The highest of the 2025 WNBA Draft skilled a significant shakeup when Olivia Miles entered the switch portal. Miles was projected to be the No. 2 decide in April’s draft and sure fall no decrease than third total, however as an alternative she has elected to increase her school profession, simply not at Notre Dame.
Though the period of the pandemic bonus 12 months has basically led to school basketball as eligible gamers needed to be on rosters throughout the 2020-21 season, which was when the present crop of fourth-year seniors was in highschool, eligibility choices are nonetheless at play for WNBA prospects. There are nonetheless medical redshirts, which is why Miles can play for an additional 12 months as a result of she missed the 2023-24 season with a torn ACL. Moreover, juniors who flip 22 throughout the 12 months of the draft have the choice to go professional or stay in class.
Miles’ resolution not solely represents the rising energy of participant company within the ladies’s basketball panorama, however it’s notably attention-grabbing strictly from a basketball consideration, as she is beloved by WNBA expertise evaluators. The previous Notre Dame guard was all however assured to be a lottery decide, with basic managers calling her the most secure decide within the draft past UConn’s Paige Bueckers. Her huge enchancment as a 3-point shooter (24.6 % earlier than the damage in comparison with 40.8 % after) was the tipping level when mixed together with her already glorious facilitation as a lead guard.
In principle, Miles’ inventory has nowhere to go however down if her taking pictures doesn’t stay constant at this degree. That signifies that when she will get picked isn’t almost as essential as how a lot cash she will make within the course of, the place she goes, and the way her physique feels after her ACL damage.
The WNBA is at the moment negotiating a brand new collective bargaining settlement with the gamers’ affiliation that might probably triple particular person salaries. Slightly than lock herself right into a four-year rookie contract totaling about $350,000, Miles may wait to enter the league till 2026 and presumably recoup that determine inside the first two seasons. Brokers have been advising school gamers throughout the nation with a further 12 months of eligibility to remain in class and reap the monetary rewards of the subsequent CBA.
If Miles makes her switch resolution inside the subsequent week, she may additionally safe title, picture and likeness commitments earlier than the ultimate listening to within the Home v. NCAA lawsuit on April 7. That is the final gasp for unregulated “pay-for-play” offers with athletes earlier than they’re assessed by an NCAA clearinghouse. Given Miles’ standing as a two-time All-American — the one different multi-time All-American to ever enter the portal was LSU’s Aneesah Morrow, who left DePaul — Miles will presumably be raking in money from collectives.
It’s price remembering that Miles’ exterior sponsorships will seemingly keep together with her when she turns skilled, supplementing her WNBA wage. Nevertheless, collectives affiliated with a college will solely be taken with her as a collegian; thus, that is her final alternative to drag in that individual income stream.
Most WNBA executives didn’t cite Miles’ well being as a priority within the lead-up to the draft, as she has suffered just one important damage and seemed to be in glorious type throughout the 2024-25 season. Nevertheless, she informed The Athletic in Birmingham that she will not be near the place she needs to be post-injury.
“My bodily form could possibly be higher,” Miles stated. “This damage, it’s an extended, lengthy course of. Even after you’re healed, getting the remainder of your physique to catch up. I’d say I’m not even 75 % of the best way there but.”
Taking the leap from school to the WNBA requires a sure degree of confidence not solely in a participant’s abilities, however of their physique. If Miles doesn’t really feel bodily herself, it wouldn’t be the correct time to play towards grown ladies in a bodily league. That’s an identical calculation that Azzi Fudd needed to make. The redshirt junior opted out of the 2025 draft to return to the Huskies regardless of additionally being a projected first-round decide. Fudd has barely performed one full wholesome season at UConn and will stand to get stronger earlier than becoming a member of the W.
Miles additionally has extra to perform on the collegiate degree. She ended her season within the Candy 16, simply as she has each full season at Notre Dame, which was wanting what the Irish — who have been ranked No. 1 within the nation on Feb. 17 — had hoped for. There have been at all times questions in regards to the match between Miles and one other ball-dominant guard in Hannah Hidalgo. Now, Miles can discover one other staff the place she is the full-time level guard and with extra returning expertise. Even when Miles returned, Notre Dame was dropping half its rotation (Sonia Citron, Maddy Westbeld, Liatu King and Liza Karlen) and bringing in a single top-100 recruit.
Flau’jae Johnson, a draft-eligible junior, stated she wished to do extra profitable earlier than leaving LSU, regardless of already being a nationwide champion.
“When you style the nationwide championship, you need extra,” Johnson stated after dropping within the Elite Eight. “And I really feel like that nationwide championship I had (as a freshman), yeah, I used to be a giant think about it, however there have been larger elements in that. I need my very own one. The place I lead the staff.”
Ta’Niya Latson, who was a 2025 All-American with Miles and Johnson, has skilled sufficient particular person accolades at Florida State. She additionally entered the portal as an alternative of the WNBA draft, having hit a repeated NCAA Event first-weekend ceiling with the Seminoles.
There’ll at all times be a draw to taking part in within the NCAA Event, one which the WNBA can’t match, and there are solely so a few years when gamers can participate in it. The entire aforementioned athletes have been disadvantaged of postseason expertise because of damage. Miles missed two tournaments, Fudd missed one and was ailing throughout one other, and Latson was injured throughout her freshman postseason.
This can be a scenario JuJu Watkins must contemplate when she returns from her ACL damage. Slightly than go professional in 2027, she may keep in school a fifth 12 months as a medical redshirt to get again the March time she misplaced, relying on what USC has achieved to that time.
Miles’ resolution doesn’t exist in a vacuum. It’s consultant of all of the monetary, medical and legacy-related questions that feminine athletes are confronting in a time once they have extra company than ever. The stability of energy is shifting, and faculties and WNBA groups at the moment are on the mercy of the gamers.
(Photograph: Michael Reaves / Getty Photos)