Golden State Valkyries GM weighs in on WNBA expansion draft, hiring a head coach
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Golden State Valkyries general manager Ohemaa Nyanin. Photo: Lea Suzuki/San Francisco Chronicle via Getty Images
As the Golden State Valkyries gear up for their inaugural season next May, general manager Ohemaa Nyanin told Axios she is focused on hiring a head coach and building a roster.
The big picture: Valkyries — and Warriors — owner Joe Lacob laid out his marching orders when the expansion team was announced in 2023: become a championship contender within five seasons.
- When the team brought on Nyanin a couple of months ago, she said she welcomed "all the high expectations."
Catch up quick: The Valkyries are the WNBA's first expansion team since 2008, when the Atlanta Dream entered the league.
- Golden State now has four key ways to add players to their roster: the expansion and WNBA drafts, free agency and trades.
- In the expansion draft, the Valkyries can poach a to-be-determined number of players from the other 12 WNBA franchises.
- Current franchises, however, will be able to protect a certain number of players, so don't expect the Valkyries to end up with the Aces' A'Ja Wilson, the Liberty's Sabrina Ionescu, the Fever's Caitlin Clark or the Sky's Angel Reese.
- Per WNBA rules, each team can have a maximum of 12 players and must have at least 11 on their roster.
What they're saying: Ahead of the expansion draft, Nyanin hopes to have a head coach in place "just to understand what type of athletes they're looking for," but it's not a "hard and fast rule," she told Axios recently.
- Even though the search didn't start "as soon as [she] wanted it to," it's ultimately "going well," she said.
- There have been multiple conversations and interviews with potential head coaches and "it'll get announced when we all feel right about this person," she said.
Between the lines: The Valkyries don't yet know how many players they can get from each team, or how many players a team can protect, Nyanin said.
- She wants to "give the league a little bit of grace," given the exciting start to the year, the All-Star break and the Olympics, but hopes for some more clarity heading into the second half of the WNBA season, which resumes Aug. 15.
- In the meantime, Nyanin and her first hire, vice president of basketball operations Vanja Černivec, have been scouting, "looking at every scenario" and "planning for every kind of outcome," Nyanin said.
Flashback: In 2008's expansion draft, each WNBA team could protect up to six players, allowing the Dream to select one unprotected player from each team.
- Atlanta was also granted the fourth, 18th and 32nd picks in the 2008 WNBA draft.
- In the Dream's inaugural season, they finished with a league-worst 4-30 record but made the playoffs the following season. They would go on to make the WNBA Finals in their third, fourth and sixth years, losing each time.
What we're watching: When the WNBA sets a date for the expansion draft and whether the league does it in February — the month it landed in back in 2008.