What trading for DiJonai Carrington means for the Minnesota Lynx

The Lynx and president of basketball operations and head coach Cheryl Reeve made perhaps the biggest trade of the season on Sunday morning with the WNBA trade deadline looming on Thursday, August 7 at 3 p.m. ET.

Per the team’s release, the Lynx acquired Dallas guard DiJonai Carrington, sending forward Diamond Miller and injured guard Karlie Samuelson in order to match salaries. Additionally, Dallas will receive Minnesota’s 2027 second-round pick.

Carrington bolsters Minnesota’s depth at the wing and adds a 2024 First-Team All-Defense selection to a team that’s already at the top of the league in most defensive metrics. Carrington also took home the league’s Most Improved Player honors last season and finished second in 6th Player of the Year voting in 2023. 

Dallas acquired her via a four-team trade on Feb. 2. Despite averaging a career-high 5.1 rebounds, Carrington’s shooting numbers are the lowest they’ve been since her rookie season in 2021. However, now that she finds herself on the team leading the league in metrics such as offensive rating, assists, and assist percentage, it’s not exactly a hot take to imagine those numbers will start to climb back up. 

Carrington also fits with the Lynx as a player who persevered through injuries and years of development before playing time was a given. Carrington joins Bridget Carleton, who finished two spots behind Carrington in last season’s Most Improved Player voting, as a major development win over the past few seasons.

From The Next’s reporting on both Carrington and Carleton during last year’s playoffs, when both players met in the semifinals:

Carleton and Carrington both are qualified to teach grad school level courses in resilience and the grind. 

A second-round pick of the Sun in 2021, Carrington arrived in the W as a rookie out of Baylor by way of Stanford. Just like every player who enters the league, Carrington had to fight for minutes, which weren’t immediately plentiful. Unlike other players, multiple ACL tears and a torn patellar tendon produced six surgeries before the age of 25 for Carrington. Forcing the young and talented player to spend full offseasons dedicated to rehab more so than refinement. 

“That’s something that I’ve really tried to focus on especially in this world that we live in, where everything is typically at the click of a button,” Carrington told The Next after shootaround ahead of Game 3 against Minnesota. “Just the art and I think the depth of how much more it means when you do wait and when you do just kind of work your way up, it means a lot.”

Carrington has parlayed the hard work that takes place in the shadows into a special season in 2024. She’s posted career highs across the board and has become a fixture of Connecticut’s starting lineup after making just three starts across her first three seasons in the league. An imposing presence on the defensive perimeter, Carrington is one of the biggest threats in the league to snatch a ball away and send it the other direction at any time. Justly earning her a place on the WNBA’s all-defensive first-team, and the honor of being named the league’s Most Improved Player. 

Carrington also played with both Natisha Hiedeman and Courtney Williams during her time in Connecticut, and she appeared on one of the earliest StudBudz streams of the season when the Lynx played in Dallas.

In return, the Wings acquire Miller, the No. 2 overall pick in the 2023 WNBA Draft. Miller flashed plenty of promise during her 2023 rookie season. However, after a string of injuries during the following winter and early in the 2024 season, she fell completely out of the rotation during Minnesota’s run to the Finals last year. She has played better in stretches this season, providing an essential spark in a win against the Aces in Minneapolis in June, and she is shooting over 50% on 3-point attempts. But she hasn’t found the consistency to be a constant contributor in the rotation.

The Lynx acquired Samuelson in an aggressive draft-day trade in April. The former Mystic sustained a Lisfranc injury on her left foot in June and was ruled out for the remainder of the season after undergoing surgery on the foot in July. Samuelson started the first four games of the season when the team was without All-Star Kayla McBride, and averaged 3.3 points in 16 games for Minnesota. Samuelson’s inclusion, despite being out for the season, keeps Minnesota below the salary cap to keep the trade legal.

The Wings also waived center Teaira McCowan in an adjacent roster move to make space for Miller and Samuelson. The two-for-one move also leaves the Lynx with an open roster spot and enough cap space to sign a 12th player. Who the Lynx acquire, and when, will likely be influenced by the timeline and severity of Napheesa Collier‘s ankle injury suffered on Saturday.

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