(CBS DETROIT) — Detroit Pistons owner Tom Gores is looking to bring a WNBA franchise back to the Motor City. Gores submitted a formal bid on behalf of an expansive ownership group on Thursday.

An investment group, led by Detroit Pistons owner Tom Gores and including Detroit Lions principal owner Sheila Hamp and General Motors CEO Mary Barra, submitted a formal expansion bid on Thursday for a WNBA franchise.

As cities across the country vie for the next Women’s National Basketball Association team, the league quietly filed a trademark application this week for the name “Detroit Shock.”

The owner of the Detroit Pistons is leading a supergroup of investors in an effort to bring a WNBA franchise back to Detroit.

The team trying to bring the WNBA back to Detroit includes Goff and his wife, Christen, Webber, former Pistons great Grant Hill and his wife, Tamia, Lions principal owner Sheila Hamp and husband, Steve, General Motors CEO Mary Barra and her husband, Tony, and many others.

As the Detroit Shock's market shrinked as the 2010's dwindled, the team was sold and relocated to Tulsa for the 2010 season. According to a report from the Grand Rapids Press, the team lost $2 million their last season in the Motor City. The Tom Wilson group cited sagging interest and shrinking population in the Detroit metropolitan area.

Detroit Pistons owner Tom Gores submitted a bid for the city to receive a WNBA franchise, sources told Yahoo Sports. The Detroit Shock were a big part of early WNBA history, winning championships in 2003,

It would revive the legacy of the Detroit Shock, which won three championships as one of the league's first expansion franchises from 1998-2009.