A\u2019ja Wilson is i\u2019nevitable. <\/p>\n
Following a historic championship season<\/a>, the WNBA All-Star was named the Associated Press Female Athlete of the Year<\/a> on Wednesday. It\u2019s the latest accolade acknowledging Wilson\u2019s unprecedented year that saw her named the league\u2019s most valuable player for a record fourth time, as well as co-defensive player of the year and finals MVP. <\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s an honor when you think about the group of women who have won before,\u201d Wilson said to the AP. \u201cJust to have my name be a part of it, I\u2019m blessed.\u201d<\/p>\n The Las Vegas Aces forward, who led her team to its third championship in four years, is just the fifth basketball player to be recognized for the award following Sheryl Swoopes (1993), Rebecca Lobo (1995), Candace Parker (2008, 2021) and Caitlin Clark (2024). <\/p>\n Wilson is the first player in WNBA or NBA history to win the championship; be named Finals MVP, league MVP and DPOY; and claim the scoring title in the same season. In June, she also became the fastest player to ever reach the 5,000-point milestone in the league. <\/p>\n To celebrate collecting an array of on-court achievements this season, Wilson donned a replica of Thanos\u2019 Infinity Gauntlet<\/a> during the Aces\u2019 victory parade in October. Under each of the golden glove\u2019s six Infinity Stones \u2014 which took the iconic Marvel Cinematic Universe villain an entire 23-film saga<\/a> to collect and unleash \u2014 Wilson reportedly wrote down a different season honor. <\/p>\n \u201cWhen you\u2019ve collected everything, that\u2019s Thanos,\u201d Wilson said to Time<\/a>, which named her the outlet\u2019s Athlete of the Year on Tuesday. \u201cAnd this year, I collected everything. I don\u2019t really talk much [s\u2014]. … I kind of let my game do it. This was my biggest moment of doing it, because no one\u2019s ever done what I\u2019ve done. And I think people really needed to understand that.\u201d<\/p>\n It appears Wilson will need to procure another gauntlet just to commemorate her numerous accomplishments off of the basketball court as well. In February, the former Gamecock standout saw her alma mater South Carolina hang her college jersey<\/a> in the rafters. In May, the two-time Olympic gold medalist<\/a> saw the first batch of her Nike signature shoe sell out<\/a> in a day. The bestselling<\/a> author was also recently revealed<\/a> as a member of the 2026 Met Gala\u2019s host committee. <\/p>\n In addition to being the WNBA\u2019s only four-time MVP and a three-time champion, Wilson is a two-time Finals MVP, a three-time DPOY and a seven-time All Star. And she\u2019s just getting started. <\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019m just going to continue to prove why I\u2019m one of the greatest and why my team is part of a dynamic dynasty,\u201d Wilson told the AP. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A\u2019ja Wilson is i\u2019nevitable. Following a historic championship season, the WNBA All-Star was named the Associated Press Female…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":338064,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[629],"tags":[4662,148256,49,48,148254,93952,148252,2002,148257,8490,148253,82,2341,15780,148255,45333,630,4458,2552],"class_list":["post-338063","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-wnba","tag-aja-wilson","tag-ap-female-athlete","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-dpoy","tag-finals-mvp","tag-infinity-gauntlet","tag-league","tag-on-court-achievement","tag-part","tag-same-season","tag-sports","tag-team","tag-thanos","tag-third-championship","tag-win-streak","tag-wnba","tag-wnba-all-star","tag-year"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/338063","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=338063"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/338063\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/338064"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=338063"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=338063"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=338063"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}