‘They know the player they’re getting in me’: Bethesda native Kiki Russell on being selected in WNBA draft
Monday night capped a whirlwind few weeks for Kiki Rice and her UCLA teammates.
On April 5, UCLA’s senior-laden team beat South Carolina to win the school’s first ever NCAA Championship. Then on Monday, a record six UCLA players were selected in the first round of the WNBA draft.
Rice was taken by expansion team Toronto Tempo with the sixth overall pick.
“I had a great conversation with (Toronto) before the draft,” Rice told reporters while attending the draft in New York. “I feel like they’ve been able to really appreciate a lot of things I do in my game. I can tell they’ve studied me a lot and they know the player they’re getting in me and that’s something that I really appreciate.”
Rice, a 5-foot 11-inch guard from Bethesda, Maryland, ranked second on a very talented UCLA squad in scoring, rebounds, assists and steals. She was named a third-team All-American. And in 2022, she was the All-Met player of the year at Sidwell Friends.
“I play both ends, I take pride in my defense, I compete at a high level and I work really hard,” Rice told WTOP.
The highlight of the night was “the moment I go to share with my family, to embrace and hug them when I heard my name being called,” she said.
“It’s super exciting that Kiki gets to be part of a new WNBA team,” Andrea Rice, Kiki’s mother, told WTOP. “She’ll have the opportunity to learn from the veterans who were selected in the expansion draft and a great veteran coach (Sandy Brondello).”
The WNBA added Toronto and Portland as expansion teams for the league’s 30th season.
“She will forever be the first college draft pick ever for the Toronto Tempo,” Andrea said.
The Tempo’s inaugural regular season game will be played May 8 in Toronto against the Washington Mystics, which drafted two of Rice’s UCLA teammates — center Lauren Betts and forward Angela Dugalić.
The Tempo will face the Mystics in D.C. on June 12 and August 19.
Rice was one of two D.C.-area natives selected in the first round of Monday’s WNBA draft.
Azzi Fudd of Arlington, Virginia, became the first player from the region to be selected first overall. The UConn guard is going to the Dallas Wings.
Fudd, Rice and the other 2026 WNBA draft picks will be the beneficiaries of the new collective bargaining agreement — unanimously ratified last month — which will greatly increase rookie salaries. Fudd is getting a $500,000 paycheck.