WASHINGTON — Having three first-round draft picks and six total picks would qualify as a busy night for any WNBA team. But it was especially busy this year for the Washington Mystics, who made those selections just a week after parting ways with general manager Jamila Wideman.
It was the Mystics’ second straight year with three first-round draft picks and only the fourth time in WNBA history that one team has had that many. Last season, the Mystics drafted guards Sonia Citron and Georgia Amoore and forward Kiki Iriafen, all in the top six overall.
On Monday, the Mystics’ picks were slightly later in the first round. They selected 6’7 center Lauren Betts fourth overall, 6’4 forward Angela Dugalić ninth and 6’ forward Cotie McMahon 11th.
“We’ve got … some good young players, and we’re trying to add to that core,” Mystics head coach Sydney Johnson told reporters after the draft. “The word that keeps coming to mind is ascending. … We’re growing and we’re learning. And so the strategy was to identify really good players who kind of fit that mold of good, young [and] hungry.”
“I think this is just great that we can all build this franchise together,” McMahon told reporters on Monday. “And honestly, it’s only up from here.”
Betts led UCLA to its first NCAA championship last season and was named the tournament’s Most Outstanding Player. Overall as a senior, she averaged 17.1 points, 8.8 rebounds, 3.2 assists, 2.1 blocks and 1.0 steals in 27.7 minutes per game. She shot 58.2% from the floor and committed just 1.7 fouls per game. And in each of the past two seasons, she was a consensus All-American and led the Big Ten in win shares per 40 minutes.
Days before the draft, The IX Basketball’s draft experts called Betts “one of the best playmaking centers in recent history” and pointed to her athleticism as a differentiator from other players of similar size. That athleticism on defense, including being able to switch onto guards, is something Betts has worked hard to develop and takes pride in, she told reporters on Monday. It should help her stay on the court in the WNBA and be disruptive in a similar way as 6’5 center/forward Shakira Austin.
Johnson expects Betts to begin her career by backing up Austin, who the Mystics re-signed on Monday to a three-year contract worth $1.19 million annually — the standard maximum salary for 2026. But he envisions Austin and Betts as a potent one-two punch.
“When Kira comes out, you feel like, ‘Ah, man, I don’t know if you have a drop-off there,’ because Lauren is so good,” Johnson said. “… The level that Kira sets to then come with Lauren, I think it’s a pretty healthy combination.”
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Dugalić was Betts’ teammate for three seasons at UCLA and was the Big Ten Sixth Player of the Year last season. In 23.8 minutes per game, she averaged 9.0 points, 5.6 rebounds and 2.2 assists. She made 58.8% of her 2-pointers and 32.6% of her 3-pointers.
Dugalić started her career at Oregon before transferring to UCLA in 2021. She is also a two-time Olympian for Serbia, giving her a lot of experience against pro-level competition.
Dugalić’s pre-draft conversations with the Mystics staff revolved around “using my versatility and being able to stretch out the floor,” she told reporters on Monday. “I think that’s obviously my biggest asset is being able to play one through five and guarding one through five, being able to switch and shooting [and] posting up.”
McMahon transferred from Ohio State to Mississippi for her senior season and had a career year, averaging 19.5 points per game on 45.1% shooting from the field. She played more on the perimeter than she had for the Buckeyes and added 5.1 rebounds, 3.0 assists and 1.1 steals in 30.0 minutes per game.
“I feel like this past year has really helped me, just being at different positions and being guarded different ways,” McMahon said. “I think my IQ for the game has really developed a lot, and I think it just makes me more of a threat.”
“Cotie showed off,” Johnson said about McMahon’s lone season at Mississippi. “She showed her versatility in terms of being strong and aggressive and athletic, but also having the finesse to Eurostep at times and find these nifty passes. … You saw a real two-way player who’s super effective.”
The Mystics also had three picks outside the first round. In the second round, they selected 6’2 Notre Dame guard Cass Prosper 19th overall and 6’1 Baylor guard/forward Darianna Littlepage-Buggs 30th. And early in the third round, they took 5’6 Texas point guard Rori Harmon 34th overall.
As a group, the draft picks bring a lot of size to the Mystics’ roster, which Johnson said was intentional. At times in 2025, he felt like his team didn’t have enough length and physicality. Adding more of that will allow the Mystics to take more risks defensively and try to fluster opponents more.
To some extent, though, the trade-off the Mystics made for that size was perimeter shooting. Their six picks combined to shoot 31.3% from 3-point range last season. Only Harmon made even a third of her threes, and she took just 0.7 threes per game.
The Mystics not drafting more shooting was surprising because Johnson said after the 2025 season ended that he wanted to take and make more 3-pointers in 2026. That will need to be something the Mystics add in free agency and work on with some of their young players.
Still, the six draft picks should have plenty of opportunity to stick in Washington. There are roster spots available, and the organization has committed time and again to developing young players. Entering the draft, the team had just eight players signed, and two of those were on unprotected training camp contracts.
The team’s nucleus is Austin, Citron, Iriafen and Amoore, Johnson emphasized on Monday. Guard Lucy Olsen, a second-round pick in 2025, also made the roster last season and is in the mix again this year after winning a championship with the Townsville Fire in Australia’s WNBL. Some combination of the 2026 draft picks will help build up the team’s young core as it inches back toward playoff contention.
“We really understand how young we’re going to be,” Johnson said. “… We know the gains that we want to make. We want D.C. to be a place that’s recognized for women’s basketball. …
“So we really just listened closely and watched and talked to coaches and worked with our strategy team here to find players who were good, who had a humility to work with others, but wanted to get better — like, really want to get better and move this thing forward.”
Johnson also preaches playing with joy as one of the Mystics’ building blocks, and there was extra joy on draft night because of preexisting connections between the draftees and others in Washington.
For example, as Betts and Dugalić settle in in Washington, they can lean on their friendship and built-in chemistry. They’ll also have UCLA assistant coach Michaela Onyenwere, who signed a two-year contract with the Mystics on Sunday and is expected to be one of the team’s veteran leaders as a 26-year-old.
“I’m still gonna call her Coach Mic, just to get on her nerves,” Betts told ESPN’s Holly Rowe right after being drafted.
“I also did play against Michaela my first year when I was at Oregon [and she was still in college at UCLA], so it’s hard to see her as a coach,” Dugalić said. “But I have to now see her as a teammate as well, which is really cool. I never got to play with her, so it’s really exciting that I’ll [be] able to play with her now.”
In addition, Betts played with Iriafen as a freshman at Stanford in 2022-23 before transferring to UCLA. Asked on Monday which WNBA player she is most excited to learn from as a rookie, Betts pointed to Iriafen.
“She’s someone I look up to and I’ve looked up to for a really long time,” Betts told reporters. “… And I know she’s gonna help me a lot.”
Prosper is joining a former teammate in Washington, too, as she and Citron played three seasons together at Notre Dame. “My phone is just blowing up now,” Prosper told reporters on Monday, “but [Sonia] was my first text, just saying how excited she is.”
There are also several ties to Mississippi on the Mystics’ roster, though McMahon didn’t play with them. Like McMahon, Austin transferred to Mississippi partway through her college career and developed into a first-round draft pick. And guard/forward Madison Scott, who signed a training camp contract with the Mystics, spent five seasons there before being drafted in 2025.
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Without Wideman, Mystics leadership is handling the general manager responsibilities by committee. Monumental Basketball president Michael Winger is leading the way, but Johnson, Monumental Basketball senior vice president John Thompson III and Monumental Basketball vice president Don Wolfe are also heavily involved in the decision-making. McMahon said on Monday that she’d spoken with Johnson and assistant coach Jessie Miller before the draft.
According to a team source, the decision to part ways with Wideman came as the front office prepared for a hectic April of roster-building, between the WNBA expansion draft on April 3, free agency and the college draft. There was no single incident that prompted the decision; Winger just felt that there wasn’t full agreement anymore on the team’s strategy going forward.
On Monday, the Mystics front office leaned into collective decision-making to determine their six selections. And that sense of collective effort and unity is something the team will look to bring on the court, too, as soon as training camp opens next week.
“I don’t think we’re the only team that got better tonight,” Johnson said, “but I certainly know and feel like we took a step forward.”
Monumental Sports and Entertainment, the group that owns the Washington Mystics, holds a minority stake in The IX Basketball. The IX Basketball’s editorial operations are entirely independent of Monumental and all other business partners.
The IX Basketball’s Howard Megdal contributed reporting for this story from New York.
