Seattle Storm ROSTER PREVIEW: New Faces, New Era

Coming into this off-season, the Storm faced a major fork in the road. For the past two seasons, they had high hopes of making a deep playoff run with a roster built around perennial all-stars Nneka Ogwumike and Skylar Diggins. However, both seasons ended in a first round playoff defeat, and both players are 35 years old. Should they run it back and hope a new head coach and better depth would be enough to get the team over the hump? Or was it time to move on and get younger? Well, the Storm chose door number two, and executed an impressively quick and coherent pivot into what can only be called a rebuild. 

Of the 8 players who started a game at some point last year, only one of them is on this year’s roster. Of the top 5 scorers on last year’s roster, zero return. Even with all those losses, however, the cupboard is far from bare. Let’s take a look at the players the Storm will go to battle with this year:

Ezi Magbegor

Ezi Magbegor has earned an All-Defensive Team nod in each of the last four years, and she led the league in total blocks last year (though A’Ja Wilson led in blocks per game, 2.3 to Ezi’s 2.2). Ezi’s offensive game took a step back when Nneka showed up two years ago, but she showed enough the year before that to make the 2023 All Star game. She’s still just 26 years old so she’s arguably not even in her prime yet. This year she will be the highest paid Storm player, and the only one making a max salary. 

The one tricky bit is that Ezi suffered a foot injury while helping Australia qualify for the FIBA World Cup back in March. The Storm have announced that she’ll be re-evaluated in mid-June, so she’s definitely going to miss the first month or two of the season, and depending on how that re-evaluation goes (and, quite frankly, how the Storm’s season is going) she might miss more than that. From my seat, this is all fine. The Storm aren’t prioritizing wins this season anyway, so the real question with Ezi was whether she wanted to sign up for the rebuild or whether she wanted to move on to another team. She and the Storm inked a 3-year contract, so they both seem committed to each other and that’s great news if you’re a Storm fan.

Dominique Malonga

The other key returning player is Dominique Malonga. The Storm drafted her at #2 overall in last year’s draft and GMs actually voted the 19-year-old Malonga as the rookie most likely to be the best player in five years. I suspect that Paige Bueckers would win that vote if they redid it now, and Dallas feels just fine about taking Paige at #1, but the point still stands that Dom has a sky-high ceiling. Her rookie year went just fine as well as she earned an all-rookie team nod despite the Storm bringing her off the bench while they focused on winning. You could see Dom getting better in real time as the season progressed, and anyone who watched Unrivaled this off-season could see the same thing. This year Dom should get all the minutes she could ask for and it’ll be interesting to see how the Storm offense evolves around her, especially with a new head coach in town.

Awa Fam

The story of this roster really is all about the bigs as the Storm used their #3 overall pick on Awa Fam. As a Storm fan, I was rooting for the team to draft Olivia Miles, as the roster seemed to have a point-guard sized hole in it and Miles has been both good and fun to watch throughout her college career. However, Minnesota drafted Miles at #2 so that was never an option. With Miles and #1 pick Azzi Fudd off the board, the Storm did the sensible thing and took the best available player even though she does not exactly fill a position of need. Stop me if you’ve heard this before, but Fam is a 19-year old Center/Power Forward prospect who’s been playing internationally for a few years and is widely considered to have the highest ceiling of any player in the entire draft (being voted by GM’s as most likely to be considered the best player from this draft in 5 years)..

I am aware of just 5 times in the history of the WNBA draft when a 19-year old was drafted in the first round. Somehow this is the 4th time the Storm have done it! And all 4 have been bigs: Lauren Jackson, who is in the Hall of Fame and wore one of the two numbers currently hanging from the rafters in Climate Pledge Arena. Ezi, who was drafted at 19 but then didn’t come over to the W until she was 20. Dom last year, and now Awa this year. (Draft eligibility rules for Americans say you need to be 22 years old or out of college eligibility in order to be eligible for the draft, but for international prospects you just need to be 20 years old by the end of the calendar year with the draft in it.)

It seems unlikely to me that Dom, Awa, and Ezi can all play at the same time (though maybe new coach Sonia Raman and her desire to play “positionless basketball” will surprise me). However, this shouldn’t be a problem this year as Ezi is hurt and Awa went back to Spain after the draft to finish out her season with Valencia. Depending on how well Valencia does in the Spanish league’s playoffs, Awa might not join the Storm until a few weeks after the regular season starts. She’ll be the youngest player in the league and without a training camp under her belt the Storm would likely want to bring her off the bench for a while anyway. Hopefully Dom, Ezi, and Awa will all be healthy and playing together enough in the back half of the season that the Storm can pass judgment on how well that all works. It’s certainly one hell of an intimidating frontcourt rotation if they keep all 3 of them long-term. I also wouldn’t be shocked if they eventually conclude they need to trade one of them, but that’s a problem for future-Talisa.

Stefanie Dolson

With Ezi hurt and Awa back in Spain, Stephanie Dolson is likely to be a starter when the season begins. The Storm signed “Big Mama Stef” to be a veteran presence and culture-setter in the locker room. Dolson is 34 years old and can still play a little, but her real value to the team seems to be as an investment in vibes. In addition, her biggest strength as a player is her ability to set bone-crushing screens. If she can teach screen-setting to our youngsters, we’ll still be reaping the benefits of this signing long after Dolson retires.

Mackenzie Holmes

I’m writing this before rosters for the season are finalized, but it sure seems like the 5th big will be Mackenzie Holmes. Mack was a 3rd-round pick a couple years ago, but only because she blew out her knee in the NCAA tournament at the end of a very good career for Indiana (she had been mocked in the late first round before the injury). She made the team last year after completing her rehab, and she really started to come into her own this off-season in Australia where she led the league in scoring and was First Team all-WNBL. This even got her picked up for a month by a Chinese team that she helped achieve a promotion playoff victory. Australia isn’t the most competitive overseas league, so there’s no guarantee her success will translate to the W, but it’s exactly the trajectory you’re hoping for when you draft an injured player in the 3rd round.

Jordan Horston

Speaking of injured players who should be back and hopefully ready to go, let’s turn our attention to the Storm forwards. Jordan Horston was the #2 prospect in her class coming out of high school and the Storm were delighted to draft her when she somehow slid to them at #9 in the 2023 draft. She made the all-rookie team that year, and managed to reclaim a spot in the starting lineup even after Nneka and Skylar joined the team the next year. She’s got the swagger you would expect from someone named Jordan who then chooses to wear #23, but she’s also got enough game to back it up (especially on defense). If you redid the 2023 draft now, she’d almost certainly go 2nd (behind only Aliyah Boston). Unfortunately, Jordan tore her ACL in February of 2025 so she missed all of last season. She hasn’t played yet this preseason, but says she expects to be ready to go by opening night, and should plug straight into the starting lineup.

Katie Lou Samuelson

Katie Lou Samuelson was the other injury that really put a dent in the Storm’s depth last season. She was one of the biggest stories of training camp last year as she seemed to be in the best form of her career, finally ready to make good on the promise that had gotten her drafted #4 overall in 2019. But she missed the whole year after tearing her ACL on May 3rd. The Storm kept her on the roster all year anyway as she did her rehab, and then re-signed her to a team-friendly deal for both this season and next. We’re right at one year since her surgery and she is not expected to be ready for opening night, but with no pressure to win games this season the Storm can afford to bring her back slowly and hope their investment pays off in the future.

Flau’jae Johnson

With Jordan and KLS out, the Storm’s starting small forward in both preseason games was rookie Flau’jae Johnson and it would be safe to say she hit the ground running. The #8 overall pick in last month’s draft scored 12 points in her debut – a road game at Golden State – and then scored 20 more (in just 19 minutes) in her first home game. I wrote extensively about her in my season preview, but suffice it to say her joyfulness will make her fun to watch and she is a big part of why WNBA journalists keep calling the Storm an exciting “League Pass” team.

Lexie Brown

The Storm acquired Lexie Brown two years ago in a move that made a lot of sense to me at the time: she was a 3&D wing who, if she was on, could plug straight into the rotation of the contender the Storm were building. Her career had been derailed by Crohn’s disease, but she had finally gotten that diagnosis and seemed to have things under control, as demonstrated in a good off-season playing for Athletes Unlimited. The Storm managed to sign her for the minimum, but only by agreeing to a 2-year protected contract (which you can certainly understand Lexie wanting what with the whole Crohn’s of it all). 

Unfortunately Lexie never managed to claim a meaningful role in the rotation last year. She says she was healthy, and one of the biggest knocks on former head coach Noelle Quinn is that she was never very good at utilizing her bench effectively. Lexie seemed quite miserable at the end of season media availability last year, but flash forward to this year’s preseason media availability and I have never seen her smile so much. She seems to have hit it off with new head coach Sonia Raman and was the starting 2-guard in both preseason games.

The tricky bit is that she’s 31 years old so there might be some tension between giving her the playing time she needs to get her career back on track and developing the young players who will actually be a part of the next Storm contender. The Storm salary cap is in good enough shape that they could afford to just buy her out, paying her her full year’s salary while waiving her to open up a roster spot. However, she has shown enough promise in preseason that I don’t think they’re going to do that.

Zia Cooke

Zia Cooke was Aliyah Boston’s point guard for four years (and one national championship) at South Carolina. She was drafted toward the end of the first round by the LA Sparks in 2023, but was waived after two seasons. The Storm brought her to training camp last year and she made the opening night roster. They then included her in the Alysha Clark-for-Brittney Sykes mid-season trade, but when the Mystics waived her, Seattle re-signed her for the rest of the year. She seems to be on track to make the team again this year, having fended off a challenge for the 3rd-string point guard role from rookie Taina Mair. In addition to her ability to handle the ball, she’s also hit a bunch of 3’s while being the first guard off the bench in their preseason games (for whatever preseason games are worth).

Taina Mair

While Awa Fam and Flau’jae Johnson are getting all the attention, the Storm also brought in a 3rd first round draft pick this year. They had the #14 overall pick, and used it for Taina Mair, a point guard from Duke who raised her stock by leading the Blue Devils on a surprise Elite 8 run in the most recent NCAA Tournament. She hadn’t been that high in mock drafts (most of which were published before her tournament run), but her blend of defense and transition seems to fit well with the priorities of new head coach Sonia Raman.

The tricky bit is that the Storm seemed to me to have 13 players who it makes sense to keep and only 12 spots on the main roster. The new Collective Bargaining Agreement (CBA) does introduce two new optional “Developmental” roster spots per team, so you can think of teams as getting to keep 14 players. However, in order to sign a player to a developmental roster spot you first have to waive them, which means another team could claim them off waivers (assuming that other team has a roster spot for them, anyway).

The Storm waived Taina Mair on Sunday, but most onlookers expected them to sign her to a developmental contract as soon as she cleared waivers, and that’s exactly what happened on Tuesday. I know I’m not the only one who thinks it’s a little weird that you have to waive your rookie draft pick who made your 14-player roster but not your top 12. The whole idea of a developmental roster is brand new and this feels like a piece they might iterate on as they work out the kinks in what is, in the big picture, a thing I am very happy they added. Last year’s rosters were definitely too small.

Jade Melbourne

Jade Melbourne was initially drafted by the Storm in the 3rd round in 2022 (as a 19 year-old out of Australia). She came over in 2023, but then when the Storm committed to contending around Nneka and Skylar in 2024, they didn’t have any playing time for her and traded her to the Mystics. She has now reunited with the Storm by signing a one-year deal as a free agent. The jury is still out on whether Jade is good enough to be a starter in the WNBA or just a depth piece. She’s 23 now and the Storm have room for her in their rotation either way so it seems like a good fit for both sides.

Natisha Hiedeman

Jade wasn’t the only point guard the Storm signed in free agency, as their biggest addition is 29-year-old Natisha Hiedeman. (She and Dolson are tied for 2nd highest paid Storm honors this year with both making $750,000. Hiedeman’s deal also has a 2nd year, at $775,000.) Nicknamed “T,” Hiedeman has built a solid WNBA career for herself after being drafted in the 2nd round out of Marquette in 2019. She came off the bench for several of the great Alyssa Thomas-led Connecticut Sun teams earlier this decade before signing with the Minnesota Lynx, where she has backed up Courtney Williams for the last two years. (She and Courtney Williams also turned themselves into off-court superstars with their viral Twitch stream where they are collectively known as the Stud Budz.)

After many years coming off the bench for contenders, it’s easy to see how T would be attracted to the opportunity that exists in Seattle. The starting spot is hers to lose and she’ll get plenty of opportunity to see what she can do in a lead role. Meanwhile from the Storm’s perspective she should at least be able to keep things reasonably organized this year while they sort through what they have and don’t have in this rebuild, and maybe she turns into a medium to long term solution at the point guard position, or maybe not.

Depth Chart

We might know more by the time you read this, but that’s the 13 players that I currently expect to make the Storm’s roster of 12 plus two developmental spots. Other players still in camp as I write this include Rennia Davis and 3rd round pick Grace Van Slooten (who I suspect are competing with each other to be emergency big on the developmental squad) as well as Jaelyn Brown, who did get first-half minutes in the last preseason game.