{"id":305610,"date":"2025-11-21T18:19:08","date_gmt":"2025-11-21T18:19:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/305610\/"},"modified":"2025-11-21T18:19:08","modified_gmt":"2025-11-21T18:19:08","slug":"lady-vols-basketball-forward-projected-as-first-round-wnba-draft-pick-after-strong-start","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/305610\/","title":{"rendered":"Lady Vols Basketball Forward Projected as First-Round WNBA Draft Pick After Strong Start"},"content":{"rendered":"

\t\t\t\t\t\"\"<\/a>GREENSBORO, NC \u2013 November 04, 2025 \u2013 Forward Janiah Barker #0 of the Tennessee Lady Volunteers during the Ro Greensboro Invitational game between the NC State Wolfpack and the Tennessee Lady Vols at First Horizon Coliseum in Greensboro, NC. Photo By Kate Luffman\/Tennessee Athletics<\/p>\n

After five games with Lady Vols basketball, transfer forward Janiah Barker has continued to cement her case to be a first-round WNBA draft pick. She was thought to be a candidate for one of the first 15 picks heading into the season, and her strong play to begin her Tennessee career has kept her firmly in the mix.<\/p>\n

According to ESPN\u2019s<\/a> updated 2026 WNBA Mock Draft, Barker is projected to be the 13th selection to the Atlanta Dream. That is the closest team to Knoxville in the league.<\/p>\n

\u201cBarker previously played for Texas A&M and UCLA, and will finish her college career at No. 15 Tennessee,\u201d ESPN\u2019s<\/a> Michael Voepel wrote. \u201cHer skill set at her size has long interested WNBA evaluators, but she will have to show consistency through this season. She is averaging 14.4 points and 6.2 rebounds for the Lady Vols.\u201d<\/p>\n

More From RTI:\u00a0What Lady Vols Basketball Coach Kim Caldwell Said After Drubbing of MTSU<\/a><\/p>\n

After five games, in which she\u2019s started in all, Barker is averaging 14.4 points on 49% shooting from the field and 35.3% from three. This goes with 6.2 rebounds and 1.2 assists per game. She\u2019s also grabbed five steals and swatted five stats so far.<\/p>\n

Most recently, Barker dropped 20 points on 6-for-10 shooting from the field and a made three in the 85-41 win over MTSU. She snagged 12 rebounds, as well, to mark her first double-double of the season.<\/p>\n

\u201cShe has had some good practices back to back to back to really build those up, and she made the\u00a0right play,\u201d Lady Vols head coach Kim Caldwell said<\/a> after the game. \u201cShe didn\u2019t try to force it. She took what the game gave her, which I think is gonna be the biggest thing for her because it\u2019s gonna give her a lot. She can score multiple ways. And so she didn\u2019t try to force it. She didn\u2019t make up her mind. She read the defense and I think just continuing to get that out of her and teaching her how to do that at game speed, she\u2019ll just continue to get better and better.\u201d<\/p>\n

Tennessee\u2019s next game is against Coppin State on Sunday. Tip-off is scheduled for 2 p.m. ET and will air on SECN+.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"GREENSBORO, NC \u2013 November 04, 2025 \u2013 Forward Janiah Barker #0 of the Tennessee Lady Volunteers during the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":305611,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[73],"tags":[3444,117460,127653,128274,99,37754,434],"class_list":{"0":"post-305610","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-wnba","8":"tag-atlanta-dream","9":"tag-janiah-barker","10":"tag-lady-vols","11":"tag-lady-vols-basketball","12":"tag-sports","13":"tag-tennessee-lady-vols","14":"tag-wnba"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/305610","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=305610"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/305610\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/305611"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=305610"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=305610"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=305610"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}