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The WNBA draft lottery was on Sunday, confirming the order of the first five picks of the 2026 WNBA Draft. For the second year in a row, the Dallas Wings have the first selection, and will get to choose from a pool of incredible talent. After them, it will be Minnesota, Seattle, Washington and Chicago picking.
It’s also the second year in a row that Washington has the No. 4 pick. After that, they have the 9th overall pick and the 11th overall pick.
At the 2025 draft, they picked Sonia Citron No. 3, Kiki Iriafen No. 4, and Georgia Amoore No. 6. In the second round, the Mystics drafted Lucy Olsen No. 11, and she ended up making the roster along with their three first-round picks. Yet, things got a little crowded on the Mystics roster during the season, even with Amoore out with an ACL injury. The Mystics decided to trade their 2024 first-round pick, Aaliyah Edwards, who they got at No. 6, to the Connecticut Sun.
The Mystics’ young trio of Citron, Iriafen and Amoore have a ton of future potential as a core, which is good given they are some of the only players the Mystics will 100% have on their roster come 2026. With about 80% of the league heading into free agency this offseason, plus a looming expansion draft with Toronto and Portland entering the league, not many teams have sure things set for next season.
While we don’t currently know the rules of the expansion draft — including how many players teams will be able to protect — the Mystics trio of Citron, Iriafen and Amoore is probably safe. Last year, teams could protect six players from the Valkyries’ expansion draft. Even if the league cuts that to three players, the Mystics should still protect those three.
Still, when you think about these returning sophomore players and the players the Mystics will eventually pick up in free agency, you then come into a roster issue. As of right now, teams have a cap of 12 players. If you put in Citron, Iriafen, Amoore, and even Olsen, who is still technically on contract as a rookie-scale player, plus the three first-round picks, that is already 7 players. Washington then also has the 19th, 30th and 34th overall picks in the later rounds of the 2026 draft. Camp is already at 10 players, and that’s before free agency.
The draft also means a little more this season, as the two expansion teams enter the mix. There are more roster spots, and with a deep pool of talent leaving college in the spring for the WNBA, those first-round picks are going to be hot commodities.
The Mystics are in a great position to consolidate the No. 9 and No. 11 picks for a player with veteran experience on the trade market. Having an older player to pair with this excellent group of young talent could be really beneficial to the development of the Mystics.
Keeping all six draft picks for 2026 is going to make training camp more of a competition. Roster spots are limited, and most of the players the Mystics end up drafting will ultimately be waived. They can get some value for those picks before they are even made, from teams that need or want young players more.
None of this should happen until two things are behind us, though. First, the WNBA needs to come to terms with a new Collective Bargaining Agreement. We won’t know about new draft rules, expansion draft rules, free agency rules etc., until that happens. After that, all teams should wait until free agency has settled a bit before going hard with trading draft picks. See what the landscape looks like and who could be available before you start making big trades.
Still, it seems unlikely that the Mystics will enter the 2026 WNBA draft with all six of their current picks, so their offseason activity bears watching.
