Michael Voepel, ESPN.comDec 2, 2024, 05:45 PM ET
- Michael Voepel is a senior writer who covers the WNBA, women's college basketball and other college sports. Voepel began covering women's basketball in 1984, and has been with ESPN since 1996.
The WNBA's 2025 regular-season schedule will give us an immediate look at both the newest team and the newest No. 1 pick on opening day on May 16. But we will have to wait for the first WNBA Finals rematch.
The league released its 2025 schedule Monday -- broadcast and streaming details will be released next spring -- with the Dallas Wings and their top pick (expected to be UConn's Paige Bueckers) and the expansion Golden State Valkyries both playing on the first day. The Wings will host the Minnesota Lynx and the Valkyries will host the Los Angeles Sparks.
But the New York Liberty and the Lynx won't meet until July 30, the first of their four matchups. That's unless they meet again (like last season) in the Commissioner's Cup final, which is July 1. The Lynx won that 2024 title while the Liberty won a hotly contested five-game Finals series for their first WNBA championship.
A lot will happen between now and the start of the league's 29th season, including the Golden State expansion draft Friday (6:30 p.m. ET, ESPN), free agency signings beginning in February and April's 2025 draft. All of it will affect rosters and matchups. But based on what we know now, here are the 10 must-see games -- spread throughout each team's 44-game regular season -- to watch in 2025.
May 17: Chicago Sky at Indiana Fever
One of the WNBA's geographic rivalries -- Chicago's Wintrust Center and Indiana's Gainbridge Fieldhouse are 182 miles apart -- became spicier last season. Rookies Caitlin Clark of Indiana and Kamilla Cardoso and Angel Reese of Chicago brought more eyes to this series than ever before. Indiana, which won the series 3-1, made the playoffs; Chicago didn't. The Sky are slotted to add another lottery pick -- No. 3 -- in the draft, and both teams have new coaches (Stephanie White for the Fever, Tyler Marsh for the Sky). It will be the first of five meetings between the teams in 2025.
May 21: Dallas Wings at Minnesota Lynx
It's the second meeting between these teams in the season's first five days, but this one projects as Bueckers' homecoming game in Minneapolis. The Wings missed the playoffs last season, finishing 9-31, and fired coach Latricia Trammell despite her leading Dallas to the semifinals the year before. Longtime coach Curt Miller is now Dallas' general manager; the Wings haven't hired a coach yet. Bueckers, one of the front-runners for the 2024-25 NCAA national player of the year with UConn, projects as the favorite for WNBA Rookie of the Year.
May 27: Atlanta Dream at Los Angeles Sparks
Two of the league's new coaches, the Dream's Karl Smesko and the Sparks' Lynne Roberts, left their college teams early this season to go to the WNBA. This will be their first matchup as pro coaches, and a chance to see some big-time young stars like Atlanta's Rhyne Howard and Los Angeles' Rickea Jackson (and Cameron Brink if she has returned from a knee injury that cut short her rookie season).
June 7: Las Vegas Aces at Golden State Valkyries
This will be the first meeting between Aces coach Becky Hammon and her former assistant, Natalie Nakase, coach of the Valkyries. Another of Hammon's former assistants, the Sky's Marsh, will first meet up with the Aces on Aug. 25 in Chicago.
June 17: Las Vegas Aces at Minnesota Lynx
Las Vegas' A'ja Wilson was the unanimous MVP last season, while Minnesota's Napheesa Collier was one vote shy of unanimous runner-up, and won the WNBA Defensive Player of the Year award. The two stars are in the primes of their careers, and this will be their first meeting of 2025.
July 13: Dallas Wings at Indiana Fever
This projects as the second meeting between Clark and Bueckers, who faced off in the NCAA tournament twice in their careers. UConn won their 2021 Sweet 16 game; Iowa won their 2024 national semifinal. Indiana and Dallas first meet on June 27 in Texas.
July 15: Indiana Fever vs. Connecticut Sun (Boston)
White left the Sun to return to her home state of Indiana and her second stint as Fever coach. She led Connecticut in the WNBA's first game at Boston's TD Garden last season in August, a 69-61 win over Los Angeles. Now she returns with Indiana and star attraction Clark for what's likely to be another sellout at TD Garden.
Aug. 10: Minnesota Lynx at New York Liberty
This is the first time the teams will meet at Barclays Center since the decisive Game 5 of the 2024 championship series. (Unless, again, they play there for the Commissioner's Cup in July.) Game 5 and the title went to the Liberty, 67-62 in overtime on Oct. 20. Lynx coach Cheryl Reeve was furious with officiating afterward, proclaiming, "This s--- was stolen from us." The league opted not to fine her.
Aug. 13: New York Liberty at Las Vegas Aces
The Aces beat the Liberty in the 2023 Finals, but New York avenged that with a 3-1 semifinal series victory over Las Vegas last year on the way to its first WNBA title. This will be the third meeting of the season between the Liberty and Aces, and Las Vegas' Wilson and New York's Breanna Stewart, who between them have five MVP awards.
Sept. 11: Phoenix Mercury at Dallas Wings
Did we see Diana Taurasi's final WNBA game last season? Or might she come back for a 21st year in the league, in which case this could be her regular-season finale. If Taurasi returns, this could be her fourth meeting of the season against fellow UConn star Bueckers. The first would be June 11, Taurasi's 43rd birthday, in Phoenix.
