The 2024-25 ladies’s school basketball season might need simply ended on Sunday, nevertheless it’s already time to show our consideration to the 2025 WNBA Draft.
Everyone knows in regards to the headliner of the category, newly minted NCAA champion UConn guard Paige Bueckers, however what about those that is perhaps flying below the radar?
Listed here are 5 hidden gems on this 12 months’s draft, scheduled for Monday, April 14.
Iowa capturing guard Sydney Affolter
As Iowa adjusted to life after Caitlin Clark, it stayed afloat within the Large Ten because of contributions from gamers like Affolter, who has muted WNBA Draft inventory. The four-year senior ranks No. 50 in ESPN’s listing of greatest accessible gamers within the 2025 class, so it is attainable her identify is not one of many 38 known as on Monday.
However Affolter, 5-foot-11, does a number of issues that make her a possible asset in a successful tradition. She will be able to rebound and shoot from distance. In 2024, Affolter averaged 7.8 rebounds and was 46.3 p.c from past the arc, with 42.1 p.c of her discipline objective makes an attempt coming from deep.
Norfolk State level guard Diamond Johnson
Do not let Johnson’s small 5-foot-5 body idiot you. She performs so much larger than her top. The 2024-25 MEAC Participant of the Yr shone brightly in the course of the current ladies’s school basketball All-Star Recreation, incomes the sport’s MVP Award after main all scorers with 21 factors.
Johnson confirmed off her clean mid-range sport within the exhibition and hit the successful three in transition for Crew Miller, coached by the legendary Cheryl Miller.
