DHJ Quick Take: Jessica Shepard to Join Dallas Wings

The Notre Dame Connection: Reuniting Jessica Shepard and Arike Ogunbowale isn’t just a nostalgia play—it’s a tactical one. The duo led the Fighting Irish to the 2018 NCAA title, and their shared history provides the “connective tissue” Curt Miller has prioritized for the Wings‘ locker room culture.

Sixth Player Pedigree: Shepard arrives in Arlington coming off a career year in Minnesota, where she finished third in WNBA Sixth Player of the Year voting. Her 63.8% field goal percentage in 2025 and elite rebounding (7.3 RPG) offer a stabilizing presence for a frontcourt that recently lost Luisa Geiselsöder to the Portland Fire.

Frontcourt Versatility: Pair Shepard’s interior efficiency with Awak Kuier’s shot-blocking and floor-spacing, and the Wings suddenly possess one of the most versatile big-man rotations in the league. At 29, Shepard is in her prime and provides a veteran buffer for the incoming No. 1 overall pick on April 13.

Financial Strategy: This signing used the cap space freed up by the Diamond Miller trade. By navigating the new $7 million cap to secure Shepard while Ogunbowale accepted a deal below her $1.4 million supermax, Dallas has successfully added high-end talent without sacrificing future flexibility.

ARLINGTON, Texas — The Dallas Wings have agreed to a multi-year contract with forward Jessica Shepard, sources told Dallas Hoops Journal. The 6-foot-4 forward joins Dallas after spending her entire WNBA career with the Minnesota Lynx, bringing size, interior efficiency, and a proven track record as a frontcourt contributor — along with a pre-existing connection to a franchise cornerstone that dates back to their college days together at Notre Dame.

Shepard arrives as one of the more quietly productive forwards in the league, a player whose efficiency numbers have climbed steadily each season and who finished third in WNBA Sixth Player of the Year voting in 2025 while playing behind one of Minnesota’s deepest frontcourts.

For a Wings team that lost both Luisa Geiselsöder and Haley Jones to the Portland Fire in last week’s WNBA Expansion Draft, adding a proven interior presence with veteran experience was among the most pressing items on general manager Curt Miller‘s offseason checklist. Shepard addresses that need directly — and brings something extra along with her.

A Reunion With a Familiar Face

Shepard and Arike Ogunbowale were teammates with the Fighting Irish, winning an NCAA national championship together in 2018. The two now reunite in Dallas, where Ogunbowale just re-signed on a seven-figure, multi-year deal of her own. That shared history is the kind of connective tissue Miller has identified as a building block of the culture he is trying to construct in North Texas.

“The culture in the locker room is also important. Our players are genuinely close, which is rare for a losing team. We intentionally put great humans in that room, but now we need to raise our talent level,” Miller told Dallas Hoops Journal in an exclusive interview last August.

Shepard checks both boxes. She is the kind of high-character veteran Miller described as the target for Dallas’ offseason spending — and she arrives with an existing bond with one of the Wings’ franchise cornerstones already in place.

What Jessica Shepard Brings

Shepard enters her age-29 season coming off arguably the best campaign of her career. In 2025, she appeared in 40 games for Minnesota — 12 as a starter — and averaged 8.0 points, 7.3 rebounds, and 2.6 assists in 20.9 minutes per game while shooting a career-best 63.8% from the field. The performance earned her third-place recognition in WNBA Sixth Player of the Year voting.

Over 125 career games, Shepard has averaged 6.8 points, 6.5 rebounds, and 2.7 assists per game while shooting 53.5% from the field — numbers that reflect both her efficiency in the paint and her ability to contribute across multiple areas as a complementary talent.

The path to that production has not been without obstacles. Shepard tore her ACL six games into her 2019 rookie season with Minnesota, missed the entire 2020 campaign while recovering, and spent the better part of her career rebuilding toward the player she showed flashes of in that abbreviated debut — when she led the Lynx with 13 rebounds and 6 assists in her very first WNBA game, becoming just the third player in league history to record 10-plus rebounds and 5-plus assists in their debut.

The durability she demonstrated across all 40 games in 2025 signals the injury concerns that once shadowed her career are firmly behind her.

A Fit for What the Dallas Wings Are Building

Shepard’s arrival is precisely the kind of move Miller telegraphed last August when laying out the Wings’ offseason blueprint. With a roster built largely around younger players on rookie-scale deals, Dallas entered free agency with the flexibility to pursue veterans at competitive numbers.

“We’re going to have a really young core group to build with,” Miller told Dallas Hoops Journal. “Why that’s important is they’ll be on inexpensive or less expensive contracts, which gives us flexibility in free agency to make really competitive offers — maybe even an over-offer when needed — to acquire veteran talent around that young core.”

Shepard is that veteran. A high-efficiency big man who finished third in Sixth Player of the Year voting while playing behind one of the deepest frontcourts in the league is a meaningful addition for a Wings team that needs proven contributors surrounding its younger pieces. Paired with Awak Kuier — whose shot-blocking and perimeter range give Dallas a different frontcourt dimension — Shepard gives the Wings two legitimate interior options heading into what figures to be a dramatically more competitive season.

Another Move for the Dallas Wings

The Shepard signing is the latest in a series of moves that have reshaped the Wings’ roster over the past two weeks.

Ogunbowale headlines the offseason, re-signing on a seven-figure, multi-year deal after taking less than her $1.4 million supermax qualifying offer to give the front office additional cap flexibility. Kuier was also re-signed, returning from three seasons in Europe where she averaged 12.9 points, 6.3 rebounds, 2.0 blocks, and 1.0 steals per game for Galatasaray while shooting 59.3% from the field and 40.9% from three, leading the Euroleague in blocks.

Center Li Yueru and guard Grace Berger have both accepted qualifying offers, retaining two rotation contributors from last season as restricted free agents. In a salary-clearing transaction, Dallas sent forward Diamond Miller to the Connecticut Sun in exchange for center/forward Rayah Marshall, generating a minimum savings of $259,088 with the potential to clear Miller’s full $536,588 salary with an additional roster move.

The offseason also brought losses. The Portland Fire claimed Geiselsöder and Jones in last week’s WNBA Expansion Draft — two rotation pieces whose departures created the frontcourt need Shepard now helps fill. Geiselsöder averaged 6.9 points and 4.8 rebounds across 28 games in 2025. Jones averaged career bests of 8.1 points, 3.8 rebounds, and 2.5 assists across 24 appearances.

Up Next for the Dallas Wings

With the roster continuing to evolve, Dallas turns its attention to Sunday’s WNBA Draft on April 13, where the Wings hold both the No. 1 overall pick and the No. 31 selection.

The 2026 season gets underway May 9 on the road against the Indiana Fever at noon CT, with the home opener to follow May 12 at College Park Center in Arlington, Texas, at 7 p.m. against the Atlanta Dream.