Elena Delle Donne could be on the move.
The two-time WNBA MVP’s contract with the Washington Mystics ended this season, and The Next Hoops has reported that Delle Donne is expected to sign with another team in the offseason.
She’s played for the Mystics since 2017, when she was traded from the Chicago Sky. In that time, she won a WNBA championship with the team and was a four-time WNBA All-Star. But she appeared in just 53 total games of her contract after a back injury kept her limited from 2020 through the 2022 season.
Injuries also caused her to miss time last season, although she still proved to be impactful, averaging 16.7 points and 5.4 rebounds on 48.5 percent shooting.
Both Delle Donne and the Mystics have remained relatively mum about her free agency.
“[Transition] is a word that can be used a little bit,” Mystics head coach Eric Thibault said last September. “I think we have to make a decision about what this is going to look like going forward. And it’s not an easy one.”
“I think the most encouraging thing is that she clearly views herself as having a lot of really good basketball left in her,” Thibault continued. “And that gives me a lot of confidence that that’s true, quite frankly.
Team general manager Mike Thibault also said something similar.
“Any time you have some of your players getting older, whether [Delle Donne] was a free agent or not, we need to make sure that we have other players that we can make focal parts of what we do,” Thibault said. “It can’t just be one player.”
For her part, the seven-time All-Star and two-time WNBA champion has stressed that the most important thing for her at this point in her career is winning.
“I think you always need to take a little bit of time to just kind of reflect and see what your next steps are going to be,” Delle Donne said.
“I just want to win. That’s truly what I care about most. It’s been my whole career, but especially coming back from all the back stuff and feeling like I’m really the strongest I’ve ever been. I’m in great shape. I feel like I have a lot more basketball to play, and I want to win.”