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Sparks go for Candace Parker vibes, taking Tennessee’s Rae Burrell in WNBA draft

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The final time the Sparks drafted a participant from Tennessee within the first spherical of the WNBA draft, issues turned out all proper.

Fourteen years after Candace Parker started her WNBA profession with the Sparks, fellow Girl Volunteer Rae Burrell will make the trek to Los Angeles because the Sparks picked the 6-foot-1 guard ninth total.

With Parker now in Chicago and the Sparks coming off their first season since 2011 with out advancing to the postseason, Burrell hopes to stay as much as the two-time WNBA champion’s legacy.

“Candace, she got here in and had an instantaneous impression and altered the sport for them,” Burrell stated Monday night time. “I hope to do the identical factor, simply are available in and include that very same grit and grind that she did, and to be half the participant that she is.”

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Burrell missed 12 video games this season due to a knee harm and returned to common 12.3 factors and three.9 rebounds per recreation. Sparks coach and common supervisor Derek Fisher stated he wasn’t deterred concerning the harm as a result of he had Burrell, a second-team All-SEC performer as a junior, circled on his scouting report for years.

“We’ve prioritized size and flexibility and having the ability to impression the sport enjoying a number of positions on both sides of the basketball this whole offseason and Rae is de facto, actually a participant that we expect going ahead will help us in that regard,” Fisher stated.

The Sparks additionally picked Louisville guard Kianna Smith (sixteenth total), Connecticut’s 6-foot-5 ahead Olivia Nelson-Ododa (nineteenth) and Large West participant of the 12 months Amy Atwell out of Hawaii (twenty seventh).

After WNBA Commissioner Cathy Engelbert introduced Burrell’s identify, the Las Vegas native hugged her dad and mom and strode to the stage. She took a photograph with Engelbert holding a Sparks jersey and waved to new teammate Nneka Ogwumike throughout an on-air interview with ESPN’s Holly Rowe.

Ogwumike attended the draft and shared a desk with former Sparks star Lisa Leslie and South Carolina coach Daybreak Staley. As a part of the league’s first in-person draft in three years, prospects loved predraft occasions like a tour of the Empire State Constructing and conferences with former gamers. Burrell stated she spoke to Ogwumike, the gamers union president, briefly throughout a tour of the WNBPA’s workplaces.

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“She was already being so useful with me,” Burrell stated. “So I’m excited to comply with her lead as I’m going into this subsequent section of my life.”

Kentucky guard Rhyne Howard was the highest total decide of the Atlanta Dream, who traded up from No. 3 final week to seize the two-time SEC participant of the 12 months.

Smith, a 6-foot guard, averaged 12 factors and a couple of.7 assists per recreation as a redshirt senior for Louisville, the place she performed for 2 years after transferring from California.

Nelson-Ododa was the Large East co-defensive participant of the 12 months in 2021 and was chosen first-team all-conference as a senior after main the Huskies with 7.5 rebounds per recreation.

Atwell, a 6-foot guard, will be a part of fellow Australian Liz Cambage in Los Angeles. Atwell jumped into the WNBA dialog this 12 months after main Hawaii with 17.8 factors and 6.9 rebounds with a team-high 46 steals. She is the college’s all-time chief in three-pointers made (205) and single-season three-pointers (76).

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