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The Connecticut Sun has a solid young core of players to build around, and the 2026 WNBA draft should offer them a chance to add to it.
That core includes WNBA all-Rookie selection Leila Lacan, guard Saniya Rivers, forward Aneesah Morrow and forward Aaliyah Edwards. But, because the Sun doesn’t have a lottery pick, the Sun are robbed of adding one of the top players in the WNBA draft, which is set for April. That is assuming the league and the players’ association come to an agreement on a new collective bargaining agreement.
The draft lottery should be held before the draft. But the lottery is really nothing more than a spectator sport for the Sun. Wherever Connecticut’s ping pong ball lands, it won’t belong to them, thanks to a trade made more than a year ago.
The Sun had the second-worst record in the WNBA in 2025. But, due to a couple of trades made in the past two years, they won’t have a pick in the lottery portion of the draft which is the first five picks. That expected first-round pick ended up being conveyed to the Chicago Sky due to a pick swap in the deal that sent Marina Mabrey to the Sun in 2024.
The pick swap takes away the Sun’s access to one of the top five players in the draft. Per ESPN’s latest mock draft, the first five players projected to be selected were UCLA center Lauren Betts (No. 1 Dallas), TCU guard Olivia Miles (No. 2 Minnesota), UConn guard Azzi Fudd (No. 3 Seattle), Spanish center Awa Fam (No. 4 Washington) and LSU guard Flau’Jae Johnson (No. 5 Chicago).
Further pushing Connecticut down in the order are the two expansion teams, the Toronto Tempo and the Portland Fire. The Tempo will select No. 6, and the Fire will select No. 7. In this mock, that takes South Carolina guard Ta’Niya Latson (Toronto) and Ole Miss forward Cotie McMahon (Portland).
Connecticut does have two selections late in the first round. The first is a pick acquired from Phoenix, which will be No. 12 overall. The other pick is No. 15 overall, which comes from a deal the Sun made with the Minnesota Lynx.
ESPN projects that the Sun will take Spanish guard Iyana Martin Carrion at No. 12 overall, who was the MVP of the FIBA U19 World Cup in 2023. Then, Connecticut is projected to take South Carolina center Madina Okot at No. 15. The 6-foot-6 star averaged nearly a double-double with Mississippi State in 2024-25 before he transferred to the Gamecocks. Coach Dawn Staley may need to lean harder into Okot after the season-ending injury to Chloe Kitts.
