New York (AFP) – Paige Bueckers was chosen by the Dallas Wings with the number one pick in the WNBA draft on Monday, crowning a successful season that saw her lead the University of Connecticut to the US college championship earlier this month. The 23-year-old point guard had been the overwhelming favorite to be selected first by the Wings and will enter a league that has surged in popularity in the past year.
“Just an overwhelming sense of gratitude, it’s super-surreal just being here,” Bueckers said moments after her selection at a ceremony in New York before paying tribute to her coaches and teammates at Connecticut. “All their hard work helped me get to this stage. I didn’t do it alone — it took a village,” Bueckers said. Speaking before the draft, Bueckers told ESPN reaching the WNBA marked the realization of a near-lifelong dream. “Ever since I was five, it’s the reason I played the game,” Bueckers told the network. “Ever since I picked up the ball I had big dreams.”
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Bueckers enjoyed a fairytale final season in collegiate basketball, leading the Huskies to a blowout 82-59 win over the South Carolina Gamecocks on April 6 after missing most of the previous two seasons with injury. “I can’t even put into words everything that’s happened this past week, the entire year, the journey,” Bueckers told ESPN on Monday. “It didn’t really hit me until I saw the stage today. It’s just surreal.”
A year after Caitlin Clark’s rise took college basketball and the WNBA by storm, Bueckers has enjoyed a similarly meteoric journey to the world’s top women’s basketball league. US sports equipment giant Nike made her the first college athlete to have a sneaker named after them, and she has also signed a multi-year endorsement deal with Gatorade. Speaking after leading UConn to the college title earlier this month, Bueckers said her success had been shaped by her determination to fight through a litany of injuries which included a torn meniscus in 2021 and a torn anterior cruciate ligament in 2022. “It’s been a story of resilience, of gratitude, of adversity, of overcoming adversity, just responding to life’s challenges,” Bueckers said of her career trajectory. “To be shaped, to be the person that I am today … obviously you feel like on the other side of a really hard time is a really big blessing.”
In other early draft selections on Monday, French teenager Dominique Malonga was chosen with the second pick by the Seattle Storm. “It’s amazing to me,” the 6ft 6in (1.98m) 19-year-old Olympic silver medalist said. “I’m so happy to represent France, but not only France, Cameroon, and Congo. I’m a multicultural person. I will work very hard to fit in this league because I know it’s gonna be tough.” Notre Dame’s Sonia Citron was chosen with the third pick by the Washington Mystics.
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