{"id":245747,"date":"2025-10-23T09:41:06","date_gmt":"2025-10-23T09:41:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/245747\/"},"modified":"2025-10-23T09:41:06","modified_gmt":"2025-10-23T09:41:06","slug":"valkyries-fan-favorite-is-taking-full-advantage-of-huge-offseason-opportunity","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/245747\/","title":{"rendered":"Valkyries fan favorite is taking full advantage of huge offseason opportunity"},"content":{"rendered":"

Many fans in the Bay Area were ecstatic when the Valkyries picked up Kaitlyn Chen in June. The Valkyries drafted her in the third round in 2025, and, as is common for such a late draft pick, Chen didn\u2019t make the initial roster. However, she got a second shot with the team when several players left to play in EuroBasket, and she remained on the roster for the rest of the season. While on the roster, Chen found herself at the end of Natalie Nakase\u2019s bench and didn\u2019t play much.\u00a0<\/p>\n

With a big free agency period coming up and the Valkyries still trying to build a championship contender, Chen\u2019s role in Golden State may be in jeopardy.<\/a> She is doing her best to make an impression on WNBA teams during her stint overseas. Chen\u2019s EuroLeague debut with the reigning champions ZVVZ USK Praha has been quiet but efficient so far.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Kaitlyn Chen recorded her first double-double as a pro<\/p>\n

Kaitlyn Chen is one of three 2025 WNBA rookies on Praha\u2019s roster, teaming up with fellow Valkyries rookie Janelle Sala\u00fcn and Makayla Timpson, as well as WNBA prospects Pauline Astier<\/a> and Emma Cechova. Unlike in the W, Chen is playing meaningful minutes for Praha, averaging 19.8 minutes per game over our games in the Czech league and 22 minutes over three EuroLeague games.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Chen found her footing quickly, recording her first double-double as a professional basketball player just seven games into the season. She finished Praha\u2019s win over Gdynia with 10 points on 5-7 shooting from the field, 7 rebounds, 10 assists, and 1 steal. Chen also only turned the ball over once in 23 minutes on the court. It was the second time this season that Chen scored in double figures, but the first time she reached such a high number of assists.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Playing in Europe will be great for Chen\u2019s development\u00a0<\/p>\n

EuroLeague is a great opportunity for players from the U.S. to spend the offseason playing against experienced professionals and some of the best international players in the game. It is an especially valuable experience for young players who haven\u2019t carved out a secure role for themselves in the WNBA yet. Chen falls into that category. She proved that she could contribute to a winning team, but she also wasn\u2019t a productive key player for the Valkyries.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Playing in Europe, working on her game, and gaining confidence as well as experience will be invaluable to Chen\u2019s WNBA journey. Third-round picks don\u2019t often have long WNBA careers or manage to establish themselves as role players. In recent years, Temi Fagbenle, Stephanie Talbot, Li Yueru, and Sug Sutton, for example, managed to do it, but it doesn\u2019t happen often. So, Chen will have to work overtime to stake her claim as a contributor in the WNBA. <\/p>\n

Fortunately, league expansion\u2014and maybe roster expansion, depending on the outcome of the CBA negotiations\u2014will create more opportunities for players like Chen.\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Many fans in the Bay Area were ecstatic when the Valkyries picked up Kaitlyn Chen in June. The…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":245748,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[73],"tags":[99,434],"class_list":{"0":"post-245747","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-wnba","8":"tag-sports","9":"tag-wnba"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/245747","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=245747"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/245747\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/245748"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=245747"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=245747"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=245747"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}