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Angel Reese Selected in the WNBA Draft 7th Overall by Chicago Sky – LSU
BROOKLYN, N.Y. – Angel Reese was chosen by the Chicago Sky throughout Monday night time’s WNBA Draft within the first spherical with the No. 7 decide contained in the Brooklyn Academy of Music.
Reese turns into the 23rd participant from LSU to be chosen within the WNBA Draft and the eighth to go within the first spherical. She can also be the 24th participant that Kim Mulkey has despatched to the WNBA and 10th to be picked within the first spherical. She is LSU’s first first-round choice since LaSondra Barrett was taken with decide No. 10 by Washington within the 2012 WNBA Draft.
Chicago entered Monday holding the No. 8 decide, however put a deal along with Minnesota to maneuver as much as No. 7, probably to make sure their potential to choose Reese. She is going to be part of the Sky, who went 18-22 final season and fell within the first spherical of the WNBA Playoffs to the longer term champions Las Vegas Aces.
WNBA camp is ready to start on April 13. The preseason will kickoff on Could 3 with the common season set to start 11 days in a while Could 14.
Reese is the third participant from LSU to be chosen by the Sky; Sylvia Fowles was chosen by Chicago for the second decide of the 2008 draft; and Quianna Chaney was taken within the second spherical with the 19th general decide by the Sky, additionally in 2008.
“Angel transferred to LSU after my first season in Baton Rouge and he or she helped rework our program,” Coach Kim Mulkey stated. “When she got here right here, she stated she needed to be right here for 2 seasons and he or she has lived as much as that. What a outstanding two years it has been. We’re all indebted to Angel Reese for the contributions she has given to this program, serving to us win our first Nationwide Championship, and the contributions she made on our college as an entire. She not solely helped develop our program but in addition had an impression on rising the sport of girls’s basketball throughout the nation. We want her good luck as she strikes to the WNBA and sit up for see all that she accomplishes with the Chicago Sky. We’ll miss her however will at all times cherish the 2 yr’s we acquired to spend together with her. Ceaselessly LSU.”
In her two seasons at LSU, Reese helped rework the ladies’s basketball program, main the Tigers to their first NCAA Championship final season. She has 61 double-doubles at LSU, trailing solely Sylvia Fowles in class historical past. The Baltimore, Maryland native had three separate streaks of no less than 10 straight double-doubles throughout her time in Baton Rouge.Reese averaged 20.9 factors and 14.4 rebounds per recreation in her time at LSU. Reese grew to become the primary participant since Wendy Scholtens from Vanderbilt in 1989 and 1990 to steer the league in each scoring and rebounding in consecutive seasons and was named this season’s SEC Participant of the 12 months. Reese had seven video games with no less than 20 factors and 20 rebounds over the previous two seasons.
“I’m leaving school with the whole lot I ever needed,” Reese stated on a video posted to X. “A level, a nationwide championship and this platform I may have by no means imagined. That is for the ladies who appear like me that’s going to talk up in what they imagine in. It’s unapologetically you. To develop ladies’s sports activities and to have an effect on these coming subsequent. This was a tough choice, however I belief the subsequent chapter as a result of I do know the creator. Bayou Barbie out.”
Reese noticed her model skyrocket at LSU. She got here to Baton Rouge with nearly 70,000 Instagram followers and now has 2.7- million. She has appeared on quite a few journal covers, like Sports activities Illustrated and Girls’s Well being. Reese received the 2023 ESPY for the Finest Breakthrough Athlete, was named the 2023 BET Sportswoman of the 12 months and the 2023 Sporting Information Athlete of the 12 months.
In her first season at LSU, Reese had a historic yr, averaging 23.0 factors and 15.4 rebounds per recreation, main the SEC in each stats to garner First Crew All-America accolades. She started the season with 23 consecutive double-doubles, breaking Fowles’ document of 19 consecutive double-doubles at LSU; it was additionally the longest double-double streak to start a season in SEC historical past. In complete, Reese recorded 34 double-doubles to set the NCAA document. She additionally set the SEC document with 555 rebounds, eight shy of the NCAA document. Reese made 240 free throws out of 339 makes an attempt, each SEC data. She had a number of viral moments, such because the “Shoe Block” in opposition to Arkansas and the efficiency of a tik tok dance in opposition to Tennessee, which helped her Bayou Barbie model skyrocket.
In LSU’s first recreation of the 2023 NCAA Event, Reese had 34 factors to tie the LSU match document (Marie Ferdinand, 2001) and 15 factors in opposition to Hawaii to turn out to be the primary SEC participant with 30 and 15 in a match recreation. Within the second spherical in opposition to Michigan, Reese had 25 factors and a LSU match document of 24 rebounds. She would document a double-double in every of LSU’s six NCAA Event video games, capping off the season together with her thirty fourth to set the NCAA document with 15 factors and 10 rebounds.
This season, Reese continued to dominate, averaging 18.6 factors and 13.4 rebounds per recreation, as soon as once more main the SEC in each classes. Reese had 27 double-doubles on the yr, and Reese recorded a double-double in every of LSU’s last 16 video games. Reese scored 20+ factors in 16 video games all year long and grabbed 15+ rebounds in 13 video games, together with three video games with 20 rebounds. She had one 25/20 recreation in opposition to Texas A&M.
Reese recorded a double-double in all 10 of the NCAA Event video games she performed as a Tiger, tying the NCAA Event document for consecutive double-doubles.
