Hailey Van Lith participated in an Ask Me Anything session the WNBA subreddit Thursday, offering fans the opportunity to ask her about the game from a truly unique perspective. Van Lith, who built a large social media following as a college student at Louisville, LSU, and TCU, was asked if she believes the WNBA Draft age should be lowered from 22 — and her answer had a lot to do with her collegiate career.
"I would say right now the draft age is perfect," Van Lith answered. "I think that the college game generates so much awareness that players should want to play as long as they can, because it's such a great platform, and the WNBA is great, but it's also growing. I think you want to play in college as long as you can, just from an overall perspective of your career and how to maximize your visibility, your marketability, your talent level, all those things."
She added that while the WNBA is still growing, she doesn't believe the league is at a place where a 19-year-old could amass the same kind of opportunities as a pro that they can as a college student.
Could the WNBA lower the draft age?
In early July The Athletic's Chantel Jennings suggested that more expansion teams in the WNBA means the league should lower the draft age. As Jennings pointed out, in five years there will be 60 additional roster spots in the WNBA — and GMs will need to "scour the world" to find players to fill those spots.
But as we've seen year after year, it's rare for more than half of the players drafted to even stay on a roster, and a lot of the reason for that comes down to a lack of space — not a lack of talent. It's arguable that teams won't need to search too far to find talent to flesh out their teams, but that they will instead be able to retain players like Madison Scott, who has found opportunities outside the WNBA since she was waived by the Wings in May.
While there are a handful of players who probably didn't need to finish their college careers to earn brand deals and endorsements (Caitlin Clark, Paige Bueckers, and JuJu Watkins all spring to mind), for the most part, Van Lith is absolutely on to something. The current landscape of women's collegiate basketball provides young athletes with experiences and opportunities that don't exist in the professional game. It's not that players don't have huge endorsement deals in the WNBA, because plenty of them do, but the collegiate game affords a more intimate exchange between athletes, fans, and brands, that often results in the ability to cast a wider net in terms of deals.