What is their argument that says Ezi and Dom can't play together? Both players are capable of playing inside or out. Do both players need to improve their outside shooting? Sure. But it's not like they haven't displayed the ability to do so. Breanna Stewart and Jonquel Jones showed that they can play together. And you might say, "But yeah, they are much better three-point shooters." Stewie shot 24% from beyond the arc in 2025 and 29.5% from 3-PT range in 2024. But she can knock down those shots, and that allowed the Liberty to space the floor. Magbegor shot 29% from 3 in 2025 and 25% in 2024. But she shot 39% from the arc in 2023 and 35% in 2022.
As far as the three-player lineup with Nneka, Ezi, and Dom. That does get a little more complicated. However, I think Ogwumike has improved her three-point shooting enough that they could make it work offensively.
If Nneka re-signs, she isn't coming off the bench. It is possible that either Ezi or Dom would need to, to make lineups work. But that doesn't mean that Ezi or Dom wouldn't still play 25+ MPG. I will admit that if the team believes they're going to start Nneka and Dom, but not Ezi, that will be a difficult sell to get Magbegor to re-sign as a Free Agent if another team is offering her more money and more opportunities.
Defensively maybe Dom guards the 3? Assuming we have a couple of prototypical guards, what do we do with wings Gabby and Jordan? I do like Gabby at the 2-guard though.
It's going to be a crazy roster to put together and I'm sure we're in for some surprises.
I disagree with some of the logic of this post. It doesn't matter who our best players are - it matters way more what our best contracts are. For unrestricted free agents in particular, protecting them doesn't mean we get to keep them. It doesn't give us any edge in resigning them at all unless we're willing to pay them more than the max (you can only go up to the supermax for your own previous year players). Meanwhile, drafting them doesn't mean they play for the expansion team. They can just resign with us if they want. It only helps the expansion team if they are willing to Core them (which comes with a mandatory 1-year super-max contract offer) and/or offer them more than the max. The big conclusion I take away from this is that we don't need to protect anyone unless we think an expansion team would offer them more than the max. Furthermore, expansion teams are limited to drafting just one unrestricted free agent each. So we also don't need to protect people unless they're going to be among the top 2 best UFA's left unprotected. Gabby is in her 20's and likely would be so protect her. Ezi also might be, but we shouldn't protect her unless we actually want to pay her what it's going to take for her to sign with us, which requires her to want to sign with us and also I think we can't afford her if we're running back the Skylar + Nneka core. So don't be surprised if she gets drafted on Friday. Meanwhile I don't think an expansion team would draft Skylar so I think we just risk it with her, even if we do want her back. Nneka is good enough that I think she's probably worth protecting, though I also wonder if an expansion team would really draft her and pay her a super-max at her age.
Anyway, the net net of this perspective is that I think Mackenzie Holmes is a very realistic option for a protection. She was 1st team all WNBL in Australia this off-season, and a Chinese team just snapped her up for their playoff run. We have her on the rookie min for 2-3 more seasons. I also thought Nika Muhl was a reasonable protection until she hurt her (other) knee two weeks ago playing for Croatia. Is either of these players more useful than Katie Lou Samuelson? No ... but no one is gonna pay KLS a million dollars for next season, so we don't need to protect her in order to sign her for next season. (Or Wheeler, etc.)
You wrote: “my prediction is that they protect Dominique Malonga, Jordan Horston, Gabby Williams, Nneka Ogwumike, and Ezi Magbegor.”
Oof. It’s difficult to imagine the Storm without the passion of Skylar and Wheeler, and to a lesser extent Sykes. But yeah I agree with you for the most part. Just would love more offensive production from Ezi.
I will be shocked if they don't resign Wheeler. She was both useful and a fan favorite, plus I don't expect her to cost much more than the minimum. (Leaving her unprotected has basically no impact on our ability to bring her back since she is an unrestricted free agent either way.)
There's no way we're going to protect both Nneka and Ezi. They're both gonna cost the max (if not the super max) and we can't afford to pay them both when we're also going to be paying a 7-digit contract to Gabby Williams, especially not when we need a starting point guard a lot more than we need a 3rd big.
I think we're either gonna run it back with Nneka + Skylar (and hope the coaching change plus Jordan Horston being healthy allows us to unlock more of that roster's potential) or we're going to pivot into a rebuild. I think we'd like to have Ezi in the rebuild scenario, but that only works if she wants to be here and I read some rumors on Reddit that she doesn't. And that might be fine anyway if Awa Fam falls to us at 3.
Great article. Can’t wait to see what direction the team and new coach take. I think they need to go into a full rebuild . Hopefully , we draft Olivia Miles as the franchise point guard. . Resign Ezi and have Dom and her as the front court. Let Nneka and Skylar go. It’s time and Skylar is not a good leader and brings drama to the locker room. Remember her pouting at the post game presser and her bad body language in games and on the bench. There are so many free agents available. We need younger players and outside shooting desperately . Can’t continue to be the worst 3 pt team in the league.
Gabby and Horston seem like a duplication. I love Gabby but with her poor outside shooting, it’s a tough fit. It’s going to be a fun and exciting season. Go Storm.
If we protect Ezi, other teams are still going to come after her and we're going to have to pay her the supermax. And if you do that, she's gotta play starter minutes.
Gabby just shot 39.5% from 3 in Euroleague, so maybe that's improving.
What do you say to the people (not me) who don't think Ezi and Dom can be on the floor together? Or that a lineup of Nneka, Ezi, and Dom won't work?
Are you willing to bring Nneka or Ezi off the bench? I don't think I can endure another season of Dom watching from the bench.
In the words of my friend Erica Ayala, "When you have the number 2 pick, YOU PLAY THE NUMBER 2 PICK!"
What is their argument that says Ezi and Dom can't play together? Both players are capable of playing inside or out. Do both players need to improve their outside shooting? Sure. But it's not like they haven't displayed the ability to do so. Breanna Stewart and Jonquel Jones showed that they can play together. And you might say, "But yeah, they are much better three-point shooters." Stewie shot 24% from beyond the arc in 2025 and 29.5% from 3-PT range in 2024. But she can knock down those shots, and that allowed the Liberty to space the floor. Magbegor shot 29% from 3 in 2025 and 25% in 2024. But she shot 39% from the arc in 2023 and 35% in 2022.
As far as the three-player lineup with Nneka, Ezi, and Dom. That does get a little more complicated. However, I think Ogwumike has improved her three-point shooting enough that they could make it work offensively.
If Nneka re-signs, she isn't coming off the bench. It is possible that either Ezi or Dom would need to, to make lineups work. But that doesn't mean that Ezi or Dom wouldn't still play 25+ MPG. I will admit that if the team believes they're going to start Nneka and Dom, but not Ezi, that will be a difficult sell to get Magbegor to re-sign as a Free Agent if another team is offering her more money and more opportunities.
Defensively maybe Dom guards the 3? Assuming we have a couple of prototypical guards, what do we do with wings Gabby and Jordan? I do like Gabby at the 2-guard though.
It's going to be a crazy roster to put together and I'm sure we're in for some surprises.
I disagree with some of the logic of this post. It doesn't matter who our best players are - it matters way more what our best contracts are. For unrestricted free agents in particular, protecting them doesn't mean we get to keep them. It doesn't give us any edge in resigning them at all unless we're willing to pay them more than the max (you can only go up to the supermax for your own previous year players). Meanwhile, drafting them doesn't mean they play for the expansion team. They can just resign with us if they want. It only helps the expansion team if they are willing to Core them (which comes with a mandatory 1-year super-max contract offer) and/or offer them more than the max. The big conclusion I take away from this is that we don't need to protect anyone unless we think an expansion team would offer them more than the max. Furthermore, expansion teams are limited to drafting just one unrestricted free agent each. So we also don't need to protect people unless they're going to be among the top 2 best UFA's left unprotected. Gabby is in her 20's and likely would be so protect her. Ezi also might be, but we shouldn't protect her unless we actually want to pay her what it's going to take for her to sign with us, which requires her to want to sign with us and also I think we can't afford her if we're running back the Skylar + Nneka core. So don't be surprised if she gets drafted on Friday. Meanwhile I don't think an expansion team would draft Skylar so I think we just risk it with her, even if we do want her back. Nneka is good enough that I think she's probably worth protecting, though I also wonder if an expansion team would really draft her and pay her a super-max at her age.
Anyway, the net net of this perspective is that I think Mackenzie Holmes is a very realistic option for a protection. She was 1st team all WNBL in Australia this off-season, and a Chinese team just snapped her up for their playoff run. We have her on the rookie min for 2-3 more seasons. I also thought Nika Muhl was a reasonable protection until she hurt her (other) knee two weeks ago playing for Croatia. Is either of these players more useful than Katie Lou Samuelson? No ... but no one is gonna pay KLS a million dollars for next season, so we don't need to protect her in order to sign her for next season. (Or Wheeler, etc.)
You wrote: “my prediction is that they protect Dominique Malonga, Jordan Horston, Gabby Williams, Nneka Ogwumike, and Ezi Magbegor.”
Oof. It’s difficult to imagine the Storm without the passion of Skylar and Wheeler, and to a lesser extent Sykes. But yeah I agree with you for the most part. Just would love more offensive production from Ezi.
I will be shocked if they don't resign Wheeler. She was both useful and a fan favorite, plus I don't expect her to cost much more than the minimum. (Leaving her unprotected has basically no impact on our ability to bring her back since she is an unrestricted free agent either way.)
There's no way we're going to protect both Nneka and Ezi. They're both gonna cost the max (if not the super max) and we can't afford to pay them both when we're also going to be paying a 7-digit contract to Gabby Williams, especially not when we need a starting point guard a lot more than we need a 3rd big.
I think we're either gonna run it back with Nneka + Skylar (and hope the coaching change plus Jordan Horston being healthy allows us to unlock more of that roster's potential) or we're going to pivot into a rebuild. I think we'd like to have Ezi in the rebuild scenario, but that only works if she wants to be here and I read some rumors on Reddit that she doesn't. And that might be fine anyway if Awa Fam falls to us at 3.
Great article. Can’t wait to see what direction the team and new coach take. I think they need to go into a full rebuild . Hopefully , we draft Olivia Miles as the franchise point guard. . Resign Ezi and have Dom and her as the front court. Let Nneka and Skylar go. It’s time and Skylar is not a good leader and brings drama to the locker room. Remember her pouting at the post game presser and her bad body language in games and on the bench. There are so many free agents available. We need younger players and outside shooting desperately . Can’t continue to be the worst 3 pt team in the league.
Gabby and Horston seem like a duplication. I love Gabby but with her poor outside shooting, it’s a tough fit. It’s going to be a fun and exciting season. Go Storm.
This might be the answer to clear up the logjam.
If we protect Ezi, other teams are still going to come after her and we're going to have to pay her the supermax. And if you do that, she's gotta play starter minutes.
Gabby just shot 39.5% from 3 in Euroleague, so maybe that's improving.