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Dallas Wings fan Ally Pleckaitis celebrates holding a photo of UConn guard Azzi Fudd alongside Josh Dewey after Fudd was announced as the Wings selection with the first overall pick during a 2026 WNBA draft party at Happiest Hour on Monday, April 13, 2026, in Dallas, Texas.<\/p>\n
Smiley N. Pool\/The Dallas Morning News<\/p>\n
Kenzie Etzler had a feeling the Dallas Wings <\/a>would take UConn star Azzi Fudd No. 1 overall in the 2026 WNBA draft.<\/p>\n And that\u2019s exactly what happened on Monday night,<\/a> as Etzler and other Wings fans gathered for a draft party at Happiest Hour in Dallas and celebrated their team\u2019s newest star.<\/p>\n Article continues below this ad<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019ve been watching Paige [Bueckers] and Azzi for 2-3 years now, so I\u2019m just excited that they\u2019re going to be playing on the same team again,\u201d Etzler said after the Wings made the pick that reunited the former UConn teammates. “I always knew it was going to be Azzi. I had her picked since Paige got drafted last year.\u201d<\/p>\n But in a year where there was no consensus No. 1 pick, some fans thought the Wings could go in another direction by drafting\u00a0TCU\u2019s Olivia Miles<\/a> or 19-year-old Spanish center Awa Fam Thiam. Along with Fudd, both had topped mock drafts.<\/p>\n Shortly before the Wings made their pick, Nick Angstadt said Dallas should take Fam Thiam for her potential.\u00a0<\/p>\n Make Dallas News a preferred source so your search results prioritize writing by actual people, not AI.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Add Preferred Source<\/p>\n <\/a><\/p>\n \u201cShe could be the MVP of the league in like four years,\u201d Angstadt said.<\/p>\n Article continues below this ad<\/p>\n But when he weighed the Wings’ 3-point shooting struggles over the last several seasons, Fudd made sense.<\/p>\n \u201cBring [Fudd\u2019s shooting], the vibes, the passing. Give me all of that,\u201d Angstadt said.<\/p>\n Dallas Wings players, from left, Shyanne Sellers, JJ Quinerly, Maddy Siegrist, Aziaha and James applaud after UConn guard Azzi Fudd was announced as the Wings selection with the first overall pick during a 2026 WNBA draft party at Happiest Hour on Monday, April 13, 2026, in Dallas, Texas.<\/p>\n Smiley N. Pool\/The Dallas Morning News Dallas Wings fan Ally Pleckaitis celebrates holding a photo of UConn guard Azzi Fudd alongside Josh Dewey after Fudd was announced as the Wings selection with the first overall pick during a 2026 WNBA draft party at Happiest Hour on Monday, April 13, 2026, in Dallas, Texas.<\/p>\n Smiley N. Pool\/The Dallas Morning News Members of the Dallas Wings Flight Crew warm up the crowd during a 2026 WNBA draft party at Happiest Hour on Monday, April 13, 2026, in Dallas.<\/p>\n Smiley N. Pool\/The Dallas Morning News Dallas Wings fan Ally Pleckaitis celebrates holding a photo of UConn guard Azzi Fudd alongside Josh Dewey before Fudd was announced as the Wings selection with the first overall pick during a 2026 WNBA draft party at Happiest Hour on Monday, April 13, 2026, in Dallas, Texas.<\/p>\n Smiley N. Pool\/The Dallas Morning News Maddy Siegrist of the Dallas Wings is interviewed after UConn guard Azzi Fudd was announced as the Wings selection with the first overall pick during a 2026 WNBA draft party at Happiest Hour on Monday, April 13, 2026, in Dallas, Texas.<\/p>\n Smiley N. Pool\/The Dallas Morning News A vendor shows off a Dallas Wings jersey for Azzi Fudd after the UConn guard was announced as the Dallas Wings selection with the first overall pick during a 2026 WNBA draft party at Happiest Hour on Monday, April 13, 2026, in Dallas.<\/p>\n Smiley N. Pool\/The Dallas Morning News<\/p>\n Colton Green said he was a believer in Miles.\u00a0<\/p>\n Article continues below this ad<\/p>\n \u201cI think she\u2019s the best player in the draft. I think when you have pick No. 1, you should go for the best player in the draft,\u201d Green said minutes before the Wings were on the clock. \u201cI don\u2019t know if a 3-and-D will slot in the best right now.\u201d<\/p>\n Darius Tse and Erin Curry, who shared the same table with Green at the Happiest Hour draft party, countered his opinion.<\/p>\n \u201cI do think we should take Azzi Fudd,\u201d Tse said. \u201cBecause we do have a lot of defense. But we\u2019re going to need more defense.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cAnd we had the worst 3-point shooting percentage last year in the league,\u201d Curry added. \u201cAnd Azzi Fudd\u2019s a 3-point shooter. Seems like a natural fit to fill a need.\u201d<\/p>\n Article continues below this ad<\/p>\n But Tse did agree that Miles was the best player in the draft, noting her six triple-doubles at TCU this season.<\/a><\/p>\n Green said he thought a lot of bad discourse surrounding who should go No. 1 came as a result of \u201cbox-score watching.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cAll these people, they\u2019re not really watching EuroLeague. Some people are, but people speaking on Awa Fam, I don\u2019t think they\u2019re actually watching it,\u201d Green said. \u201cAnd I think [with]\u00a0stan culture, people want their favorites to go to their favorite team. I don\u2019t blame them, but I think that has not been good for discourse.\u201d<\/p>\n By signing up, you agree to our Terms Of Use<\/a> and acknowledge that your information will be used as described in our Privacy Policy<\/a>.<\/p>\n The discourse is moot now that the Wings have made their pick. Fudd is headed to Dallas, which also made big moves in free agency.<\/p>\n Article continues below this ad<\/p>\n Before it became official, Teresa Solano figured that the Wings would take Fudd and said she\u2019s excited for the team.<\/p>\n \u201cI think it\u2019s going to be a really great season,\u201d\u00a0Solano said. \u201cThey\u2019ve gotten some great [acquisitions] so far.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Dallas Wings fan Ally Pleckaitis celebrates holding a photo of UConn guard Azzi Fudd alongside Josh Dewey after…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":248720,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[732,102,104,103,94507],"class_list":{"0":"post-248719","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-dallas","8":"tag-article","9":"tag-dallas","10":"tag-dallas-headlines","11":"tag-dallas-news","12":"tag-tp-wnba"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/248719","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=248719"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/248719\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/248720"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=248719"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=248719"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=248719"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}<\/p>\n
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