The Dallas Wings have won the WNBA draft lottery for the second consecutive season.
The Wings, who drafted former University of Connecticut guard Paige Bueckers at No. 1 last year, had a league-best 42% chance to secure the top pick again in Sunday night’s drawing in Los Angeles.
Bueckers — selected in April not long after leading the Huskies to their record-extending 12th NCAA Division I women’s basketball championship — delivered in her first pro season, becoming the fourth straight No. 1 pick to be voted WNBA rookie of the year. However, Dallas went 10-34 and missed the playoffs for the second straight season, so a top pick should prove useful.
“This is a integral piece, a core piece,” Wings general manager Curt Miller said. “In recent draft classes, you see what consecutive number ones can do.”
Unless the Wings trade their No. 1 pick, they will be the third franchise in the past decade to go first in consecutive drafts, joining the Seattle Storm (2015-16), the Las Vegas Aces (2018-19) and the Indiana Fever (2023-24). The Storm won WNBA championships in 2018 and 2020; the Aces won their third league title in a four-year stretch last month; and the Fever have made back-to-back playoff appearances — including a run to the best-of-five semifinals this year, where they lost to the Aces in overtime in Game 5 — to end a seven-year drought.
The New York Liberty held the No. 1 pick in 2020 and again in 2021, but they traded it the second year. The Liberty made back-to-back appearance in the WNBA Finals in 2023 and 2024, with the second trip netting the franchise’s first title.
Earlier this month, the Wings hired Jose Fernandez, who spent the past 25 years leading the University of South Florida women’s basketball program, as their next head coach.
“Exciting times with our young core and new facilities and new coach,” Miller said. “Great moment.”
The Minnesota Lynx, who had the best record in the 2025 regular season and reached the WNBA Finals in 2024, will pick second. The Lynx possessed the Chicago Sky’s first-round pick after a previous trade. The Storm, the Washington Mystics and the Sky rounded out the lottery picks.
This marked the fifth time in the history of the lottery (and first time since 2018) that the results matched the order of chances held by the teams.
The WNBA is currently negotiating with the players’ union for a new collective bargaining agreement. The two sides agreed to extend an Oct. 31 deadline to Nov. 30. Assuming a new CBA can be negotiated, the draft is normally held in April.
While there’s no clear No. 1 pick in the draft like Bueckers last season, there are a host of draft-eligible players in college including UCLA’s Lauren Betts, UConn’s Azzi Fudd, LSU’s Flau’jae Johnson and TCU’s Olivia Miles. There’s also Spanish player Awa Fam.
“The great thing about this draft is there’s a lot of optionality coming out,” Miller said.
Miller said he had more nerves about the lottery this year than last year. He also said he has fielded more calls before the lottery results were announced from other teams interested in potentially trading with Dallas than last year.
The Wings sent forward Maddy Siegrist to the lottery for the second year in a row. She recently got married and met Pope Leo XIV before heading to Los Angeles to represent Dallas.
The WNBA is expanding to 15 teams next year — the 30th season in league history — with the addition of the Portland Fire and the Toronto Tempo. Those teams will pick sixth and seventh in the first-year player draft, with a coin determining the order.
Details of the expansion draft for those two new franchises haven’t been announced yet, but the expansion draft for the Golden State Valkyries, who debuted this year, was held in December 2024.