Paige Bueckers charmed in her newbie WNBA period, gaining AP Novice of the Year with amazing efficiencies for the Dallas Wings.
ARLINGTON, Texas– Paige Bueckers went into the WNBA with the problem of assumptions that commonly squash young gamers.
Selected No. 1 total in the 2025 draft, the Dallas Wings guard not just bore the hopes of restoring the Wings franchise business yet likewise developed herself as one of one of the most impressive newbies the organization has actually ever before seen.
Her last efficiency of the year on Thursday was the excellent capstone. In a 97– 76 triumph over the Phoenix metro Mercury, Bueckers placed on a masterclass: 24 factors, 8 rebounds, 7 helps, 2 blocks, one take, and 2 three-pointers in half an hour. It was a suitable verdict to a period that mixed racking up sparkle, playmaking vision, and protective grit.
What made Bueckers’ launching project so amazing had not been simply the numbers; it was the uniformity. Unlike lots of newbies that blink in minutes, she supplied evening after evening, racking up in dual numbers in virtually every video game. The emphasize was available in August, when she emerged for 44 factors versus the Los Angeles Triggers, damaging the WNBA document for the highest-scoring single-game by a novice– formerly held by Candace Parker.
Throughout the year, she balanced 19.2 factors, 5.4 helps, 3.9 rebounds, and 1.6 swipes while leading all newbies in effectiveness and mins played. And she did it on a group that ended up 10– 34, connected for the organization’s worst document. Opposite defenses game-planned to quit her, yet Bueckers maintained searching for means to rack up, produce plays, and lead.
On Friday, Bueckers was elected Associated Press (AP) Novice of the Year. She was likewise an AP All-WNBA Junior varsity option and a consentaneous option to the AP All-Rookie Group.
Her newbie return to does not simply radiate by itself– it piles up with tales. She went beyond Las Las vega Aces A’ja Wilson’s newbie racking up mark (682) and covered Sue Bird’s newbie aid overall (191 in 2002). For context, Bird took place to come to be the WNBA’s all-time helps leader with 3,234.
Bueckers is currently charting that course, revealing command of a crime at the highest degree from the first day.
The contrasts to UConn greats were unpreventable the minute she proclaimed for the draft, yet couple of anticipated her to surpass standards this promptly. Like Candace Parker prior to her, she showed a novice might lug the lots as the very best gamer on the flooring, just this time around, it was a guard raising a battling franchise business.
The larger tale isn’t simply her racking up, helps, or protective visibility. It’s the grace, effectiveness, and management that mean something better. Paige Bueckers isn’t just a novice celebrity– she’s the sort of fundamental gamer franchise business are constructed around.
Year one was just the starting.
