‘AT for MVP’: How Alyssa Thomas’ standout season in Phoenix has her in the MVP conversation again

Thomas, who is playing her 11th season in the WNBA, has been a frequent finalist but has yet to win league MVP. Even this year, she faces tough competition from A’ja Wilson of the Las Vegas Aces and Napheesa Collier of the Minnesota Lynx, among others. 

At PHX Arena, though, the Mercury are trying their hardest to advocate for their star.

When guard Kahleah Copper scored 28 points on her birthday, the first words out of her mouth in her on-court interview were, “AT for MVP.” The Mercury clinched a playoff and then returned home to hand out purple shirts and signs emblazoned with the slogan a few nights later. 

Even the targeted Meta ads in the area urge users to go and see the Valley’s MVP candidate before the end of the regular season. 

“I mean, that’s a good vote,” Thomas’ teammate and fiancée DeWanna Bonner told reporters with a laugh at a recent shootaround. “She’s going to rebound, she’s going to dish, she’s going to score, she’s going to defend. I think that’s the definition of MVP.”

And speaking of dishing, Thomas just took back her own record for single-season assists, too, with 342 in 37 games. She now has three of the top-five season assist totals with 316 in 2023 and 317 in 2024. Indiana’s Caitlin Clark ranks second with 337 in 2025.

Thomas is averaging a career-best 9.2 assists and 15.8 points per game. She is also pulling down 8.9 rebounds per game, setting her on pace to become the first in league history to average 15-plus assists, 9-plus rebounds, and 9-plus assists while shooting better than 50% from the field.

An 11-year veteran and key offseason acquisition, Thomas has also helped the team into a prime position as it enters the final week of the regular season with homecourt advantage already secured for the WNBA Playoffs.

“She just impacts the game in so many ways,” Phoenix head coach Nate Tibbetts said. “Those are just the numbers. But, you know, you can’t put a value on her competitive spirit and her focus and determination and what she does at the defensive end, right? Like, she’s just probably the best, like, free safety in our league, she just can see things that others can’t defensively, and all those things matter.”

Tibbetts has touted her ability to turn defense into offense through her vision in transition. Her 7.3 defensive rebounds per game are the second-highest in her career. Her 52.7 assist percentage, which measures the number of teammate baskets assisted during her time on the court, leads the league by a wide margin. Veronica Burton of Golden State is second at 36.6.

“I think that’s one of the most special things about her,” Tibbetts said after the team’s Aug. 30 victory against New York. “She goes from a rebound, one-or-two dribbles, and she’s at half court.”

And once she crosses half court, she is one of the league’s most lethal shooters, averaging 53% from the field and 71.4% within two feet of the basket. And then there’s her spin move.

“You just drive hard and they try to cut it off and you get to the move you want to do anyway,” Thomas told reporters after defeating the New York Liberty at home. “It’s my patented move.”

As much as her teammates might think she deserves the recognition, Bonner said Thomas certainly isn’t one to campaign for herself.

“We love it, but she doesn’t,” Bonner told reporters with a laugh at a recent shootaround. “You don’t see her post too much on social media about it. She don’t talk about it much. That’s just who she is. She loves basketball, and she likes to play the right way.”

And she has plenty of teammates prepared to campaign for her, though Sami Whitcomb said she thinks the stat sheet speaks for itself.

“If you’re watching and you know basketball and you know impact and value, there’s no pitch,” Whitcomb told reporters. “No one has done what she’s doing every single day.”

All stats sourced from Basketball Reference.