As the Washington Mystics fell into a 39-14 hole against the Golden State Valkyries on Wednesday, general manager Jamila Wideman was evaluating.
Then the Mystics cut the lead to 9 points in the third quarter, saw it swell back to 23 in the fourth quarter, and cut it again to 3 with 53.8 seconds left before losing by 5. Wideman was evaluating all of that, too.
Evaluation — and planning for the future — has been a constant part of Wideman’s job since she joined the Mystics in the offseason. From the day of her introductory press conference, Wideman has emphasized player development and building a foundation to regularly contend for championships. That requires frequent evaluation of where the team is and where it’s going.
Wideman spoke with reporters on Thursday for the first time since the Mystics’ preseason media day on April 28. She discussed the trades the Mystics made before the Aug. 7 deadline, how the 15-18 Mystics have performed this season, and the next steps of their rebuild.
Why Wideman traded Brittney Sykes and Aaliyah Edwards
In Wideman’s first move before the trade deadline, she sent leading scorer and assister Brittney Sykes to the Seattle Storm on Aug. 5. In exchange, the Mystics got veteran forward Alysha Clark and the Storm’s first-round pick in the 2026 WNBA Draft. Forward Sika Koné was also waived to complete the trade.
Two days later, Wideman sent forward Aaliyah Edwards to the Connecticut Sun for guard Jacy Sheldon and the right to swap certain first-round draft picks in 2026. Edwards was the sixth overall pick in the 2024 WNBA Draft, and Sheldon was the fifth pick.
The moves were difficult for a young Mystics team that has emphasized togetherness and sisterhood as pillars of its culture. Head coach Sydney Johnson told reporters on Aug. 8 that the “dust hasn’t quite settled” as the players processed their emotions and some of them experienced a midseason trade for the first time.
Wideman expected that to be challenging, but she believed the trades were necessary to advance the franchise’s long-term goals.
“My message to the team,” Wideman said on Thursday, “is … yes, it is a business, but if you feel something about it; if it hurt you to watch your teammates walk out of the door; if it’s hard for you to figure out how to welcome two new faces, as lovely as they are, in the middle of the season; if it’s hard to think about how do we recalibrate … then we’re doing something right.
“It means that we’ve left space for feeling. And in my view, that has to be at the core of anything that you do, even if that feeling is hurt. … And so you manage that by being together. You manage that by being in live conversations.”
The trades reflect the plan the front office created in the offseason for a measured, deliberate rebuild. It stuck to that plan even as the Mystics outperformed expectations this season by going 11-11 before the All-Star break. For the front office, that wasn’t a reason to change course, but it could speed up the timeline for the rebuild.
“[We have] a goal of using our opportunity this season to develop some amazing talent that we’ve got,” Wideman said. “And we’re doing that not in service of a single season. We’re doing that in service of a goal of building something here in Washington that’s sustainable, that’s going to allow us to compete with the best teams at the highest level [and] be one of those best teams, not by luck or by chance, but by plan.
“And so I think our moves at the trade deadline represent an investment — a continuing investment — in that plan.”
Clark’s on-court production this season hasn’t matched that of Sykes, who earned her first WNBA All-Star selection this season. But Clark is a three-time WNBA champion and fills a similar leadership role.
“[Clark] just always finds the right things to say, I think, in moments where our team may be down or [we] just need someone to bring us together,” rookie guard Sonia Citron told reporters after a comeback win over the Indiana Fever on Friday.
And while many fans panned the Edwards trade, Wideman raved about how Sheldon’s work ethic, ability to make reads and “underrated” athleticism fit the Mystics now and in the future.
On Thursday, the Mystics temporarily filled their final open roster spot by signing rookie forward Madison Scott to a seven-day contract. They can sign her to up to three seven-day contracts before deciding whether to give her a rest-of-season contract. Scott made her WNBA debut on Friday and was in the game for the final 22.6 seconds of the 4-point win.
Wideman’s assessment of the 2025 Mystics
One way the Mystics are trying to develop their players is by asking them to try new things in games, not just rely on their strengths. Without Sykes, Citron and rookie forward Kiki Iriafen are getting the ball more in key moments and learning what does and doesn’t work.
The Mystics can push Citron and Iriafen to that level because both rookies have dramatically exceeded expectations this season. Though they were both top-four draft picks, the fact that they became All-Stars right away was a surprise. Iriafen wasn’t even a surefire starter entering the season, but now she holds the Mystics’ rookie record for rebounds.
For Wideman, the fact that the players around the two rookies have also gotten better has been just as important. Many of those players have also exceeded expectations for how quickly or how much they’ve improved.
“You could almost throw any player’s name out there and I would have something incredibly positive to say,” Wideman said, “because that’s just been true about how our team has showed up.”
Wideman highlighted 26-year-old point guard Sug Sutton, who is shooting a career-high 35.6% from 3-point range and has by far the best plus-minus on the team. She mentioned 22-year-old point guard Jade Melbourne, who has become a starter for the first time in her career alongside Sutton. Wideman pointed to the development of rookie reserve Lucy Olsen and even rookie Georgia Amoore, who has missed the entire season with an ACL injury but has become a leader on the team anyway.
“What we’re seeing,” Wideman said, “is a collective and kind of integrated effort that’s allowing us to compete, probably at a level that we don’t have business competing in.”
Wideman also praised the players’ competitiveness, which has been visible in their comebacks all season. They’ve trailed by at least 10 points in 24 of 33 games this season, but they have won nine of those games. And despite winning the first half only 10 times this season, they’ve won the fourth quarter 19 times.
“We’re talking about a group of some of the most competitive elite athletes in the world,” Wideman said. “… They’re almost incapable of anything else. We saw that [against Golden State]. … A lot of teams fold after the second [comeback attempt] kind of fizzles and the lead creeps back up to 16 points. But not our team.”
Still, the comebacks are something of a double-edged sword for the Mystics. Melbourne and forward Emily Engstler each told The Next after Wednesday’s game that the team needs to start games better. And Wideman looks at Washington’s nine wins by 6 points or fewer and sees a team that still has a lot to learn about imposing its will.
“Those small margins of victory also [mean] that we’re not controlling games,” she said. “We are not necessarily controlling the pace. We’re not necessarily controlling our destiny in the way that is the mark of a team that we are trying to be. … It’s in those margins that we have been putting work in on the court, and it’s those margins that we were trying to build into through our moves at the trade deadline.”
Looking ahead to the offseason
The Mystics have six players, not counting Scott, who will enter some form of free agency in 2026.
| Unrestricted free agents | Restricted free agents | Reserved free agents |
|---|---|---|
| Alysha Clark | Shakira Austin | Emily Engstler |
| Stefanie Dolson | Sug Sutton | |
| Jade Melbourne |
Assuming the terms of free agency don’t change in the revised collective bargaining agreement (CBA) that’s expected to be in place for 2026, the Mystics will have some control over their restricted and reserved free agents. If they extend qualifying offers to Sutton and center/forward Shakira Austin, they will have the right to match any offer those players get from other teams. For Engstler, they will have exclusive negotiating rights.
Though Austin has dealt with injuries throughout her WNBA career, she has also shown moments of brilliance when healthy. Wideman indicated that she sees Austin as a franchise cornerstone, saying, “We love Shakira. … She is part of that young core that we’re very excited to build around.”
The Mystics could’ve delayed Melbourne’s free agency by picking up the team option on her rookie-scale contract. That would’ve kept her around for another year on a relatively cheap salary, but her contract would’ve been fully protected for 2026. That decision had to be made by May 15, before the Mystics had played a game with Wideman as the general manager.
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Wideman said on Thursday that though she likes how Melbourne has played this season, she hadn’t wanted to give up flexibility in the form of a protected contract, especially with the uncertainty around the new CBA and upcoming expansion drafts.
“We’re entering into a period that is more uncertain than any period in WNBA history, except maybe the five minutes before the very first game was played,” Wideman said. “… One of the priorities is for us to have tremendous flexibility, and we’ll enter that period with knowing a lot more about Jade and her game, but honestly about every player on our team, but also around the league.”
“You kind of can’t build until you know the pieces, then the levers that you have to build with,” she added, referring to the players first and then the league rules.
One certainty, though, is that the Mystics want to continue to build through the college draft. The draft capital was the main prize from the Sykes trade, giving the Mystics a third first-round pick in 2026.
| Total draft picks | First-round draft picks | |
|---|---|---|
| 2026 | 6 | 3 |
| 2027 | 4 | 1 |
Those 2026 first-round picks have all moved up the draft board in the past few weeks. The Mystics have fallen from seventh place at the All-Star break to 10th now, which would put them in the lottery for the second straight season. Seattle has fallen from sixth to eighth — one spot out of the lottery — since the Sykes trade. And the Edwards trade gave the Mystics the right to swap the pick they have from the first-place Minnesota Lynx with the pick the Sun have from the New York Liberty, who have gone 4-6 in their past 10 games.
If the season ended after Friday’s games, the Mystics would have a lottery pick, the No. 8 pick and the No. 14 pick, assuming the expansion teams will draft immediately after the lottery teams.
If the Mystics keep those picks and scout well, they could add them to the young group they already have of Citron, Iriafen, Amoore, Olsen and Sheldon. All five of those players are under team control for 2026 on inexpensive rookie-scale contracts.
However, Wideman will keep evaluating the team through the end of the season, and she’ll stay flexible and open to any moves that push the Mystics’ rebuild in the right direction.
“We’ll be looking at everyone and everything,” she said. “… We’re still very much a work in progress, all of us, and so I expect that work in progress to continue right through to the end.”
Monumental Sports and Entertainment, the group that owns the Washington Mystics, holds a minority stake in The Next. The Next’s editorial operations are entirely independent of Monumental and all other business partners.
