The Guru’s WNBA Report: Minnesota, Los Angeles, and Washington Are Winners on the League’s Opening Night.

 

By Mel Greenberg @womhoopsguru

An active offseason with powerhouse player movement through trades, free agent signings, and the influx of more fresh young talent riding last month’s draft gave way to perhaps the best pro women’s summer yet as just short of three decades old as the WNBA returned to active duty Friday night in a triple bill in which the veterans had the upper hand though some newbies did managed to succeed.

The  Minnesota Lynx, which narrowly missed a record fifth championship last October, were spoilers on the road in Texas beating Dallas 99-84, in the process making it a rough night for Paige Bueckers, the overall No. 1 pick in last month’s draft out of NCAA champion Connecticut, holding the Minneapolis area native to 10 points, shooting 3-10 from the field, including 0-2 from deep, with two assists, though she did grab seven boards in 30 minutes of action.

The outcome put Wings coach Chris Koclanes, one of five new coaches of the six on the sidelines Friday, on the wrong side of the scoreboard along with Atlanta’s Karl Smesko, who’s Dream lost at Washington 94-90 where the Mystics also have a new mentor in Sydney Johnson, an assistant at Chicago in 2024, who replaced Eric Thibault, the son of longtime coach and general manager Mike Thibault, who was also ousted from the front office and replaced by former Stanford great Jamila Wideman, whose father starred at Penn.

Smesko was a longtime coach in college at Florida Gulf Coast and was one of two plucked from the NCAA ranks in the offseason, the other being Utah’s Lynne Roberts, who had a winning effort Friday with Los Angeles, ruining the debut of the league’s 13th team the Golden State Valkyries, 84-67, in San Francisco’s Chase Center, the home of the NBA Warriors.

Roberts replaced Curt Miller, who quickly became the GM in Dallas.

Koclanes was once a video co-ordinator under Cindy Griffin at Saint Joseph’s.

Coaching at Golden State is Natalie Nakase, a former UCLA star who was an assistant to Las Vegas coach Becky Hammon and is the first Asian American coach in the WNBA.

There are three other newbies with teams, though Indiana’s Stephanie White ran the Connecticut Sun in recent seasons.

Chicago’s Tyler Marsh was another Hammon assistant in Las Vegas, and the other new head coach is Rachid Maziane, who is from France and coached the women’s Belgian Nationals, who are now under Mike Thibault.

Meanwhile, it was business as usual for Minnesota’s Cheryl Reeve, the former La Salle star from South Jersey who has been coaching the Lynx since 2010 and has four wnba titles and last summer’s Olympic gold medal, the record eighth straight for Team USA, attached to her resume.

On the winning side in Dallas, former UConn star and MVP candidate Napheesa Collier, who scored 34, is another former Husky, who also co-founded the Unrivaled winter league with former UConn standout Breanna Stewart of the reigning WNBA champion New York Liberty, who will raise their banner Saturday afternoon before hosting arch-rival Las Vegas in Brooklyn’s Barclays Center at 1 p.m. on ABC, ESPN+, and Disney+.

Despite the loss, Bueckers was glad to get Game One of her pro career out of the way.

“The first one’s always the hardest, usually,” she said. “Not to say that it won’t get harder, but just being able to have a starting point and continuing to build on that. And there’s no more questions about what it’s going to be like for your first WNBA game. Now you have to move on past that.”

A announced sellout crowd of 7,000 watched the game at the shared home of the campus arena at Texas-Arlington, though there are some scheduled at the home of NBA Dallas and the Wings are planning to move downtown.

Said Koclanes of Bueckers, “She’s been fantastic. She’s special in how she’s able to handle things with such grace.”

The crowd included 76ers star Tyrese Maxey. The Dallas native’s NBA team in Philly, which with Comcast, made a bid among a crowd of hopeful cities for the next WNBA expansion team following Portland and Toronto, which are coming online.

But it’s possible that a chance exists to gain the Connecticut Sun in the wake of reports on Monday the team is exploring a sale and possible relocation after a long run under the Mohegan tribe at the entertainment-casino establishment near New London in Uncasville.

“It was fun, it was competitive,” said Bueckers of her debut which followed on the trail of last season’s No. 1 pick and rookie of the year Caitlin Clark with the Indiana Fever, who follow the New York opener at 3 p.m. hosting Chicago Saturday afternoon on the same three platforms.

Saturday’s other opener has Seattle at Phoenix at 10 p.m.

As for more detail on all the night’s action, Courtney Williams backed up Collier with 25 points and nine assists, while Jessica Shepard added 15 points and eight boards for the Lynx.

Former Notre Dame standout Arike Ogunbowale, a WNBA All-Star, had 16 points for Dallas, while DiJonai Carrington, who came from Connecticut in a swap, part of a Wings roster shakeup, scored 16.

Meanwhile, third-year pro Maddy Siegriest, the third overall pick in the 2023 draft who suddenly has been able to say she has something in common with newly elected Pope Leo XIV as a graduate of Villanova, scored 11 points off the bench matching Dallas starter Myisha Hines-Allen.

Siegriest, whose option waas recently picked up by Dallas wasn’t the only one with Villanova DNA playing pro hoops Friday night besides the “Nova Knicks” on the NBA side who led New York to finish ousting the defending champion Boston Celtics in six games for their first Eastern finals in 25 years.

Former Wildcat Lucy Olsen, who finished her collegiate career filling Caitlin Clark’s roster spot at Iowa last season and went in the second round as the 23rd overall pick to Washington, played eight minutes for the Mystics and scored two points on her only attempted shot.

Brittney Sykes scored 22 points, 19 in the second half, for the winners, while rookie Sonia Citron out of Notre Dame, one of the night’s performing rookies, was also a strong second-half contributors, with 15 of her 19 points coming after the break.

Kiki Iriafen, fourth overall in last month’s draft, had 14 points for Washington, while SSug Sutton scored 13 and Jade Melbourne scored 11.

Sykes closed out the win, connecting on a driving layup with 27 seconds left in regulation, then making a steal, feeding Citron, who was fouled and made both from the lane with 17.1 seconds remaining in regulation.

Atlanta’s Allisha Gray scored 25 points while matching her personal best with six from deep, while two all-star arrivals in the offseason performed, Brittney Griner, who had spent her whole career in Phoenix, scored 11 of her 18 points under the final seven minutes, while Brionna Jones, who had been on Connecticut, scored 16 with 10 boards, and five helpers, and Rhyne Howard scored 11 with six assists.

After Olsen made the last cut, suriving the deepartures of Zaay Green, Ashten Prechtel, Khadijiah Caave and Lauren Jensen, Johnson, who previously had been a men’s head coach at Fairfield and Princeton, said, “How hard are you playing? Where’s your growth? How many minutes can you spell? You know, I don’t necessarily see her in our first group, so how good can she be off the bench? How is she learning? How is she competing?

“And honestly, it’s still really early in her career. I mean, she hasn’t played a first official game. So, there’s a lot of growth for her to undertake, and so at this point, we’re just encouraged to to see how can she do it.”

Out West, pro women’s hoops were officially back in the Bay Area, and the Valkyries delighted a sellout crowd of 18,064 staying in the game through three periods.

Golden State snapped a 17-year drought becoming the first WNBA expansion squad since 2008.

But ultimately, the night belonged to Kelsey Plum, who came to Los Angeles in the offseason and scored 37 for the Sparks, another heavy-duty performer in the second half with 26 of them.

Dearica Hamby gave the Sparks 14 points while Rickea Jackson scored 13.

Mark Kayla Thornton’s  shot as the first score in Golden State history. Former UConn star Tiffany Hayes scored 19 as the top contributor for the Valkyries, while former Harvard star Temi Fagbenle scored 15 and Julie Vanloo, who came from Washington in the expansion draft, scored 14.

Plum had come in the offseason from the Aces, where she won two titles with Las Vegas.

Following the explosive attention to Clark’s rookie season, the stats off the court to be noticed are the attendance, a bunch of teams hosting Indiana during the season are moving those games to bigger arenas, the TV ratings, and the ongoing negotiations with a new CBA.