Teresa Resch knows tech can give the Toronto Tempo a competitive advantage

Toronto is buzzing with anticipation of the inaugural tip-off sure to bring everyone in the city together. Are we talking about Toronto Tech Week, or the debut of Canada’s first WNBA team in 2026? For Toronto Tempo president Teresa Resch, it’s both. 

Next week, Resch will be among the headliners at Homecoming, the sold-out official mainstage of Toronto Tech Week 2025. Held in the Evergreen Brick Works, Homecoming is just one of over 300 partner-run events taking place during Toronto Tech Week from June 23-27 (read our guide for the full details).

While the connection between tech startups and a basketball team may not be immediately obvious, Resch told BetaKit ahead of the event that the Toronto Tempo “is a startup in every way.”

As the official media partner of Toronto Tech Week, BetaKit sat down with Resch ahead of Homecoming to learn more about how the Tempo will use tech, her thoughts on leadership, and how many games the Tempo will win in its inaugural season. 

The following interview has been edited for length and clarity. 

You’re speaking at Homecoming alongside these fast-growing Canadian startups, and you’re responsible for scaling Canada’s first WNBA team. Are there other parallels between tech startups and launching the Tempo? 

Absolutely! That’s why we want to be part of it. Toronto Tempo is a startup in every way. You talk about founding teams, brand identity, funding—all those things that a startup is experiencing, we’re experiencing right now. So there are a lot of parallels. 

The tech world, especially startups, is always so good at identifying solutions for problems, and that’s literally what we’re doing every day. So it’s great if they can solve some of our problems as well.

If you take it at a higher level, women have been playing sport for just as long as men, but there hasn’t been any attention, or innovation, or fan insights, at the same level. The low-hanging fruit is women’s health, first and foremost, and thinking about performance. Or how fans of women’s sports are different from fans of men’s sports. And to focus and innovate around some of those pillars, the advancement is going to be really, really compounding, because it hasn’t been looked at. It hasn’t been invested in before.

So there’s just a ton of open space there to solve. If tech can help us in those spaces—which is what technology has done in every single industry—and unlock some of that information and help us get better, everybody’s gonna benefit.

You were previously VP of basketball operations for the Toronto Raptors, a tech and analytics-forward team. How are the Tempo going to use tech? 

We’re building a foundation right now. So when you talk technology, we are a startup right now: we’re starting at ground zero. It’s literally, ‘What is our operating system?’ 

We ended up going with Microsoft Dynamics, and then on top of that you have to build your CRM, and then on top of that you have to build your ERP. The league has invested in some different technology, like [Canadian fan engagement platform] StellarAlgo, that we all have access to and will be using to understand our fans.

“It’s using player tracking data, shot tracking data, to find ways to reveal either opportunities or shortcomings where we can find a competitive advantage.”

Teresa Resch

The WNBA has invested in player tracking cameras, so those are being installed in every single arena this year. We’ll have access to all that data, and it’ll be up to us to figure out how we’re going to use and optimize all that data. 

If you look back at the NBA, the Raptors were ahead of the game. In 2011 or 2012, they invested in those cameras, and that was something that they did on their own. But in the WNBA, the cameras have been installed by the league. Now it’s basically, ‘How are you going to make sure that you’re using that data?’ So we will 100 percent have part of our resources dedicated to optimizing that data that we have access to, and understanding the different tools out there.

The other place where there’s huge opportunity is research and data collection around women’s health and performance. Women’s bodies are so different than men’s and there haven’t been large studies done to understand what participation in sport does to women physically. 

There’s a huge conversation around menstrual cycles, training, ACL tears—these are all just anecdotal. There’s not research, there’s not data to actually support any of these hypotheses. 

This needs a much bigger data set than just one team. But then that information is going to inform us on how we can keep these athletes injury-free, but also optimize their performance. 

Is it fair to say that, right now, you are as focused on building the Tempo fan base as the product on the court? 

Right now, we don’t even have any players, so it’s almost all on brand building. It’s about getting in the marketplace, telling the Tempo story, planting the flag for who we are, what we stand for, and what you can expect from the Tempo going forward. 

Ultimately, we’ll be building a team, but that won’t happen until the winter, so we still have months before that to build our brand, gain traction, grow fandom, and also find out about those fans.

Can a good tech CEO run a sports team, or vice versa?

There’s obviously overlap. You talk about intangibles, some of the things that need no technical skill, like being good people leaders, having good EQ—there’s some things that are just so universal, and it’s just a matter of understanding how to be a good leader in a space. 

It’s also just like a matter of what that team or business organization needs, right? There’s some moments where a sports team, on paper, looks great. You’ve got all the technical skills, you just need someone who can motivate them, or speak to them in the right way. Other times, the teams are a mess and you need better pieces. You need someone to evaluate the talent and get the pieces right. You probably can’t bring in someone who’s never watched a game of basketball in their life and be able to do that. 

I’m a generalist, I think that’s what’s made me valuable: having experiences and background in a lot of different spaces that can then inform you. I think there are a lot of leadership qualities that transcend any sort of technical skill. I think that those leadership qualities are revealed no matter what industry you’re in.

How many games are the Tempo going to win in their inaugural season?

Gosh, we don’t have a player! We don’t even have a coach!  We’re not going down that path. 

I’ll tell you what I can say: we won’t lose more than 44 [games] because that’s all there is in the season, and we’re not going to win 44 because there’s never been an undefeated team. 

We’re just excited that there’s so much momentum behind this team, even though we don’t have any players yet. There’s incredible support within this marketplace, not only Toronto, but all of Canada. As Canada’s team, we really look forward to representing this entire country.

A tech CEO would absolutely have said 44 wins. So, no win projections, but what is your immediate goal?

We have a lot of people who have placed $100 deposits to be season seat holders. Now that we have the technology right, we’re really excited to start having conversations with those depositors and actually turning them into season seat holders. That has probably been the most asked question that I get: ‘When are you selling tickets?’ and we are! You can place your deposit and we’re going to be converting those into season seat holders.

The other question I get most is, ‘Who’s going to be your coach?’ That’s going to wait a little while. We are not going to hire a coach until probably after this WNBA season is done. That will be further down the road, a little closer to when we actually have players. 

Super immediate, we launched our Together We Win platform, which we’re very proud of and and very excited that we have this inclusion platform that’s not just for Pride Month or National Indigenous Heritage Month. It’s something that we’re going to stand by and be part of who we are going forward. 

It’s a pledge that we encourage everyone to sign, and there’s actually a donation connected to it for this month. Going forward, it’ll be part of our game presentation before every game. I’m just looking forward to welcoming and building that community, too. 

There’s a lot of pent-up desire for a WNBA team in Toronto. I think you’re gonna find a really strong audience at Toronto Tech Week.

It’s been a really well-received and very enthusiastic response. I knew it was going to be good, but it outweighed even my expectations. Very excited. I can’t wait. I look forward to being swamped by tech people. 

BetaKit is the official media partner of Toronto Tech Week. Feature image courtesy the Toronto Tempo.