Everything you need to know about today’s WNBA expansion draft

Tune in to ESPN tonight at 5:30 pm CT to watch the 2025 WNBA Expansion Draft presented by State Farm! Wendell Epps explains everything Lynx fans need to know.

The WNBA Expansion Draft is on Friday, December 6th.

Here’s what it means for the lynx.

The WNBA is adding a new team… The Golden State Valkyries will begin play in 2025.

To build their team…Golden State will select players from each of the league’s current teams…including ours.

Here’s the deal…by November 25th…each team had to submit a roster list to the league office…featuring EVERY PLAYER the team has rights to…beginning on the last day of the 2024 regular season….. This included players on the the team’s active, suspended… and draft lists… AND ALSO players on the team’s reserved… core… and retired lists… We’re talking EVERY PLAYER…

From this list, each team will designate a MAXIMUM OF SIX “protected players” who will NOT be available in the expansion draft.

These six players are SAFE… and cannot be selected by the Valkyries.

The rest are on an available list for draft day.

But get this… Between the submission of roster lists… and a set time the day BEFORE the expansion draft… Golden State can do business with existing teams… That means Golden State can make an agreement to select a specific player… and then trade that player to a team OTHER than the existing team… Golden State can also make an agreement to select… or NOT SELECT a specific player from a specific team.

On December 6th, the Valkyries can select ONE player from each team’s available roster, but they don’t have to take a player from each team if they don’t want to.

If they select a player WITHOUT a contract for next season, they have the same chances of signing that player as we would have had.

The Valkyries can only select ONE player in the Expansion Draft who is eligible to become an unrestricted free agent after the 2024 season… But… the Valkyries can only select one player who has not previously received a CORE DESIGNATION CONTRACT for two or more seasons .

It’s all super interesting!

The last time we saw an expansion draft was in 2008 when the Atlanta Dream selected Kristen Mann from the Lynx.

With more teams expected to join in the future, this process will repeat over the next few offseasons as the WNBA continues to expand.

So… mark December 6th on your calendar!