The Las Vegas Aces spent much of last year tearing up the team that had already made them a powerhouse. Kelsey Plum was traded to the Los Angeles Sparks, Jewell Loyd arrived from the Seattle Storm, Dana Evans came from the Chicago Sky and Cheyenne Parker-Tyus joined in free agency. Yet the team that opened this offseason with a warning about continuity ended it the only way the Aces seem to know how: with a championship.
Las Vegas won its third title in four years after sweeping the Phoenix Mercury, and A'ja Wilson was at the center of it again, taking home a WNBA-record fourth MVP award. Wilson, the two-time champion shooting guard Kelsey Plum once shared a backcourt with, helped steady a roster that had already shown how quickly it could change. The Aces’ message in early free agency is that after all the movement, keeping the core together now matters more than another splashy move.
The season turned on Aug. 2, when the Aces were beaten by 53 points at home by the Minnesota Lynx. Wilson sent a blunt text to teammates afterward: if they were not embarrassed, they should not come into the gym. She added that they were not needed or wanted there and that the mindset had to shift because the loss was embarrassing. The words landed. Las Vegas responded with a franchise-record 16-game win streak and turned that collapse into the kind of surge that only elite teams can survive.
Read Also: Skylar Diggins, A'ja Wilson headline WNBA free agency tracker for 2026
That turnaround gives the Aces’ current offseason a different meaning. They entered it as champions, but also as one of the league’s most altered contenders, having lost Aaliyah Nye to the Toronto Tempo in the expansion draft and moved through the kind of roster churn that has been common across the WNBA because of uncertainty around the collective bargaining agreement. In that environment, the Aces are signaling that their answer is not another reset. It is continuity around Wilson, who is expected to sign a supermax contract worth $1.4.
For Las Vegas, the lesson from last season is plain. The roster can change, the market can shift, and the league can spend months in flux, but the Aces still expect the same thing at the end of it: a team built to win, and a standard that starts with Wilson.
