League MVP awards criteria are a nuanced cocktail with an ever-changing recipe. No one approaches it quite the same as another, and the scales can swing night by night with more intel.
Which is why a late-season injury to 2025 WNBA MVP frontrunner Napheesa Collier is so interesting in the context of this year's race. Consistency matters to many, and missing any significant stretch of time hinders one's candidacy. It’s especially notable since a slew of contenders are making increasingly strong cases in Collier's ongoing absence.
Collier, a 6-foot-1 forward and odds-on MVP betting favorite, entered the season as the top contender following a standout year in 2024. She finished second to A’ja Wilson, a unanimous winner whose season snapped league records. That set Collier up for success from the jump, and she lived up to expectations with another strong statistical season as the fulcrum for league-leading Minnesota (28-6) on both ends.
She leads the league in scoring (career-best 23.5 ppg) and ranks top-10 in average steals (1.8, third), blocks (1.6, fourth) and rebounds (7.5). She’s shooting 53.7% overall (11th), 36.8% from 3 and 90.8% at the free throw line (fourth). Those rankings drop a smidge in per-40-minute stats, a preferred stat for many to compare players' numbers.
The bulkiest claim is her status as the best player on the best team. The Lynx (28-6) are running away with the standings at 6.5 games ahead of the New York Liberty and Atlanta Dream. But she missed her eighth game on Tuesday night in the Minnesota Lynx’s 85-75 loss to New York at Barclays Center. Collier (sprained ankle) hasn’t played since Aug. 2.
To win MVP would set a precedent. No MVP in league history missed more than 15.6% of the regular season. Jonquel Jones won the 2021 honor despite missing five of the Connecticut Sun’s 32 games while competing at EuroBasket.
At eight games, Collier has already missed 18.2% of the full season schedule. She’s played in 26 of 34 games. A ninth absence would be 20% of the season. The Lynx upgraded her availability to doubtful earlier in the week. Head coach Cheryl Reeve said they expect her back before the regular season ends on Sept. 11.
There are no league-mandated qualifications for MVP. The NBA instituted a games-played threshold of 65 games — 79.3% of the regular season’s 82-game schedule — for its awards ballots. Its implementation was meant to curtail load management for star players, an issue the WNBA hasn’t significantly faced yet with a shorter schedule.
Minnesota has kept winning in Collier’s absence, another potential knock to her candidacy if one believes the MVP should go to a player whose presence is so significant that an absence would derail a contender. Minnesota is 4-1 without Collier this month, including two wins against reigning champion New York. They are 6-2 in games without her this season.
As players around the league are showing, there’s a final quarter to state their case for awards.
It was easy to leave Wilson out of the conversation when the Las Vegas Aces were barely a postseason squad two weeks ago. Winners historically play on a team that finishes in the top two in the standings. But the Aces have charged into a tie for fourth, shifting the MVP bar of team success more in Wilson’s favor.
She became the first in league history to score at least 30 points with 20 rebounds and isn’t far off from her historic 2024 stat line. She ranks second behind Collier in scoring (22.6 ppg), second in rebounding (9.9) and first in blocks (2.1) for a fourth consecutive season. And the three-time MVP overtook Collier in win shares, a category the Lynx star led handily before her injury. Wilson leads the league (6.6 to Collier’s 6.4) after scoring 32 points with 12 rebounds to notch an eighth consecutive win for Las Vegas on Tuesday.
Alyssa Thomas continues to cut her own lane in the history books. She has five of the league’s 10 triple-doubles this season and nearly half of the 53 in league history (20). Her stat line is similar to that of 2023 when she won the most first-place MVP votes, but fell seven points short of winner Breanna Stewart.
Her game style doesn’t fit nicely into the historic MVP mold, and she’s had to advocate to be seen as one. The knock is always the lack of scoring compared to other candidates, but she is once again averaging nearly a triple-double on the season with 16.2 points, 8.6 rebounds and 9.1 assists.
Unlike the other top candidates, Thomas is performing in a brand-new environment on a revamped roster in Phoenix. After an 11-year career in Connecticut, Thomas leads the Mercury in rebounds (8.6), field goal efficiency (53.9), and for the first time in her career, leads the league in assists (9.1).
Though the guards always fall down the consideration list (no guard has won since Diana Taurasi in 2009), a few will receive down-ballot votes, which could impact a close race.
With the “ultimate green light” under first-year head coach Karl Smesko, Atlanta Dream guard Allisha Gray is having the best year of her professional career. The Dream are tied with the Liberty for the No. 2 seed as of Wednesday morning, with the most wins (22) since 2018 (23-11). Gray is third in win shares (5.9).
Despite an injury-induced fall for the Indiana Fever, calls are coming for Kelsey Mitchell. Mitchell played in all 35 games through Wednesday morning with averages of 20.4 points (fourth), 3.4 assists and 1.6 turnovers. She’s carrying the offensive load for Indiana and stepping up to fill voids left by three injured point guards, including Caitlin Clark. Mitchell finished tied for 10th in MVP voting last year.
Sabrina Ionescu’s availability bar is also nearly full as the most dependable starter of the New York Liberty’s big three. She’s averaging a career-best 19.1 points per game (fifth), but not as efficiently as years prior. Her 5.4 assists per game rank seventh, and she finished sixth in voting a year ago.
It’s difficult to parse out a league MVP from the loaded superstar crew in New York. Stewart finished third last year, but has also missed all of August with a knee injury.
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