Washington point guard Markelle Fultz is the favorite to be picked No. 1 overall in June’s NBA Draft, but Thursday it was his friend and fellow Huskies star Kelsey Plum who heard her name called first.
Plum, the NCAA’s all-time leading scorer, was selected by the San Antonio Stars with the first pick in the WNBA Draft. She will provide an immediate offensive boost to a team that went 7-27 in 2016, by far the worst record in the league. As a senior in 2016-17, Plum led the nation with 31.7 points per game. In February, she scored 57 points against Utah to pass Jackie Stiles as the all-time leading scorer in women’s Division I history.
While Plum’s selection at the top of the draft was no surprise, the picks got interesting from there.
With the second pick, the Chicago Sky selected South Carolina center Alaina Coates, who most mock drafts had lasting a bit longer. And at No. 3, the Dallas Wings took Kentucky’s Evelyn Akhator, who was widely projected as a second-round pick.
The 12-pick first round wound up featuring three players from defending champion South Carolina (Coates, Allisha Gray, Kaela Davis) and two from Maryland (Shatori Walker-Kimbrough, Brionna Jones).
UConn, which had won 111 straight games before losing in the Final Four, did not have a player selected until the third round, when guard Saniya Chong went No. 26 overall to Dallas.
Here are the results of the entire first round:
1. San Antonio Stars — Kelsey Plum, Washington
2. Chicago Sky — Alaina Coates, South Carolina
3. Dallas Wings — Evelyn Akhator, Kentucky
4. Dallas Wings — Allisha Gray
5. San Antonio Stars — Nia Coffey, Northwestern
6. Washington Mystics — Shatori Walker-Kimbrough, Maryland
7. Atlanta Dream — Brittany Sykes, Syracuse
8. Connecticut Sun — Brionna Jones, Maryland
9. Chicago Sky — Tori Jankosa, Michigan State
10. Dallas Wings — Kaela Davis, South Carolina
11. Los Angeles Sparks — Sydney Wiese, Oregon State
12. Minnesota Lynx — Alexis Jones, Baylor.
The full draft board is available here.
