The Las Vegas Aces won the WNBA Finals in 2022 and 2023, putting the team on track to be the next great WNBA dynasty. A loss in the semifinals last season disrupted some of that momentum, but Vegas was widely expected to still be at the top of the league in 2025.
But after a slow start in 2025 and a blowout loss to Golden State, are we sure the Aces are still contenders?
Maybe the burgeoning dynasty has already been vanquished. Afterlosing by 27 points on Saturday to the Valkyries, the possibility that the Aces' run of dominance is fizzling out looks more real than ever.
What happened to the Las Vegas Aces dynasty?
Vegas lost in four games to the Liberty in the semifinals last year in a series that didn't feel particularly close, but that didn't mean the Aces' window had closed. The team still entered the offseason with the best women's basketball player in the world, A'ja Wilson, on the roster, not to mention a strong cast around her.
Wilson's still in Vegas, but one of her most important counterparts is not. The Aces traded Kelsey Plum in a sign-and-trade deal with the Storm and Sparks, a trade that landed Jewell Loyd with the Aces.
Plum has a huge part of this Aces' run. Her shooting, coupled with her ability as a secondary ball-handler, took a lot of pressure off the rest of the Aces' lineup, and it was pretty clear that she was someone who could be a true No. 1 player somewhere else in the league. So far, that's been the case with Plum in Los Angeles.
Loyd is a high-volume scorer, but there were serious questions about how she'd fit in with the Aces in a Plum-esque role. Could she scale down, or were her efficiency concerns going to remain even in a smaller role?
The answer here is clear: Loyd currently ranks 116th in the league in field goal percentage.
Las Vegas doesn't have the depth it once did
Chelsea Gray is a year older. Key reserves Alysha Clark, Tiffany Hayes and Kate Martin all play elsewhere and weren't replaced by reliable options. Kiah Stokes is a non-factor offensively at the five.
All that combined makes Vegas look real, real shaky.
The team is 4-3, but that record needs to come with some added context. Of the four wins, just one was against a playoff contender, with a five-point win over Seattle. The other wins were against Connecticut, Washington and Los Angeles.
Then there are the losses, which have all come by double-digits, including a 20-point loss and Saturday's blowout defeat against the Valkyries.
It's starting to look like the winning record is an illusion.
Vegas still has a high floor. There's no scenario where a team led by Wilson and featuring Jackie Young in the backcourt is going to miss the playoffs, or even finish under .500. This is still a good basketball team.
But the lack of depth severely limits the team's upside. Look at Wilson's on-off numbers, for example. With her on the floor, the team has a +7.77 net rating. When she's on the bench? -20.51. Vegas has absolutely zero frontcourt depth at the moment, and it's forcing the team to play lineups that don't play to the team's strengths.
Unless Loyd suddenly figures out how to work out as a team's No. 3 option, Vegas simply feels too far back of the New York Liberty and Minnesota Lynx to consider the team a contender at this point. The window isn't closed, but a hard enough wind could blow it shut.