026, Montgomery explained, according to Front Office Sports News, “It’s been educational to say the least because coming from the locker room to the boardroom, there’s so many things that I had to learn, and there’s so many, not even just me, but us as a group where we all have a collective brain, like Larry, Suzanne, and I, we all wanted the same thing. And it was to take the Atlanta dream to a different level.”
She continued, “We saw the potential. We saw like the city is a character in itself. We felt like we wanted to tap in more. I talk a lot about like we wanted to be all things Atlanta because then Atlanta will love us back and understand that we’re here for them.”
The Atlanta Dream, which added Angel Reese to its roster in April, leads the WNBA Finals 2-1 against the Golden State Valkyries as of this writing. The Atlanta team just sold out the 17,000-seat State Farm Arena for Game 3, Yahoo Sports reports.
The post Former WNBA Player Renee Montgomery Invested In The Atlanta Dream When It Sold For Up To $10M, Now Its Valuation Has Soared To $280M appeared first on AfroTech.
The post Former WNBA Player Renee Montgomery Invested In The Atlanta Dream When It Sold For Up To $10M, Now Its Valuation Has Soared To $280M appeared first on AfroTech.