Does French teen phenom Dominique Malonga have the biggest upside in the WNBA Draft?

Yahoo

14-04-2025

Does French teen phenom Dominique Malonga have the biggest upside in the WNBA Draft?
The 2025 WNBA Draft is here, and UConn's Paige Bueckers — fresh off a national championship — is widely projected to go No.1 overall to the Dallas Wings.
But another name to keep an eye on will be 19-year-old French power forward Dominique Malonga, who already has four seasons of professional basketball and an Olympic silver medal under her belt.
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On the latest episode of 'No Offseason,' Zena Keita, Ben Pickman and Sabreena Merchant discussed why Malonga might have the highest upside of any player in the draft.
Keita: I want to know more about Dominique Malonga. One of the things he talked about at length, with the pun intended, is that as tall and long as Dominique is, the fluidity of her movement is surprising. She moves like a guard at 6-foot-6. It's crazy how she comes off pick-and-rolls and drives to the basket. Everything about her game is very smooth, and she's so young, so there's still so much more to develop. Ben, you're our international player expert. Give us some insight as to why Dominique Malonga is so special.
Pickman: A few years ago, when I first met Sabreena, it was like, 'Hi, I'm Ben, have you heard about Dominique Malonga (laughs)?' That might have been our first conversation to a T. I remember a couple of years back when executives started telling me about her, and what kind of prospect she could be. People were like, 'Hey, have you heard about this player? If not, go and watch some of these videos and all this tape on her.' That was when she was put on my radar. It's been fascinating to watch her explode from there and suddenly make the French Olympic team, and she's having a really good season in France right now with Lyon in Eurocup play. She's almost certainly going to be the No.2 or No. 3 pick in this WNBA Draft. Some people even think she could be the best prospect in this draft when we look back in five to 10 years, she has that kind of talent. Because physically, there are not a lot of players in the WNBA who have the raw athletic tools that she possesses. When we think about the NBA Draft, for example, you see that a lot of these high-upside athletes get chosen early. But traditionally in the WNBA, you either don't have that kind of prospect, or teams don't settle on them early.
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But Dominique is definitely an exception, because we've seen just how skilled and impactful she already is at 19 years old playing professional basketball. Our colleague Mike Vorkunov, and this is a little bit of a tease here for Monday, spent some time earlier this year in Paris doing some work on the WNBA and NBA during the Paris Games. And during that time, he sat down with Dominique and learned more about her story. I would recommend people who are curious to learn more about her as a person and her interests to come back to the site on Monday morning to read a bit more about her journey. But also, to learn who she is as a person, her work ethic, and how she feels about being compared to Victor Wembanyama, obviously another French star for the San Antonio Spurs. She's been a prospect on people's radars for a while, and she could be the best player in this draft when it's all said and done. It's just again; she's 19 years old, so people have not heard about her. But she's had a lot of success in Europe already for someone so young. It's why so many people are so excited about her prospects and have been for three or four years now.
Keita: I just love that France is showing up and showing out. I didn't quite get the same water that Victor Wembanyama and Dominique Malonga did when I was growing up, but clearly France has just elevated all of their basketball prospects, particularly on the men's side. But now we're starting to see this with Carla Leite, Janelle Salaun and now Dominique Malonga on the women's side. Everyone keeps saying, 'She's amazing, she's a great prospect.' But Sabreena, I want to know in a forward dominant league — you think of players like A'ja Wilson, Napheesa Collier and Breanna Stewart, who are all killing the game and leading their teams — what can Dominique bring to a WNBA roster?
Merchant: I think all of that. She has the skill set to do everything that those great power forwards are already doing, or great centres, depending on how you want to classify A'ja Wilson. She's capable of running an offense, running a pick-and-roll and coming off the pick-and-roll. She can do a little bit of the guard stuff and a little bit of the big stuff, and she's already a pretty good rim protector. She is quite skinny right now. She has the Sylvia Fowles length with her height, but not the toughness and build of a strong defensive rim protector yet. But she's still just 19 years old, so it will take some time for her to grow into that body. But if she does end up in Seattle (who hold the No. 2 overall pick), it's a great landing spot for her because they've seen this growth trajectory also with Ezi Magbegor. They drafted her very young and allowed her to develop in their system, and she's another long, athletic big with many tools. Dominique is just a better version of what Ezi was when she came into the WNBA, so it would be a really good spot for her. Especially in terms of an organization that knows how to give her some space and time, but also put her in situations that are going to allow her to succeed at a really high level.
This article originally appeared in The Athletic.
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