The 2026 WNBA season is officially underway, with three of the 330 regular-season games now in the books. Opening night won’t go down as one of the most eventful gamedays of the 2026 season, but the journey to crown the league’s 30th champion has to start somewhere. Here’s what went down on night one:
New York Liberty 106, Connecticut Sun 75
Despite coming into the season with five players unavailable and a pair of hardship signings seeing the floor, the Liberty looked nothing like the team that went 10-11 over roughly the second half of the 2025 season following a 17-6 start, a collapse which was characterized by aimless offense and soft defense. The Libs came out in attack mode on both ends of the floor against the overmatched Sun, pushing tempo at every opportunity when they had the ball while contesting every move Connecticut made on offense en route to a 36-13 lead after the first quarter. The defense let up a bit from there, which is surely not what new head coach Chris DeMarco was hoping for, but New York still managed to outscore Connecticut by a 70-62 margin over the final three quarters.
Breanna Stewart led the way with 31 points and 10 rebounds on 10-for-17 from the field, although her 0-for-4 effort from deep was yet another indication that she’s just not a 3-point threat anymore after finishing the last two seasons under 30%. The Sun had no one with a prayer of staying in front of Stewie when she went at the rim, however, sending her to the line 12 times while letting her make 10-of-13 inside the arc. In the end, she had her 39th career 30-point game, breaking a tie with Angel McCoughtry for third-most in WNBA history. It was her 18th 30-burger in a Liberty uniform, one shy of the franchise record held by teammate Sabrina Ionescu. Marine Johannes was next with 17 points on 5-for-9 from deep and Betnijah Laney-Hamilton added 12 in her first WNBA game since the 2024 Finals. Highly-touted 24-year old French point guard Pauline Astier scored only 5 points, but had four assists without a turnover while starting in place of Ionescu — who’s out at least a couple weeks with a foot injury — in her WNBA debut. It took me about three minutes of seeing Astier play live to completely understand the hype, as I’m guessing was the case for the Sun as well while she penetrated the Sun’s defenses with ease before kicking to open 3-point shooters. Had the Liberty cashed in on more of those open looks (Stewart, Laney-Hamilton and Jonquel Jones were a combined 1-for-12), Astier might well have had more like eight to 10 helpers.
On the other hand, the Sun picked up pretty much right where they left off in 2025. The 31-point loss was Connecticut’s fourth loss by at least 30 since the start of last season — the Sun/Orlando Miracle franchise only suffered eight such losses from its inception in 1999 through 2024. I wouldn’t bet against the Sun being blown out enough times for 2025-26 to match that total from their previous 26 seasons.
Golden State Valkyries 91, Seattle Storm 80
Last year’s expansion darlings, the Valkyries trailed throughout the first quarter while seeing the Storm start 4-for-4 from deep and force a team expected to be among the WNBA’s best defensively into a track meet. Golden State settled in, however, and made life miserable for the Storm on offense the rest of the way. The Valks allowed just 29 points in the middle quarters after giving up 24 in the first and led by as many as 20 points in the fourth en route to the season-opening win. Veronica Valkyrie (aka Veronica Burton) led the starters with 16 points and continues to have been a starter in every game in Valkyries history, while the franchise’s first All-Star Kayla Thornton had 13 points and 8 rebounds in her return from a knee injury suffered during last year’s All-Star break. The Golden State bench also made some major contributions, as Janelle Salaün scored a team-high 20 points on 7-for-15 from the field and 5-for-10 from deep while Kaitlyn Chen — who wasn’t a sure thing to make the roster a few days ago — scored a career-high 14 points, all in the second half, on 5-for-10 from the field. Seattle got 21 points and 8 rebounds from 20-year old center Dominique Malonga on 8-for-15 from the field, but the rest of the Storm hit just 37.5%.
It wasn’t all good news for the Valkyries, unfortunately, as both Tiffany Hayes (finger) and Cecilia Zandalasini (jaw; scored 8 points in 7 minutes of action) left the game early due to injuries. Any missed time for Hayes and/or Zandalasini, a starter and top reserve, respectively, will further test the depth of a team already weathering the unexpected absence of presumptive starting center Iliana Rupert (pregnancy). That depth passed the first test with flying colors, albeit against a very young team with an entirely new starting five and its highest-paid player (Ezi Magbegor) sidelined.
Washington Mystics 68, Toronto Tempo 65
The game itself didn’t end as the Toronto faithful would’ve hoped, but the Tempo and our neighbors to the north are officially a part of WNBA history after hosting their inaugural game. That said, it was far from an offensive clinic, which was probably to be expected of two teams expected to be among the league’s worst. Ultimately, extremely young (in literal terms) Mystics held on to beat the newborn (in figurative terms) Tempo behind second-year star Sonia Citron’s 26 points — tied for third-most in her young career — on 9-for-12 from the field. Citron and fellow 2025 rookie/All-Star Kiki Iriafen (12 points, 16 rebounds, 5-for-9 FG) were the only players on either team to make more than half of their field goals excluding Toronto’s Julie Allemand and Kia Nurse, who were 2-for-3 combined. The other Mystics made just 33.3% from the field (14-for-42), but even that meager rate was better than the 27% that Toronto hit as a team. Both teams were also under 25% from beyond the arc, with players other than Citron making just 16.3% (7-for-43), and both teams had more turnovers than assists. Washington center Shakira Austin, who signed an offer sheet with the Tempo before the Mystics matched, had 18 points and 11 rebounds while making 6-for-13 from the field. She sealed the deal with four straight makes at the line in the final 20 seconds, before which she’d gone 2-for-6 at the stripe.
There really weren’t many positives to take away from the game for the Tempo and coach Sandy Brondello, whose former team was in the midst of snuffing out the Sun simultaneously. Marina Mabrey continued putting up big point totals, as she did this winter while leading Unrivaled with over 25 points per game, putting up 27 in her Tempo debut, but was just 6-for-18 from the field. The good news for Tempo fans is it can only get so much worse than 27% from the field and 20% from deep.