4X WNBA Champion Crowns Paige Bueckers ROTY as Wings Guard Joins Caitlin Clark in Historic Scoring List

The air in Dallas shifted almost overnight. What began as sadness for slipping out of playoff position and anxiously tracking the Rookie of the Year race, has now become a mission to simply protect Paige Bueckers. For a city that thrives on star power, 2025 has been especially jarring. In February, the Mavericks stunned the NBA by sending Luka Dončić to the Los Angeles Lakers. Just when fans were still reeling, the Cowboys followed suit. They traded away Micah Parsons to the Green Bay Packers. Two of Dallas’ brightest cornerstones were gone in the span of months.

Now, all eyes remain on the rookie guard who hasn’t even guided the Wings to a playoff berth: Paige Bueckers. That’s the irony, and maybe even the danger: she hasn’t had the postseason stage to prove herself, but if anything, her individual brilliance is undeniable. If Rookie of the Year were about sheer performance, she would already be the frontrunner, at least Sue Bird certainly seems to think so. On Bird’s Eye View, the legend didn’t hesitate to run through Paige’s rookie résumé. It happened fresh off her joining Caitlin Clark as just the ninth rookie in WNBA history to score 600+ points. Here’s the landscape-

1. Caitlin Clark: 769 (2024)
2. Seimone Augustus: 744
3. A’ja Wilson: 682
4. Arike Ogunbowale: 630
5. Cappie Pondexter: 624
6. Cynthia Cooper: 621
7. Breanna Stewart: 621
8. Candace Parker: 610
9. Paige Bueckers: 606 (2025)

With four games left and a 19 points-per-game average, Paige is projected to land around 682, right in A’ja Wilson territory. Even if she doesn’t reach that exact mark, just being in this historic top ten as a rookie is nothing short of remarkable. In fact, that list seems to be never ending and Sue Bird captured it perfectly. “She’s fifth in scoring, she’s 10th in assists, and she’s fifth in steals per game. This makes her the only player in the league who’s in the top 10 in all of those categories. And that’s league-wide, not just rookies. Plus, she’s top 10 in assists to turnover ratio.”

Sue Bird admitted she can’t really keep track of all the “fastest to points” records floating around, but she knows what really matters: efficiency. And that, is exactly what Paige delivered on the night that may have sealed Rookie of the Year. She dropped 44 points on 17-for-21 shooting (over 80%) becoming the first player in league history to shoot that well while scoring 40+. In Bird’s words, “She pretty much locked up Rookie of the Year that night. That all happened in one night.”

So yes, when it comes to Paige Bueckers, the city has something worth holding onto. The ROTY title seems destined to follow her home, and as for those worried about “protecting Paige,” they can rest a little easier. After all, the only trade Paige has on her mind isn’t about leaving Dallas at all. It’s about swapping lives with Zendaya for a day. Moreover, with her old teammate suiting up for the Wings for a while now, she has all the more reason to keep showing up for Dallas.

Paige Bueckers Finds Sisterhood in Dallas’ Crisis

And that’s where the story takes a turn back to Storrs. On Friday, the Wings announced a set of roster moves to keep the team afloat. With that news, came a familiar face for Paige Bueckers: her former UConn teammate Christyn Williams. The franchise signed her to an extreme hardship contract. It is a mechanism that lets teams exceed the roster limit until they return to at least 10 healthy players and Williams now finds herself sharing the court with Bueckers once again. For Dallas fans worried about Paige going anywhere, the timing couldn’t be better.

Williams’ path to this moment has been anything but easy. A second-round pick in 2022, she was waived by Washington after a knee injury and later released by both Phoenix and Minnesota before finding her way back through Dallas. In college, though, she was a proven star: American Conference Rookie of the Year in 2018-19, two-time All-AAC selection, and an All-Big East honoree after UConn changed conferences. Over four years, she averaged 14 points and 3.9 rebounds per game, carving out her place in Huskies lore while overlapping with Bueckers for two seasons.

Now, that bond gets a new chapter in Dallas. “I know Krysten has had a journey, kind of like mine, where she’s had to battle injuries and find her way in the league,” Bueckers said. “So it’s really awesome that she gets an opportunity to show. Obviously being on the same team, for us to share that moment together is really exciting. I know she’s worked extremely hard to get here, and we have a great history playing together, so that’s always sisterhood.”

For a franchise searching for stability, that bond matters. Paige Bueckers may be carrying Dallas’ future on her shoulders, but with Williams beside her, the city’s present feels just a little more grounded…