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Valkyrie Nation · Aug 9, 2026

EARLY Game 32. GSV at Los Angeles Sparks. 4:00 PM PT

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Eric Apricot · Valkyrie Nation

Last game’s Valkyrie Valor goes to Veronica Burton!

  • I’ll try to take game notes in the first half.

  • I’ll post the raw discombobulated notes (if any) as I write them to the Discord server (see bottom) and quarter by quarter in the comments of this article.

  • Feel free to write your game reactions in either Discord or the article comments. Be respectful to each other.

    • (Most of the live game chat seems to be happening in the Discord server. )

The TV channel finding experience is truly miserable in 2026.

VN reader jesswondering developed this bingo game with the help of the Valkyrie Nation Collective. You can read the backstory here.

She took feedback from last game’s bingo and has improved it with 49 possible squares (so everyone can have very different boards).

To play:

  • Go to https://mfbc.us/m/wbdf5zj

  • Every browser or device should randomly open 1 of 30 bingo cards, so everyone in your group can have a different card.

  • If you don’t like your card and want a different card, choose “Help”.

  • Suggestions welcome! There’s a thread in the Discord for bingo feedback, or you can post in the comments.

sketch by Marisa Thinkmoo

  • Kate Martin was a surprise cut when Golden State set its 2026 roster, waived on May 7 to make room for Kaitlyn Chen.

    • Three days later, Martin signed a player-development deal with the Sparks and was tearfully grateful for a second chance. GSV did offer her a player development spot, but Kate Martin declined. One can imagine lots of reasons for that, such as having a better road to getting a regular contract with LA, but also maybe feeling rejected by the Valkyries and not wanting to take a demotion.

    • Kate was signed last month by the Sparks to a standard WNBA contract.

  • Guard Julie Vanloo, another original Valkyries expansion draft selection from the Washington Mystics, was waived by Golden State after EuroBasket in 2025 and claimed off waivers by the Sparks.

  • Valkyries forward Gabby Williams and Sparks star Nneka Ogwumike were teammates on the Seattle Storm in 2024.

  • Sparks center Cameron Brink and Valkyries forwards Ashten Prechtel and Nadia Fingall are all Stanford alumni.

  • Valkyries center Kiah Stokes and Sparks forward Dearica Hamby were also Aces teammates from 2021–2022 before Hamby was traded to the Sparks.

  • Sparks guard Erica Wheeler and Valkyries guard Tiffany Hayes were teammates on the Atlanta Dream in 2022, where Hayes was the veteran leader and Wheeler ran the point.

  • Sparks guard Monique Akoa Makani, acquired from Phoenix in the Kelsey Plum trade grew up in France and was pre-selected for the French national team but was ultimately cut, prompting her to choose Cameroon instead. She’ll be out for revenge against Valkyries Janelle Salaün, Iliana Rupert, and Gabby Williams, who were all on France’s 2024 Olympic silver medal squad.

by Karlie, Eric and the Valkyrie Nation Collection

Pop Quiz Game 32. Can you guess the reason for the team order? Yes this changes every time.

First few correct solutions sent to apricotan@gmail.com will be acknowledged in VN.

The readers with the correct answer to VN Pop Quiz Game 31 were

  1. OskiDubs

  2. Gaelan

  3. Erin S.

(No, I’m not saying what the answer is. That’s so you can have a little puzzle to work on the next time you’re bored.)

Team stats (via stats.wnba.com and Basketball Reference, rank out of 15 teams):

  • ORTG: GSV 110.8 (7th) | LAS 109.1 (9th)

  • DRTG: GSV 103.1 (1st) | LAS 114.4 (13th)

  • NET RTG: GSV 7.7 (2nd) | LAS -5.3 (11th)

  • 2P%: GSV .480 (15th) | LAS .547 (3rd)

  • 3P%: GSV .353 (5th) | LAS .338 (9th)

Golden State Valkyries (22-9)

Top 3 by stat (per game, via Basketball Reference, min 10 MPG):

  • PTS: Gabby Williams (14.8) | Janelle Salaün (13.3) | Veronica Burton (12.5)

  • AST: Veronica Burton (5.6) | Tiffany Hayes (2.4) | Kaitlyn Chen (2.1)

  • REB: Kiah Stokes (5.3) | Kayla Thornton (5.1) | Kaila Charles (4.5)

  • STL: Gabby Williams (1.6) | Veronica Burton (1.3) | Cecilia Zandalasini (0.9)

  • BLK: Kiah Stokes (1.9) | Laeticia Amihere (0.8) | Veronica Burton (0.5)

  • 2P%: Kaitlyn Chen (.602) | Kiah Stokes (.571) | Tiffany Hayes (.523)

  • 3P% (min 1.0 3PM): Janelle Salaün (.400) | Kayla Thornton (.367) | Veronica Burton (.361)

  • FT%: Kayla Thornton (.911) | Cecilia Zandalasini (.833) | Tiffany Hayes (.828)

  • PER: Janelle Salaün (19.8) | Veronica Burton (19.5) | Gabby Williams (18.7)

Los Angeles Sparks (12-18)

Top 3 by stat (per game, via Basketball Reference, min 10 MPG):

  • PTS: Nneka Ogwumike (17.1) | Dearica Hamby (15.2) | Rae Burrell (13.5)

  • AST: Erica Wheeler (5.5) | Nneka Ogwumike (2.9) | Dearica Hamby (2.5)

  • REB: Nneka Ogwumike (8.8) | Dearica Hamby (7.7) | Cameron Brink (4.5)

  • STL: Dearica Hamby (1.6) | Nneka Ogwumike (1.2) | Erica Wheeler (1.0)

  • BLK: Cameron Brink (1.5) | Dearica Hamby (0.5) | Rae Burrell (0.5)

  • 2P%: Cameron Brink (.603) | Dearica Hamby (.592) | Nneka Ogwumike (.569)

  • 3P% (min 1.0 3PM): Nneka Ogwumike (.407) | Rae Burrell (.405) | Ariel Atkins (.303)

  • FT%: Ariel Atkins (.974) | Erica Wheeler (.867) | Nneka Ogwumike (.848)

  • PER: Nneka Ogwumike (21.4) | Dearica Hamby (20.2) | Cameron Brink (15.4)

The WNBA makes all injury reports available and updates the site absurdly often (every 15 minutes).

Golden State Valkyries

  • Rupert, Iliana — OUT — Pregnancy (sigh)
    We discussed Rupert’s pregnancy in extensive detail before

  • Zandalasini, Cecilia — Questionable — Injury/Illness - Left Quad; Soreness

Los Angeles Sparks

  • Akoa Makani, Monique — Questionable — Injury/Illness - Right Ankle;

  • Burrell, Rae — Probable — Injury/Illness - Right Leg;

I’ve been asked often what Probable, Available, Questionable, Doubtful mean. They are meant to not have specific probabilities attached to them, partly because how could you even hope to estimate such probabilities to any precision?

However, just for your information, I did do a quick study of all 501 injury reports from the WNBA from 2026-05-16 to 2026-07-05 and found:

  • 300+ players listed as Out, played < 1% of the time. (That 1% comprises development players listed as Out who were activated last-minute.)

  • 5 Players listed as Doubtful played 0% of the time.

  • 82 Players listed as Questionable played 45% of the time.

  • 12 Players listed as Available played 67% of the time.

  • 38 Players listed as Probable played 84% of the time.

Golden State Valkyries

Honorary Valkyries

Want to know more about a player? Check out Valkyries Say Less, who have a series of podcasts that profiles every Valkyrie!

Los Angeles Sparks

  • 2 Chance Gray

  • 5 Dearica Hamby, Dee-ERIC-uh Ham-bee

  • 6 Jihyun Park

  • 7 Ariel Atkins

  • 8 Monique Akoa Makani, ah-KOH-uh muh-KAH-nee

  • 12 Rae Burrell, BURR-El

  • 17 Erica Wheeler

  • 20 Kate Martin

  • 22 Cameron Brink

  • 23 Kiana Williams, KEY-ah-nuh

  • 30 Nneka Ogwumike, NEH-kuh OH-gwoo-muh-kay

  • 32 Emma Cannon

  • Tonie Morgan, TOH-nee MOR-gan

  • Alissa Pili (DC), uh-LISS-uh PEE-lee

Also, for more name pronunciations, including many players saying their own names, check out Her Hoop Stats.

  • Ash = Ashten Prechtel

  • Ceci (cheh-chee) = Cecilia Zandalasini

  • illy, ili = Iliana Rupert

  • Ja = Janelle Salaün

  • Jak = Ndjakalenga Mwenentanda

  • J.J. = Juste Jocyte

  • Kai = Kaila Charles

  • K.T. = Kayla Thornton

  • L.A. = Laeticia Amihere

  • Mr. Joe = owner Joe Lacob

    • (I’m not endorsing this; I’m just reporting that the GM and players use this all the time)

  • Nat = Natalie Nakase

  • Tip = Tiffany Hayes

  • V, V.B. = Veronica Burton

  • The Backcourt Burglar = Veronica Burton (college)

  • The Black Queen = Laeticia Amihere (from childhood)

  • KFC = Kaitlyn Chen (VN discord). Too many others to list…

    • I personally use Here Comes The Cheneral and Bringing the Chenergy.

  • Spooky G = Gabby Williams (uses herself, don’t know origin)

  • V12 = Veronica Burton (college probably)

These videos are meant to be friendly to beginners but have interesting observations for observers of all backgrounds. All the parts can be viewed independently, but the vocabulary does build up with each Part. The whole series can be found on YouTube here.

Here are the series in reverse posting order.

  • No Silly Questions with H: Valkyries at Toronto. (I discuss many important and random issues with my daughter H, such as isolation plays, coach adjustments, in the bonus / penalty, intentionally fouling, and the exact color shade of the Tempo)

Part 4 terms defined include:

  • 00:38 Switching defense

  • 00:56 Mismatches

  • 02:15 Bad switches

  • 03:25 Show and recover defense (hedge and recover)

  • 04:54 Drop defense

  • 06:17 Valkyries 325 = Warriors 55

  • 06:54 Blitz / Trap / Double team defense, surprise

  • 07:41 Countering the blitz with isolation

  • 08:45 Drop vs blitz defense

Part 3 terms defined include:

  • 00:33 Go Over the screen, Go Under the screen, High side, Low side

  • 02:19 HORNS formation

  • 02:33 Dive or Roll

  • 03:23 HORNS 5

  • 04:14 Dribble handoff, DHO

  • 05:07 Pindown screen, Down screen

  • 05:15 Using the screen, Coming off the screen

  • 06:37 Jamming the cut, Bumping the cut, Denying the cut

  • 07:35 Slip a screen, Roll vs Pop

Part 2 terms defined include:

  • 00:38 Recover

  • 00:46 Bigs and Smalls

  • 00:54 Mismatch

  • 01:53 Rotating on defense

  • 02:42 Slipping the screen, ghosting the screen

  • 03:03 Double team, trap, blitz

  • 04:02 Rejecting the screen

  • 04:26 Helping at the nail

  • 06:21 Slide cut, Passing angle

Part 1 terms include:

  • 00:34 Dribbling and shooting, big vs small

  • 02:00 Screens

  • 02:10 Off ball

  • 02:32 Cut, Flare Cut, Flare Screen

  • 03:39 Ball Fake

  • 03:53 Geography of the Court

  • 03:57 Baseline, sideline, up, down, top

  • 04:10 Corners, elbows, HORNS

  • 05:29 Pick and roll, screen and roll

  • 05:49 Dribble handoff

  • 06:17 Rebounding, boxing out

  • 06:18 Roll

  • 07:18 Backdoor cut

  • 07:46 ICE defense

  • 07:51 take / accept / use the screen

If you don’t know what Discord is, you can ignore this. If you like how the site is now, then don’t worry. This site will still work the same and I’ll still post game previews and wraps over email and the web, etc.

However, if you are wondering where everyone is during game day, it’s the Discord server. For instance, for the 7/15 IND live game chat, there were 880 messages (that’s a lot, even if 150 of them were Kaitlyn Chen puns).

Basically Discord is a group chat where you can engage with me and other readers. It’s good for conversation that’s a bit more casual than leaving a web site comment. You can also respond with emojis and multimedia.

I have been posting my live game notes in the Discord chat as I write them. I even live-commented the media-coaches game over Discord and answered questions. Questions and comments sometimes turn into things I write about for the newsletter.

For now, I’ll keep it open to everyone, but I reserve the right in the future to restrict it to paying subscribers.

Many thanks to Marisa Emi and Tac0maAr0ma for volunteering to moderate the Discord and generally reorganizing it intelligently.

The invitation link for August: https://discord.gg/3P5XTuwAd

Read the original on valkyrienation.substack.com ↗

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