Armenian-American referee Roy Gulbeyan, born in Istanbul, is officiating his 29th WNBA season in 2026, nearly three decades after first reaching the league in 1998.
Gulbeyan reached the WNBA in 1998 after attending an officiating camp run by longtime NBA referee Hue Hollins, and he still wears No. 42 in honor of Hollins. He has officiated at least 31 WNBA games in 2026 through Aug. 11. RefMetrics had tracked 450 of his WNBA assignments from 2013 through Aug. 6; Gulbeyan then worked two more games on Aug. 9 and Aug. 11, bringing that publicly documented total to 452 games since 2013 alone. His résumé also includes the sport’s biggest stage. Gulbeyan officiated both Game 2 and the championship-deciding Game 5 of the 2024 WNBA Finals between the New York Liberty and Minnesota Lynx. Twenty-nine seasons, hundreds of games and multiple Finals assignments later, the Armenian-American official continues one of the more remarkable officiating careers in the league.
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