Before the playoffs began, I made a post detailing what every WNBA team had to do to win a title. For the Golden State Valkyries, I said that they needed to "keep teams in Valkatraz" because their offensive game ranked so low amongst the league, doing anything less would get them in a heap of trouble.
They did it. On the back of their all-world defense, the Golden State Valkyries are WNBA champions in just their second year of existence.
Golden State did it despite only scoring over 70 points once during the Finals. They only did it in Game 3, which happened to be a loss.
During the series, Golden State's shooting splits were 35% from the field, 26% from three, and 80% from the free-throw line. These numbers, to put it lightly, are jarring. Teams are not supposed to win much of anything, let alone a major sporting championship, with those numbers.
The Golden State Valkyries did, and do not (and should not) care who likes it or doesn't.
It is not hyperbole to say that their championship performance broke the game of basketball and broke the mold of sports. Here's how they did it.
There's never been a WNBA champion like this
Quickly, here are a few numbers surrounding Golden State's offense this year, so we know what we're measuring up to:
- PPG: 82.2, 13th of 15
- FG: 42.23%—15th, worst in the league
- TS%: 54%, 13th of 15
Starting in-house, Golden State's FG% is the most inefficient among WNBA champions in 20 years, and the 2nd-most inefficient of the century behind the 2006 Detroit Shock (41.40%).
They also have the worst true shooting percentage of any championship team since the 2008 Detroit Shock.
Let's key in on them for a bit, actually. That 2008 Shock team ranked in the top half for TS% that year, and their 2006 team that shot 41.4% from the field was good for 9th in the league that year. Remember, Golden State is last and 12th in those categories, respectively. So while Detroit shot worse than they did in their two championship years, they were in the ballpark of the rest of the league.
The Valkyries are in their own world.
In terms of their points per game, the number itself actually stacks up pretty well next to WNBA champions of the past. It's their ranking of 13th that jumps out. Golden State has just done what no WNBA team has done before—win a championship with a PPG ranking in the bottom half of the league. Every team before them has been top half, with only a few like that '06 Detroit team being middle of the road in that category.
To find teams that have done this, we have to go to the W's male counterpart. The NBA has seen six champions since its merger accomplish this feat—the '79 Sonics, '89/'90/'03 Pistons, '93 Bulls, and most recently, the '04 Spurs.
Of all these teams, only the '79 Sonics (19/22, 86.4%) and '03 Pistons (24/29, 82.8%) saw over 80% of the league score more than them a night. Only those Sonics (20/22, 90.9%) let over 80% of the league score more efficiently, too.
Golden State not only did both, but their PPG numbers (13/15, 86.7%) and FG% ranks (15/15, 100%) beat out those '79 Sonics easily.
All of that stat talk to say, we have never seen a team like the Golden State Valkyries in our lives. No one in the last half-century, no matter where their allegiances lie, has seen a team like them.
It's bigger than basketball
To really put what the Golden State Valkyries are doing into perspective, we must travel out of the basketball world.
Our first stop is the world of football, where, in terms of PPG, the 2008 Pittsburgh Steelers are the worst offense to win a Super Bowl. Pittsburgh's offense was 20th of 32 teams, meaning 62.5% of the league outscored them on a per-game basis—a far cry from the 86.7% of the Valks.
In the world of baseball, batting average serves as the closest thing to FG%. The lowest batting average to win a World Series belongs to the 1906 Chicago White Sox, who hit .230 during the regular season.
That placed them 15th of 16 teams that year, meaning 93.7% of the league outhit them...... which is still short of the Valkryies 100% in their adjacent category of FG%.
The 1965 Los Angeles Dodgers had the fewest runs per game of any World Series winner, sitting at a measly 3.58. That ranked 14th of 20 teams at the time (70% of the league outscored them), another far cry from the Valks 13th of 15 ranking in PPG.
It's only when we get to the ice that we finally find someone that can match Golden State.
The 2011-12 Los Angeles Kings were 29th of 30 NHL teams in goals per game (96.7% of the league outscored them) and dead last in shooting percentage. These metrics both match and exceed the Valks'. So, there you go—the Valks are extremely rare, but not sports-breaking, right?
Not so fast.
Even that Kings' team found fire going into the playoffs, scoring the fifth-most goals in the NHL over their last 18 games. That continued into the playoffs, too, where they only had one shutout on their 20-game trip to the Stanley Cup.
The Valks? No such luck.
In their last 20 regular season games, the Valks scored 82.8 PPG, just above their average and well below league average. Their splits of 42/34/79 also weren't great. Golden State's offensive struggles have persisted from the first tip of Game One to the final buzzer of Game Seven. Yet, they sit atop the WNBA mountain.
The Valks pulling this off should genuinely have them in all-time conversations. Not just WNBA all-time conversations, either. This defensive unit should be mentioned in the same breath as the 2000 Ravens, those '03 Pistons from earlier, the '85 Bears, etc. Golden State's defense was and has been that good, and it had to be all series.
The astronomical defense they have played has allowed the lowest-scoring and least efficient basketball team (and possibly sporting team) of the last half-century to victory over a Dream team with a flourishing superstar and two potent All-Stars.
The people of the sporting world often say defense wins championships. Those people never really stop to think to where the line is drawn for that statement.
The 2026 Golden State Valkyries might just be the line.
Add us as a preferred source on Google