MINNEAPOLIS—Heading into the locker room during the halftime break of their third game of the 2026 WNBA season, the Minnesota Lynx weren’t happy with the effort they had put on display, particularly on the defensive end of the floor. They trailed the Dallas Wings 48-40 and allowed their opponents 41 attempts at the basket. Maddy Siegrist scored 17 points on 70% shooting off the bench for the Wings, and three of Minnesota’s starters were sitting at a -9 in +/-. If the Lynx had plans of taking a second consecutive game on the road, they had yet to reveal them.
Then, the second half started and the Lynx were able to flip the game on its head.
“We couldn’t have played any worse defensively in the first half,” Lynx head coach and president of basketball operations Cheryl Reeve said after the game. “We were very, very disappointed defensively and how easy we were to play against. So, we really committed at halftime to play like, to take some things away that we knew they were going to do, and we just stuck with it. That’s what I appreciate about this group.”
The Lynx won that game by a final score of 90-86. They won the 3rd quarter 28-22, and then the 4th by a difference of 22-16. It marked the second of three wins for a team that has yet to drop a game on the road in 2026. Each win has featured different aspects of the Lynx’s strengths, such as team defense (aside from that first half in Dallas, of course), balanced scoring, the breathtaking play of rookie Olivia Miles, and the high-octane scoring of Natasha Howard, who has scored 26 points in back-to-back road games.
Another consistent element in each of those wins has also featured the strong and steady play of veteran Nia Coffey, who has taken the role of perhaps the most unheralded, yet equally important, of veterans guiding the ship in Minnesota so far in 2026.
“Nia Coffey has really defined our toughness,” Reeve added during her postgame press conference in Dallas. “I can’t say enough about what Nia did [tonight].”
That night, and every other night for the Lynx so far this season, Coffey has been Minnesota’s do-it-all/say-it-all veteran in the post and has done it all through a nagging shoulder injury she sustained in the team’s second game of the season.
“All of our vets are incredible,” Miles said to reporters after practice on May 26. “Nia has been amazing, obviously she’s going through a little nagging stuff and she’s playing through it and playing well. What she does for us, her leadership, her intensity, her focus, and her effort on both ends of the floor, it’s just intangibles for our team. She’s been great leadership-wise and just at having our backs when we’ve really needed it.”
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The early days of the 2026 season were always going to be tough waters to navigate for a Lynx team playing with a plethora of new players and without the services of familiar faces like Napheesa Collier (last year’s MVP runner-up) and Dorka Juhasz (this year’s EuroLeague Women MVP). Coffey, a local product who graduated from the Twin Cities basketball factory of Hopkins High School, has more than merely filled in for the multiple missing Lynx (please clap). She’s been a defensive-stopper, an offensive rim-protector, and an all-around floor-raiser for a team that’s equal parts in transition as well as contention.
“I love the way that the Lynx play basketball,” Coffey told reporters on the team’s media day. “I really appreciate the systems and how everyone just gels together. So, just being really aggressive in my role on both ends of the floor, I really take pride in my defense and being able to guard multiple positions, and be able to communicate and be a rim protector. I really look forward to that.”
Coffey signed a two-year deal with her hometown team in a deal that didn’t make too much noise in what will be remembered as one of the more deafeningly loud free agency cycles in league history. What Coffey’s signing lacked in external fanfare, the nine-year veteran out of Northwestern more than made up for in certainty that her hometown was the ideal spot for her 10th WNBA season.
“With the system and the strategy with everything, [Cheryl] does a great job of getting a lot of talent out of her players,” she said during training camp. “So, I’m really excited to have that opportunity to play [for Minnesota] and see what that looks like.”
A testament to Coffey’s willingness and versatility is the space she occupies on the floor. The power forward spot in Minnesota’s starting lineup is normally filled by Collier, who recorded a 50/40/90 shooting line a year ago, has appeared in five all-star games, and has multiple MVP candidacies (among several other honors). Coffey didn’t step into her challenging spot with designs of being ‘Phee,’ but to be the best version of herself and fill in wherever and whenever she’s needed.
“Well, they’re not young. I think the first five, right? Four of the five are experienced, and three of them really well-versed in the Minnesota Lynx,” Reeve said when asked how the group’s been able to gel in a short period of time. “That’s been really helpful. Then you have someone like Nia Coffey, who is just such a great listener. [She] listens to what’s needed and does it, and is also a great communicator. I think communication is a big part of it.”
That was at its most clear during the 4th quarter last Saturday in Chicago. After the Sky trimmed a 16-point Lynx lead all the way down to three, Minnesota needed stops. Coffey saved her two biggest plays of the game to come up with two blocks in the final four minutes that halted Chicago’s momentum and gave the ball back to the Lynx.
“I mean [she’s] super tough,” Courtney Williams said during the postgame press conference in Chicago. “She do all the little things. All the dirty work, we can count on Nia to do it. We know what Nia can do out there, man, and we appreciate all the little things that she do for this team.”
“When you really need her to make a play, she’s steady,” Reeve added when asked about Coffey. “She’s the one that kind of locks in on what she’s supposed to be doing.”
Coffey hasn’t just been limited to making plays at the defensive end. At the six-game point, she is the lone Lynx starter averaging short of double-figures in the scoring department, but she’s been a reliable bucket at 52.8% shooting (19-of-36) from the field and 40% (8-of-20) from beyond the arc. Reeve has mentioned it multiple times this season that she wants Coffey seeing only green lights when the ball finds her hands and to have no hesitations about letting it fly.
“Hearing that is really nice to hear, especially coming [here] from other teams where that might not have been the same situation,” Coffey said when asked about coach Reeve’s confidence in getting her more shots. “So just getting in that mindset that this is part of helping the team and just growing in that area.”
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Coffey may not have been entrusted with this much freedom in her previous WNBA stops in Atlanta, Los Angeles, Phoenix, and Las Vegas. But in Minnesota, the place where she grew up watching the Lynx teams of yesteryear and learning to love the game, she’s played a crucial part in the 2026 Lynx taking the first few steps towards becoming the championship-level team they aim to be.
“I mean, Coach says, ‘break a play to make a play,’ we’re just playing basketball and that feels good.”
Coffey, who is currently averaging a career-high 26.0 minutes per game and has already made more starts in a season than she has in the last two years, isn’t just keeping a spot warm for Collier. Her role may change when No. 24 makes her return to the lineup, whenever that may be, but Coffey’s willingness to do everything and say anything to help the team will remain the same. A trait that will help keep her on the floor in her hometown arena no matter how many all-stars are in the starting lineup.
“Honestly, anywhere I go, I’m just trying to do those pieces that the team needs,” Coffey said. “I’ve been doing that for so long, it just feels like what I continuously do. I’m glad I’m able to do that here and I feel like we’re all coming together in that regard, especially in those tight moments of the game, I feel like we’re getting closer and tougher in those moments.”
