Losing six players to the WNBA in the same draft would definitely be a legitimate cause of concern for any college basketball program. NCAA analyst Shimmy Miller, however, does not think the UCLA Bruins have any reason for alarm. True, six players from their championship-winning roster left for the WNBA, but the way she sees it, head coach Cori Close has done well to secure the perfect replacements.

Offering a preview of the upcoming college basketball season for the defending national champions, a video that the Big Ten conference page shared on X, Miller did not hesitate to push back on any suggestion that UCLA was heading into a rebuilding phase, even though they had lost key players.

“Yeah, and those six players that you talked about, they weren’t just drafted; they’re all playing in the WNBA,” Miller said, in agreement with her fellow host, Mike. “So that’s how much talent that roster had. Cori Close, though, she doesn’t have to rebuild, Mike. She just reloaded, and that’s what she did. She went into the portal; she reloaded. And she got a ton of powerful transfers, some of whom you’ve mentioned. I think it’s going to be centred around Sienna Betts. You saw her improvement and her competence over the course of the year.”

“But how about Elina Aarnisalo? That is the story in college women’s basketball, in my opinion, because transferring, that’s nothing new. But to come back to the school that you transferred from, and that was just really to give her an opportunity to get more playing time with Charlisse Leger-Walker coming back from injury. So now Charlisse Leger-Walker is gone, Elina is back, and then that’s what every coach needs: a point guard. She’s got it,” Miller added.

The UCLA Bruins did not only make history by winning their first-ever NCAA championship last season. Just eight days after that triumph, they also became the first team in history to have five players selected in the first round and six players drafted overall in a single WNBA draft. So, just like Miller pointed out, these were absolutely key players to that championship triumph, as further evidenced by their presence and contributions in the WNBA at the moment.

Notably, Lauren Betts, who was the Final Four Most Outstanding Player (MOP), was the core of UCLA’s championship team and is currently with the Washington Mystics, averaging 6.4 points and 4.4 rebounds in an average of 17.1 minutes per game for the Mystics. There’s also Kiki Rice, averaging 12.5 points, 3.3 assists, and 3.5 rebounds in over 26 minutes per game. In short, all six departed players are active in the WNBA, averaging 8-24 minutes per game.

However, despite the significance of what they meant to the Bruins and what they are doing in the WNBA, they will not be greatly missed, as coach Cori Close, who did well not to lose a single player to the transfer portal, has also done a good job in terms of harnessing that same portal to replenish the obvious gaps that their departure left on the roster.

Alongside the returning core of Timea Gardiner, Amanda Muse, Lena Bilić, Christina Karamouzi, and sophomore forward Sienna Betts, Lauren’s sister, whom Miller believes Close will build around, Coach Close has also secured five elite transfers and two international freshmen to assemble their official 2026-27 UCLA Bruins roster.

Most notably, she brought in 5-foot-10 guard Elina Aarnisalo, who actually made her collegiate debut with UCLA during the 2024–25 season as a true freshman but transferred to North Carolina for her sophomore year. However, following the 2025–26 season, where she averaged 10.2 points and shot 40.3% from deep for UNC, she’s back to fill the Bruins’ need for perimeter shooting.

For Miller, Aarnisalo is definitely a key piece in the new-look team that Cori Close has assembled this season. And seeing how much of a success they achieved last year, and what the departing players went on to do in the draft and are doing in the WNBA, Aarnisalo herself was definitely aching to join the Bruins again.

“I Wanted to Come Back”: Elina Aarnisalo Details What Made UCLA Return Appealing

Making the decision to come back to UCLA was a mutually beneficial move for Elina Aarnisalo and the UCLA Bruins. For her, it was an opportunity to experience the high standards and winning environment that ultimately reflected in the team’s record-breaking success in the 2026 WNBA Draft. And for the Bruins, they definitely needed to fill the quality gap that had emerged following the exodus of their championship-winning stars.

Speaking on her decision to return to UCLA, Aarnisalo revealed her awareness of the fact that there would be several open spots on the UCLA Bruins roster as a result of the team’s departures, and the opportunity to fill that space did interest her. But aside from that, her decision was also fueled by her familiarity with the program, its standards, and the success she had already seen from her former teammates in the environment.

“There’s going to be a lot of spots on the team open now after a big draft class,” Aarnisalo said to reporters after UCLA’s first practice on Thursday. “And a lot of seniors leaving, that obviously interested me too. Talking with Cori [about] what my role could be on this team and what we could accomplish this year … just knowing the standards at UCLA, how we practice, how they focus on individual work; I’ve seen it, and I’ve seen my old teammates [and] how they’ve succeeded in this environment, which is why I wanted to come back.”

And of course, looking at the calibre of players that Coach Close has retained and brought in, it does appear like this team is primed for another successful college basketball season ahead.

Alongside Elina Aarnisalo, Coach Close has also secured 6-foot-2 versatile forward Addy Brown, who averaged 11.9 points, 8.8 rebounds, and 5.3 assists per game for Iowa State last season. She has also brought in Donovyn Hunter, a lockdown 6-foot guard who earned All-Pac-12 Defensive honours earlier in her career and averaged 10.2 points while starting all 38 games for TCU.

There is also gritty 5-foot-9 guard Bonnie Deas, who averaged 10.2 points and led Arkansas in both rebounds (9.0 RPG) and assists (2.6 APG) last season. And KK Bransford, a 5-foot-11 fifth-year veteran guard and former team captain for the Fighting Irish, is bringing vital leadership to the new locker room.

Like NCAA analyst Shimmy Miller pointed out, this definitely doesn’t look like a team that will struggle next season. But then, it’s sport, and we’ll have to wait and see if that’ll actually be the case.