Olivia Miles only rookie named as starter in WNBA All-Star Game
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As if Olivia Miles of the Minnesota Lynx hasn’t done enough the first quarter of the season with an average of 18.7 points and 5.7 assists per game, she has now been named a starter for the WNBA All-Star Game.
Miles is the only rookie starting the game this year, and she becomes only the second rookie in franchise history to be selected as a starter after Maya Moore in 2011.
Caitlin Clark was voted to start her third straight All-Star Game and will be joined by Indiana Fever teammates Kelsey Mitchell and Aliyah Boston, the WNBA announced Thursday.
It's the second time in four years that three players from the same team were chosen to start the game, with Las Vegas doing it in 2023. Clark wasn't able to play in last year's game that the Fever hosted because she was injured right before the All-Star break.
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Clark and Mitchell will be joined this year in the backcourt by Dallas' Paige Bueckers. It's the fourth consecutive year that a rookie was chosen as an All-Star starter. Bueckers played last season.
Miles, the second overall draft pick this year, is the fastest player in league history to reach over 350 points and 100 assists. Her Lynx teammate and league veteran Natasha Howard was also named a starter for the All-Stars.
Joining Howard for the frontcourt are A'ja Wilson, Breanna Stewart, Jessica Shepard and Gabby Williams. It will be Wilson's and Stewart's eighth All-Star appearance while Shepard will be making her first.
“It's an honor to be an All-Star, even though I've had a few of them,” Stewart said. “Each one is really special and I'm not taking it lightly.”
Williams played in her first All-Star Game last season. Howard will play in her third.
Starters were chosen by a mixture of fan, player and media votes. The fan vote counted for 50 percent while media and player votes were 25 percent each. Each player’s score was calculated by averaging their weighted rank from all three areas.
The league's head coaches will select the 12 reserves for the team, results that will be announced Tuesday. The 15 head coaches will vote for three guards, five frontcourt players and four players at either position regardless of conference. Coaches can’t vote for their own players.
New this year, WNBA greats Cynthia Cooper and Teresa Weatherspoon will serve as honorary general managers and select the two teams from the pool of All-Stars. Previously the top two fan vote-getters would serve as captains and select the squads.
Bueckers, Clark and Boston were the top three vote-getters among fans. All three received more than 1 million votes.
The All-Star game is July 25 in Chicago.
