Las Vegas Aces Star Aja Wilson was the unanimous choice for WNBA MVP, the league announced Sunday.
The Aces’ versatile forward averaged 26.9 points and 11.8 rebounds this season. She is just the second player to win the award unanimously, joining Cynthia Cooper of the Houston Comets, who did so in the league’s inaugural season in 1997.
Wilson received 67 first-place votes from a panel of national media, making her a three-time winner of the award (2020 and 2022). She is the fourth player in WNBA history to reach that milestone, joining Sherly Swoopes, Lisa Leslie and Lauren Jackson.
Minnesota Lynx forward Napheesa Collier (467 points) finished in second place, followed by New York Liberty forward Breanna Stewart (295 points), Indiana Fever guard Caitlin Clark (130 points) and Connecticut Sun forward Alyssa Thomas (83 points) in fifth place.
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Wilson finished third in MVP voting last year, receiving a fourth-place vote that she said motivated her after the Aces won their second straight WNBA title.
“It gave me a little boost when I started my off-season workouts, but around February, I got tired of it,” she said. “I didn’t want to give that energy to that person, so that’s when I started to get blocked.”
Wilson finished the regular season with 1,021 points, 451 rebounds and led the league with 98 blocks. The 6-foot-4 Wilson broke the WNBA single-season scoring record set by Phoenix Mercury guard Diana Taurasi in 2006 (25.3 points per game).
She scored a season-high 42 points against Dallas, and a few days later, she scored 41 against Phoenix. Overall, she scored at least 20 points in 34 of her 38 games. She was relentless with the rebounds, grabbing 9.8 defensive points per game, the highest average in a season in league history.
Wilson’s 11.87 rebounding average is third-best in league history, behind Angel Reese and Sylvia Fowles.
