The Washington Mystics are heading into a rebuild. Or, rather, the team is embracing the fact they need to rebuild after going 14-26 last season.
Ariel Atkins is gone. Sydney Johnson has been brought in as the team's new head coach. And maybe most importantly for a rebuilding team, the Mystics have managed to finagle their way into holding three of the top six picks in the WNBA Draft. Sure, they don't hold the No. 1 or No. 2 pick and will likely miss out on the two biggest prizes — Paige Bueckers and Dominque Malonga — but that doesn't mean the team can't find some franchise-changing talent in this class.
Here's what the perfect draft would look like for the Washington Mystics on Monday night.
Pick No. 3: Sonia Citron (G, Notre Dame)
The biggest weakness right now for the Mystics is out on the wing. It's really not even clear who will start at the two and three heading into the draft. Karlie Samuelson and ... Emily Engstler, or hand the starting point guard role to Jade Melbourne and put Brittney Sykes back at the two?
This is why the first draft move for the Mystics is an obvious one: select Notre Dame wing Sonia Citron.
Citron shot 37.2 percent from deep this past season with the Irish, while adding 1.9 steals and 0.9 blocks per game. She shouldn't be asked to be a No. 1 or No. 2 scoring option in the pro game, but she can excel as a 3-and-D wing. The Next mentioned her ceiling as Alysha Clark, which feels spot on.
Pick No. 4: Kiki Iriafen (F, USC)
Washington doesn't necessarily need a big here, but it's hard to pass up on Kiki Iriafen's upside, even if her draft stock has taken a decent hit over the last year.
Shakira Austin, Stefanie Dolson and Aaliyah Edwards is an excellent frontcourt rotation, but you have to think Dolson isn't in the long term plans for the Mystics. With much of the league hitting free agency next offseason, she'll have plenty of suitors who can put her closer to winning a title.
With that in mind, adding Iriafen is a move for the future. There's an unevenness to her scoring over the past two seasons, but if she can look close to her Stanford self as a shooter, she can make an impact on that end of the floor. Defensively, she has the tools to defend multiple positions, but she has to really harness those tools and improve on the interior.
Pick No. 6: Shyanne Sellers (G, Maryland)
In my most recent WNBA mock draft, I have Shyanne Sellers going one spot above here as the No. 5 pick to Golden State, but with Lithuanian guard Justė Jocytė's draft stock rising and the Valkyries being in a position where they can wait on a European teenager to develop her game more, it's entirely possible that Shyanne Sellers falls to the No. 6 spot. That'd be perfect for the Mystics.
Sellers excels as a secondary ball-handler and can score from anywhere on the floor. Her 3-point game really improved in her senior season, with Sellers shooting 40.8 percent on 2.5 attempts per game.
Defensively, she has all the tools to be an above-average player on that end of the floor, but has to stay healthy and work on being more disciplined.
How they all fit together for the Washington Mystics
If this is the trio that the Mystics land, how will they fit together to help the team's rebuild along?
Citron and Sellers could theoretically both wind up starting for the team. Washington would still love to have a true point guard, but starting Sykes at the one with Sellers at the two and Citron at the three would be a fascinating move. It would require Washington to be okay with a backcourt that will have a lot of bumps along the way as the players learn to play in the pro game.
Washington's perimeter defense would be the big winner of this pairing. I think there are some fair concerns about both players as far as their offensive adjustment to the pro game, but both should be able to hold their own defensively, assuming Sellers holds up health-wise after knee issues in college. That's a big assumption because we've seen that the injuries have impacted her speed, especially when it comes to how she closes out and switches, but theoretically, these two should improve Washington's defense.
Iriafen is a little harder to think about here, simply because of the glut the team has on the interior. She would likely come off the bench as a rookie and would mainly be used as an offensive spark when she hits the floor. She'll need to improve defensively on the inside to play the five, so most of her rookie minutes will come at the four with another big on the floor. She probably won't develop a 3-point shot, but there's value in her mid-range shooting as a means of at least opening the paint up a little for Austin or Dolson, though Dolson's stretchiness would make an intriguing pairing with Iriafen, essentially leading to a potential situation where on offense, Iriafen is the five and Dolson the four, but on the defense the pairing swaps around.
With these three players in tow, the Mystics suddenly have a foundation to build on. There are still important needs that have to be filled down the line and only Citron feels like a lock to stick in the league longterm, but the pieces will be there.