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The Dallas Wings are looking to retool the roster around superstar Paige Bueckers, who had a tremendous first season in the WNBA. They made a huge mistake in the 2024 season, though.
Right before the 2024 season started, the Wings waived Veronica Burton, a player they’d taken with the 7th overall pick in the 2022 WNBA Draft. She’d floundered in her first two seasons, and they must not have thought she made sense with the future vision of the team.
She was picked by the Connecticut Sun for the 2024 season, and still didn’t receive a big opportunity. That all changed when she was the third pick in the expansion draft for the Golden State Valkyries.
Burton blossomed onto the scene in 2025, averaging 11.9 PPG, 6.0 APG, and 4.4 RPG, shooting 34.5% from three. That was good enough for her to be the Most Improved Player of the Year, be selected to the All-Defensive Second Team, and finished 9th place in MVP voting. It was a turnaround that likely no one saw coming.
Burton carried that momentum over to the Unrivaled League this year, where she just helped guide Mist BC to the championship in the league’s second season, averaging 9.6 PPG, 4.6 APG, and 5.7 RPG. She’s a beast on the defensive end of the floor, and considering how bad the Wings’ defense was last season, they could’ve used a player like Burton.
VERONICA BURTON is a 2026 Unrivaled Champion 🏆 pic.twitter.com/AnDXNBzhT8
— Unrivaled Basketball (@Unrivaledwbb) March 5, 2026
In the championship game, Burton put up 6 points and 5 assists, and while she may have been the only player on her team not to score at least 10 points, she still had a profound impact. She will be a free agent this summer, but after helping the Golden State Valkyries reach the playoffs, there’s no reason for her to leave the Bay Area, especially with how bought in that fanbase is already.
In the meantime, the Dallas Wings will have a lot of decisions to make on some of their own free agents. Arike Ogunbowale and Li Yueru, who were on Mist BC with Burton, are among the many players set to enter free agency this offseason, and arguably, no decision is bigger than what to do with Ogunbowale.
The play styles between Ogunbowale and Paige Bueckers are just too similar, and the focus has to be on finding the right fits around their first overall pick. Ogunbowale just may not be the right piece.
