SEATTLE — Seattle Storm forward Mackenzie Holmes had just blocked Connecticut Sun guard Nell Angloma and was letting out a celebratory scream, but the ball had not gone out of play. Quickly, new Storm center Stefanie Dolson got behind Holmes, physically pushing her forward to where she should be playing defense. It was only a split-second, but it encompassed much of what Dolson brings to Seattle.
“I’m probably like the stickler mother,” Dolson told The IX Sports. “If someone’s celebrating, someone’s doing something, it’s like no, we have to do this, like no, move, let’s go — making sure people are in the right spots as much as I can … Just trying to be as verbal and vocal as I can on the court.”
In that same home game against the Connecticut Sun on Wednesday, Dolson was visibly frustrated that she was being fouled, but no calls were made. Even though it was visible, it was controlled. She just kept having conversations with the referees and playing the game, eventually drawing a flagrant foul on one of the visitors.
“I think that she does a really good job with managing that, because she knows that her teammates are looking to her and watching her as a leader,” Storm head coach Sonia Raman said. “So, even if she gets frustrated in the moment for a second, she lets it go pretty quickly; she moves on. I think that she just knows the balance as a veteran.”
To Raman’s point, her teammates do notice and draw from her demeanor.
“Just her presence out there makes everybody feel like, ‘okay, take a deep breath,” Jordan Horston told The IX Sports. “She’s like that calming in the storm type of person for us and it’s very important for this group.”
Don’t mistake calm for low energy or not wanting to win, though.
“I think Stef brings a lot of competitiveness and fire,” Raman said. “She’s a killer, she impacts winning, she’s about all the right things. You know, it’s team first, she’s unselfish, and she’s really invested in bringing her teammates along. So I think she’s just the complete package in that way.”
While her 13 years in the WNBA are valuable, her two years in D.C. and just over a month in Seattle show that what she brings to her teams is much deeper than just veteran experience — it is her personality, her IQ and her desire to help others.
Making the transition with Washington
Dolson was signed by Seattle in the offseason as a free agent after spending the last two seasons with the Washington Mystics. In D.C., particularly last year, Dolson was one of the few veterans on very young, inexperienced teams, and drew heavy praise from her coaches and teammates for the veteran leadership she brought. That appreciation for Dolson and the way she impacted the young players there has endured beyond her tenure in the nation’s capital.
“She was amazing,” second-year Mystics guard Sonia Citron told The IX Sports ahead of Washington’s game in Seattle on Sunday. “I think her IQ is just off the charts; she’s an incredibly smart player. And she was kind of just the person on our team that settled us, helped us never be too high, too low, and just always knew what to say and when to say it. … She was the anchor of our team, just mentally helped us all.”
“I love Stef so much. I was super sad to see her leave,” Mystics second-year forward Kiki Iriafen told The IX Sports. “Seattle Storm rookies are very lucky to have her. She’s an incredible vet, she’s a great teacher, a great teammate, great coach, all of that, and just like a great human being.”
“She was kind of like a mini coach for us,” Iriafen continued. “Anything that she said we listened to. She kind of controlled the locker room. And then on the court she has a tremendous basketball IQ, so she was able to direct us … I would say just her leadership and her guidance was the biggest thing.”
Iriafen said Dolson helped her a lot individually in what was a tough rookie year with a lot coming her way. Even when the pair were competing against each other in training camp, Iriafen said the vet was always looking out for her, always coaching her through it, and always having her back.
“I hope to be a vet like Stef one day, and I truly mean that from the bottom of my heart,” Iriafen said. “She’s a great human being, but an even better teammate. Just the way that she was able to direct us, rookies, without yelling at us, but making sure we got the direction was just amazing.”
The move back to Washington, the team that drafted her No. 6 overall in 2014, marked a significant shift for Dolson ahead of the 2024 season. She felt like, up until that point, how much she needed to be a vet varied. In 2021, she won a WNBA Championship with a Chicago Sky team that boasted Candace Parker and Courtney Vandersloot. The next year, she played in New York with Breanna Stewart and Jonquel Jones.
“I can’t not talk,” Dolson said. “I feel like if I see something, I have to say it because I know everyone doesn’t think the same way. I feel like I’ve always naturally just been talkative. Even when I was in New York, we’d have a lot of meetings, and I was still talking up because I just feel like I’ve seen a lot of things in the league. I’ve been in a lot of different positions, whether it’s starting, coming off the bench, playing 25-30, playing five minutes; I’ve done everything. So I always feel like I have experience to let people know about.”
Dolson still led in her own way, but both of those teams had plenty of veterans. The Mystics in 2024 did not. She had gotten older and more experienced each year, but said the personnel in D.C. required her to lead more, and then take another big step when the team got even younger in her second season.
Growing into her role
Now 34 years old, Dolson thinks her role as a vet is an obvious, unspoken thing. Seattle didn’t have to say it; she knew that was part of why they brought her in. So she has no problem with identifying as a veteran, with seeing it as a core part of her identity.
“It’s part of who I am now,” Dolson said. “And if that is the reason I’m on teams or the reason I’m successful on a team, or not, whatever the case may be, I think that it comes with the territory, being this age. So, it doesn’t really bother me. …
“Especially coming here with Dom [Malonga] and Awa [Fam], two very young post players, like I’m not coming here to play to be a huge part. Like I’m coming to be a part and then to also be a vet to them as another post player. I feel like it is part of why I wanted to come here too, and why I’ve been on other [young] teams — I enjoy it.”
While Dolson does enjoy being a vet to young players, there are caveats and layers to that enjoyment, because it isn’t easy.
“I think it can be harder than people think,” Dolson said. “Sometimes I find myself worrying too much about what everyone else needs or needs to know, that I can’t even focus on what I need to do personally, but I do enjoy it. I love teaching people the game.”
Dolson has yet to meet a young players she doesn’t like and hopes to be a coach after she’s done playing, but it took time for her to find a good equilibrium.
“I think my first season I tried to take on too much as a vet. Like, if there were any issues within the team or with the coach I was the one who was trying to fix everything, which really took me out of just enjoying playing,” Dolson said. “I do think I’ve a little bit found that balance of being a leader but still trying to play, and also letting the cards fall where they may. I can’t control everything that happens with the team, the dynamics … so if it happens, it happens. I try to just help where I can.”
And she is still learning and growing. Recently Raman reminded Dolson during a film session that she needs to be the one on the court who tells everyone where to go because she still doesn’t think like that all the time on the court. But she feels she is starting to get there, remembering to make sure everyone’s in their right places.
Something that hasn’t changed is how much Dolson enjoys teaching. Dolson said she has always loved teaching because it is like a puzzle, and she is a puzzle person.
“I love like what piece can go where, manipulating different ideas, reading a defense and just countering and manipulating it type of stuff,” Dolson explained. “I love all those types of games. Like I love Survivor, I love Traitors, I love all these shows that are so manipulative and stuff like that. I’ve just always been like that, a very conceptual person, so it’s fun for me.”
Already impacting the Storm
From one young team rebuilding through the draft without No. 1 overall picks to another, Dolson knew looking at Seattle’s roster that her role would be similar to D.C.
With her in the post, Dolson has last year’s No. 2 overall pick 20-year-old Dominique Malonga and this year’s No. 3 overall pick 19-year-old Awa Fam. Additionally, Mackenzie Holmes is in just her second season at 25-years-old while Ezi Magbegor is still just 26 in her seventh season. Amongst the guards, Taina Mair and Flau’jae Johnson are true rookies, while Zia Cooke and Jordan Horston are still just 25 and Jade Melbourne is 23.
“Her experience matters for us,” Horston told The IX Sports. “Whatever she says, we’re all ears, because we know she knows what she’s talking about, she’s been there, she’s done that … and it’s what we need for this group. So just having her voice, having her leadership, her presence, has been what we needed.”
Melbourne played with Dolson in D.C. before similarly signing in the offseason as a free agent and said she thinks Seattle made a beeline for Dolson, knowing how valuable she has been to young rosters.
“I think Stef’s the ultimate vet,” Melbourne said. “She’s super good at sharing her wisdom with younger people. She’s an absolute gem for our bigs … and guards — someone who’s so knowledgeable and also able to share it. She’s one of the smartest players I’ve ever played with.”
Horston said she would definitely echo Jade’s characterization, that everything about how Dolson carries herself, to how she recovers, to how she goes about every day makes her the ultimate veteran.
The fourth-year player also praised her teaching. Though she couldn’t quite articulate exactly why she is such a good educator, she explained that Dolson manages to simplify the game and help her understand things she or her teammates weren’t otherwise getting. Holmes thinks her personality as a patient, attentive, calm person helps Dolson teach so effectively.
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Johnson said she feels like Dolson always talking to her and telling her what to do and where to go makes the game a lot easier for her as a rookie. While she was welcoming and funny, making her great to be around, Johnson most appreciates her bluntness.
“She’s blunt as hell,” Johnson told The IX Sports. “She’s gonna call it how she sees it … she ain’t gonna tell you no bullshit. If we had a bad practice, she’s going to be like ‘that was terrible, we need to do better.’ She knows because she’s been here before.”
Holmes said that having Dolson on the court is like having another coach on the floor. When coaches on the sidelines maybe don’t see the same things because they are worried about schemes and matchups, Dolson is able to talk to her on the court and be vocal in timeouts rather than yelling from the sidelines.
“I think it’s just the way she is able to read the game as it’s happening,” Holmes told The IX Sports. “She’s able to see things live and make adjustments on the fly based off of how the defense is guarding us, so I think that’s a really special skill that she has.”
No one pinpoint example could describe how Dolson has helped Holmes; rather, it is a combination of all those small moments.
“I think it’s just all the little things that she does,” Holmes said. “Whether it’s on the floor and she’s saying, ‘hey, they were playing you this way last time, cut next time,’ or helping you on a defensive coverage — she’s helped me with my ball screen coverages a lot … So just little things that add up, nothing specific, I think it’s just cumulative, all the impact that she’s made.”
There is a lot about Dolson’ contributions that apply to the whole team but part of her value is how she is able to connect individually with what each player needs.
Raman said she always sees Dolson pulling her teammates aside, telling them everything from ‘shoot the next one’ if they missed, to telling them to angle a different way to get open better, to plainly this is where you need to be defensively positioned.
Dolson said she consciously tries to pick and choose when to give her teammates information or just support them so they aren’t overloaded. With Malonga specifically, she is most often trying to build up her confidence.
“It’s more like fueling her fire during the games because we’re not necessarily the same on the court, she’s more dynamic than I am. But then if there’s different reads I try to help,” Dolson said.
For Johnson, she is working to teach her how to read her posts as a guard while trying not to overwhelm her in her first season. When Johnson told Dolson she wanted to watch film with her, Dolson responded, “no, do you don’t.”
“Because I will literally give you too much information and dissect every single play,” Dolson explained. “So there’s certain boundaries where I’m like, you just need to play, and so I’m also just trying to be like that.”
Johnson said she still plans to watch film with Dolson because she appreciates the different perspective and “she might say something I never thought about and change the whole dynamic of my season and what I know.”
The LSU product particularly values that Dolson can help her understand post players better rather than relying solely on the posts knowing her tendencies as a guard.
Johnson isn’t the only one who thinks that Dolson brings a unique perspective. Raman noted that coaches normally have the type of relationship she does with Dolson with points guards, the floor generals.
“To be able to add a forward to the mix in those conversations, you get to all the layers,” Raman said. “You get to all the layers on the offensive end, on the defensive end, you get to the players that are more screening actions and in the paint. So I think she just kind of brings so much to the table in that — covering an area that sometimes doesn’t get covered as much.”
With multiple frontcourt injuries — Magbegor was injured in the offseason playing internationally and is still recovering, while Malonga suffered a concussion a few games into the season — and Fam arriving late because of overseas play, Dolson has been starting and playing more minutes than expected.
While she hasn’t had the most standout stat lines, she has continued making a difference. Dolson is averaging 8.3 points, 3.9 rebounds, 1.9 assists, and 1.3 blocks per game while shooting 56.7% from the floor and 40.3% from beyond the arc this season. On Sunday she tied her season-high of 16 points on 100% shooting from the field.
Perhaps her ability to make a difference even when not scoring or directly assisting is most evident in her high plus-minus stats. In the team’s two most recent wins, Sunday against her former team and Friday against Connecticut, she had the highest plus-minus on the team, at +16 and +24 respectively.
“She’s a dimer,” Johnson said. “You don’t see that a lot as a big. You see that in NBA, like, Jokic, but she really can see the floor. So if you cut, she’s going to get that pass, and she’s gonna thread it on the needle.”
While Dolson’s playing time will likely go down as the season progresses and other players return, her veteran leadership, joyous demeanor and prowess as a teacher ensure she will continue to help this Storm team grow and succeed regardless.
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