A’ja Wilson fine-tunes her shooting touch after every practice. That extra work has defined her greatness since being drafted first overall in 2018. On Thursday, she received a voice message from former Vice President Kamala Harris congratulating her on redefining greatness leaguewide after she was named the WNBA’s MVP for a third straight year and for the fifth time overall.
Commissioner Cathy Engelbert, Aces owner Mark Davis and team President Nikki Fargas accompanied Wilson’s mother, Eva, who presented her daughter with the trophy. But this one here, I cried a little bit harder. This one here is just a little bit different. … When you dream as a young girl, you dream so big and you write your goals out, and you just never imagine that you were able to just check them off.
And so I think that’s why I cried a little bit harder on this one, because 15-year-old A’ja wasn’t sitting up here dreaming about being a five-time MVP. She wasn’t dreaming about being a three-time champion. She was dreaming about surviving this world.” The 30-year-old Wilson once again led the league in scoring with an average of 26.2 points per game while shooting nearly 53 percent from the field.
She averaged 9.4 rebounds per game, a career-best 3.2 assists and 1.9 blocks. Wilson has the defending champion Aces back in the WNBA semifinals for the eighth consecutive season although Las Vegas is down 2-0 in the best-of-five series against Golden State. I love it, not going to take for granted, shine her up, let’s do it,” Wilson said on Thursday.
I’ll be warming up with my team. … Everyone in this room knows the competitor that I am. Everyone knows what my main focus is, and that is to get a game.” Wilson received 65 first-place votes and nine second-place votes for a total of 713 points from a national panel of sportswriters and broadcasters. Minnesota’s Olivia Miles received six first-place votes and 40 second-place votes (442 points) while Indiana guards Kelsey Mitchell and Caitlin Clark followed with 287 and 212 points, respectively.
No WNBA player besides Wilson has more than three MVPs. Sheryl Swoopes, Lisa Leslie and Lauren Jackson each have a trio. On the NBA side, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar has six, and Michael Jordan and Bill Russell each have five.
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