NEW YORK — UConn star and newly minted NCAA champion Paige Bueckers was selected No. 1 by the Dallas Wings in the 2025 WNBA draft Monday night.
Bueckers, a three-time first-team All-American from Hopkins, Minnesota, became the sixth player, and first since Breanna Stewart in 2016, to be drafted first overall and win a national championship in the same year. Bueckers led the Huskies to their first NCAA title in nine years on April 6 in her final college game.
“I’m just extremely excited to be there. I’ve only heard great things about the city,” Bueckers said of Dallas. “So excited to start that new chapter and be in a new city and explore that and give everything I have to the Wings organization. I know we’re going to do great things, and it’s a fresh start, and I think we’re all ready to do something special.”
The 2021 national player of the year, Bueckers is also the sixth UConn player to be drafted No. 1, joining a distinguished group of WNBA superstars that includes Sue Bird (2002), Diana Taurasi (2004), Tina Charles (2010), Maya Moore (2011) and Stewart (2016).
Bueckers got to enjoy the moment Monday night with her UConn teammates and coach Geno Auriemma who were in the audience at the draft, which was held at The Shed in New York. Bueckers choked up when talking about her former Huskies teammates.
“They mean everything to me. They helped me get through highs and lows,” Bueckers said.
The selection marks a hopeful change of fortune for the Wings, who went 9-31 last season, missed the playoffs and changed coaches. Dallas was rewarded the top pick in November when it won the draft lottery for the first time in franchise history.
“The addition of Paige is another huge momentum-building moment for the Wings franchise and team,” Curt Miller, in his first year as Wings general manager, said in a statement. “Paige is one of the most efficient and decorated players we have seen in the history of the collegiate game. … Tonight is truly a special night for Paige and the Dallas Wings.”
The Seattle Storm followed Dallas’ selection by taking 19-year-old French star Dominique Malonga, who became the sixth player drafted in the top two who did not attend college in the United States. Malonga, a 6-foot-6 center, has been a pro since she was 15 and was part of the silver-medal-winning French Olympic basketball team last summer. She is the first French player to be drafted this high since 1997, when Isabelle Fijalkowski went second.
“I was so proud to achieve that goal,” Malonga said. “It showed that French basketball has evolved as we’ve seen the past few years on the NBA side. We see Wemby [Victor Wembanyama] and Zaccharie [Risacher] show that French basketball is great.”
The Washington Mystics, with a new coach and general manager, selected Notre Dame‘s Sonia Citron with the No. 3 pick, and USC‘s Kiki Iriafen at No. 4. At No. 6, they selected Kentucky‘s Georgia Amoore, who averaged 19.6 points and 6.9 assists this season after transferring from Virginia Tech. She is the only SEC player over the past 25 seasons with 600 points and 200 assists in a season.
Amoore was dressed on the WNBA’s orange carpet by NBA star Russell Westbrook, who has a clothing brand called Honor The Gift. Amoore said Westbrook designed her outfit and was amazing to work with since they first got together on a Zoom session last November.
“It’s phenomenal. He did such a good job,” Amoore said of Westbrook. “It wasn’t just to put his name on something. He spent hours at the hotel fitting it … He’s been very active in the process. To have a contact like that now, someone I can lean on or into is amazing. It’s the start. You’ll see this happen more often. It’s a blessing to be the first one to do this.”
The Mystics became the second team in WNBA history to make three of the first six selections of a draft, joining the 2021 Wings.
At No. 5, the expansion Golden State Valkyries made Justė Jocytė of Lithuania the first draft choice in franchise history. Jocytė is the second player drafted out of Lithuania — and first in the first round — joining Jurgita Streimikyte in 2000.
The Connecticut Sun had consecutive picks and took LSU‘s Aneesah Morrow seventh and NC State‘s Saniya Rivers eighth. Morrow is the 11th player coached by Kim Mulkey to be selected in the first round, and Rivers became the highest-drafted player in NC State history.
The Los Angeles Sparks took Alabama‘s Sarah Ashlee Barker at No. 9. Chicago drafted Ajša Sivka from Slovenia at No. 10, making her the third international player drafted Monday. That tied the most international players selected in the top 10 of a draft in league history (three were also selected in 1998 and 2000).
The Sky drafted again at No. 11 and selected TCU‘s Hailey Van Lith, the Big 12 Player of the Year. Van Lith led three schools to the Elite Eight, the first player in men’s or women’s NCAA tournament history to do so. She also set a single-season TCU record in points (680) and assists (204).
The move reunites her with Angel Reese, her former LSU teammate in 2023-24.
Dallas closed out the first round drafting Aziaha James of NC State.
Six teams didn’t have picks in the opening round. New York, Indiana, Minnesota, Phoenix and Atlanta traded theirs away, and Las Vegas forfeited its pick after an investigation by the league in 2023 that found the franchise had violated league rules regarding impermissible player benefits and workplace policies.
Even before the addition of Bueckers, the 2025 Wings — headlined by four-time All-Star Arike Ogunbowale — were already set to feature a slew of newcomers. Stars Satou Sabally and Natasha Howard moved on to different teams, and new coach Chris Koclanes and Miller brought in DiJonai Carrington, Tyasha Harris, NaLyssa Smith and Myisha Hines-Allen during free agency.
“It takes a special person to be able to navigate the daily pressures and expectations she faces and consistently deliver with the gratitude and grace that she has,” Koclanes said of Bueckers. “I look forward to empowering her to be herself and to be a rookie as she begins this next chapter.”
The Wings organization, which previously played in Detroit and Tulsa when it was known as the Shock, has made the postseason in five of its nine seasons since relocating to Dallas in 2016 but advanced past the first round only once, in 2023. Now the Wings will look to channel the momentum of drafting Bueckers into supercharging their franchise on and off the court. The team had already announced a move in 2026 from Arlington to Dallas, where it will have a standalone practice facility and play in a larger and newly renovated arena.
Bueckers enters the pros boasting the top career scoring average in UConn history (19.8) on remarkable efficiency (53% from the field, 42% from 3, 85% from the free throw line), while also shining as a facilitator. The 6-foot guard overcame a pair of knee injuries, including an ACL tear that sidelined her for the 2022-23 season, to play the best basketball of her career over the past two seasons with the Huskies.
ESPN Research and The Associated Press contributed to this report.