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Neil Paine
How much a coach wins or loses is of paramount importance when evaluating their performance, but so is how they did relative to expectations. Win more than oddsmakers projected you would? You should be in line for Coach of the Year consideration. Win less? Research suggests your seat is warming up.
(Incidentally, this is why we often see Coach of the Year winners seemingly carry a “curse” in subsequent seasons: One year’s surprising overperformance sets the bar of future expectations higher, portending backlash — and sometimes dismissal — when they go unmet.)
The same applies to new hires. While the jobs they take were generally open for a reason, the question isn’t whether they would immediately contend for a championship — it’s whether they could get more out of their rosters than oddsmakers and pundits assumed in the preseason.
That’s why we leveraged Elo forecasts to rank the seven first-year WNBA coaches by whether they are on pace to lead their teams to more (or fewer) wins than ESPN BET had projected with preseason over/unders. As a bonus, we also highlighted players who have played key roles and are on track to produce more Estimated RAPTOR wins than we would have expected based on their established levels of recent performance. Because, rookie or not, top coaches are the ones who coax the best performances out of their players.
Preseason over/under wins: 8.5
Current win projection: 23.9
Difference: +15.4
Pleasant surprises: Veronica Burton (+5.1 wins); The darkness of the fagbenle (+2.4)
The favorite to win Coach of the Year, Nakase has done an incredible job molding together the WNBA’s first expansion team in 17 years. The initial edition of the Valkyries are not just far more competitive than expected — their preseason O/U total was a mere 8.5 wins! — but they have all but assured themselves of a playoff berth, which a first-year club hasn’t done since 1997, when every WNBA team was technically in its first season.
Nakase’s team has leaned on its defense in particular, ranking fifth in defensive efficiency and No. 1 in fewest points allowed per game, while yielding the league’s lowest effective FG% (47.2) by a comfortable margin. (Related: Eight of the 12 qualified WNBA players allowing the fewest paint points per 100 possessions are Valkyries.)
Nakase’s top accomplishments at Golden State’s helm include unlocking the potential of Burton, the former No. 7 pick in the draft out of Northwestern who struggled to find an expanded role — despite good per-minute numbers — in Dallas and Connecticut over her first three seasons. Playing a career-high 29.3 MPG, Burton has emerged as Golden State’s best player and a two-way contributor who can make a difference in a variety of different ways. She leads a large group of Valkyries who have performed much better than in their previous stops; of Golden State’s nine leading minute-earning veterans, seven have an above-average RAPTOR rating and seven are tracking to generate more wins than their previously-established level of production.
This type of across-the-roster improvement is often the hallmark of great coaching.
Preseason over/under wins: 21.5
Current win projection: 29.4
Difference: +7.9
Pleasant surprises: Allisha Gray (+2.0 wins); Maya Caldwell (+2.0)
The Dream were hoping to return to a near-.500 level — like they had played at in 2023, when they went 19-21 — after a down year in 2024 under former coach Tanisha Wright; they weren’t necessarily expected to be in the field of title contenders. Atlanta has never been a powerhouse anyway; even when the Dream made three Finals appearances in four years from 2010 to 2013, they never ranked better than fourth in net rating during the regular season.
It’s a testament to the job done by Smesko, the former Florida Gulf Coast architect who had only coached in college before this, that the Dream are right next to the Lynx and Aces in the Elo title odds — and ahead of the slumping defending champion Liberty. Along with Minnesota, which ranks No. 1 in both categories, Atlanta is one of just two teams that are top-two on both offense and defense this year, with guard Allisha Gray finding a new gear to her game at age 30 as the team’s leading scorer, and the rest of a deep roster showing up big. (Of their eight most frequently-used players by minutes, only Brittney grins has a negative RAPTOR.)
What’s even more impressive is that the Dream have done this with two of their best players, Rhyne Howard and Jordin Canada, injured for significant stretches of the season. We might see even more of Smesko’s coaching at work with them back for the playoffs.
Preseason over/under wins: 14.5
Current win projection: 17.0
Difference: +2.5
Pleasant surprises: Sonia Citron (+5.3 wins); Suck Sutton (+2.3)
The Mystics won’t make the playoffs this year, which is disappointing for a team that has just three postseason bids (all first-round losses) in the six seasons since its magical run to the 2019 championship. However, Johnson does have Washington on track to beat its modest preseason win total, despite relying heavily on an inexperienced group in his first season as a WNBA head coach.
With an average minute-weighted roster age of 24.7, the Mystics are the youngest team in the league by a fairly wide margin over the Wings (25.3) and Valkyries (27.1). Washington’s two leading players by minutes are a pair of rookies (Citron and Kiki Iriafen), and Nos. 3 and 4 in playing time (Sug Sutton and Jade Melbourne) had combined for just two previous seasons with more than 400 minutes at the WNBA level. The team also traded Brittney Sykesits most established player, to the Storm in early August.
Johnson has gotten a number of encouraging performances out of his younger players — most notably Citron, who played at Notre Dame and looks as if she will be one of the league’s top guards for years to come.
Preseason over/under wins: 20.5
Current win projection: 20.7
Difference: +0.2
Pleasant surprises: Azura Stevens (+3.4 wins); Dearica Hamby (+2.7)
The Sparks will most likely miss out on the playoffs in Roberts’ first season as coach after a long stint at the helm of Utah’s program. But while they are tracking to finish below .500 for the fifth consecutive season, they are also on pace to exceed their preseason win total — and there are other signs of progress for a team that has risen from a net rating of -9.1 last season to a more competitive -2.6 this year.
Franchise centerpiece Kelsey Plum has been her usual self, but Roberts has also overseen ongoing improvements from veterans Hamby and Stevens, with guard Julie German also reinvigorating her WNBA career after spending a few years overseas.
Preseason over/under wins: 10.5
Current win projection: 10.7
Difference: +0.2
Pleasant surprises: Leila Lacan (+3.3 wins); Saniya rivers (+2.5)
There’s not a whole lot of good coming out of this season for Connecticut, which is the league’s worst team in Basketball Reference’s Simple Ratings System, and has fallen far from grace after a run of eight straight playoff appearances (including two Finals runs) between 2017 and 2024. But the young trio of Olivia Nelson-OdodaRivers and Lacan — who has been their most impactful player when given a chance to play — has kept the Sun running at a pace above their preseason win total (if only slightly).
Preseason over/under wins: 18.5
Current win projection: 10.7
Difference: -7.8
Pleasant surprises: Chamomile cardoso (+0.9 wins); Rachel Banham (+0.3)
The Sky missed the playoffs with a 13-27 record and -6.5 net rating (third-worst in the WNBA) under Teresa Weatherspoon last season. But this season’s version of the Sky under Marsh has been much worse — and more disappointing. Unlike in 2024, when they were expected to play to the level of their 12.5-win over/under, more was expected from the 2025 Sky after making headlines with offseason moves for Courtney Vandersloot, Ariel Atkins, Rebecca Allen and Kia Nurse. But Vandersloot was injured after just seven games and Allen is having arguably a career-worst season.
Losing seven of their first 10 games by an average margin of nearly 20 PPG foreshadowed their 12th-ranked -12.1 net rating on the season.
Angel Reese served a half-game suspension on Sunday after complaining about the Sky’s talent level, saying she “might have to move in a different direction” if the roster didn’t improve. (It’s worth noting she has a lower RAPTOR rating than in her rookie campaign.) But the episode illustrated the overall frustration level in Chicago around how Marsh’s team has failed to meet expectations this year.
Preseason over/under wins: 19.5
Current win projection: 9.7
Difference: -9.8
Pleasant surprises: Paige Bueckers (+5.1 wins); Luisa Geiselsoder (+1.2)
Perhaps expecting a Caitlin Clark-style rookie effect from Bueckers, the oddsmakers set a 19.5-win over/under for the 2025 Wings despite them having gone 9-31 under previous coach Latricia Trammell last season. It certainly has been a new-look roster in Dallas — only three members of that 2024 squad (Ariko SpringileTeaira McCowan and Maddy Siegrist) returned for 2025, while the team revamped with veterans Tyasha Harris, Dijons Carrington, Myisha Hines-Allen and NaLyssa Smithin addition to rookies Bueckers, Geiselsoder, Aziaha James and JJ Quinerlyamong others.
But the veteran arrivals have uniformly underperformed their previous established RAPTOR wins added, and most of the rookies are taking time to adjust. That has led to a situation in which Bueckers is having one of the WNBA’s all-time “great player on a bad team” seasons in her debut campaign — which is impressive for her, but not a great reflection on Koclanes’ ability to complement his young star with more effective play from others, particularly on a defense that ranks dead last.
