The Golden State Valkyries will select Kate Martin and Kayla Thornton in the 2025 WNBA expansion draft, a source briefed on the decision said The athlete. Full draft results will be announced Friday at 6:30 p.m. ET on ESPN.

Under the rules set by the league and the collective bargaining agreement for the expansion draft, the twelve current WNBA franchises are allowed to protect six players. The Valkyries can then select an unprotected player from each team; This could be a player on the active roster, a player for whom the organization has draft rights, or who is on its international rights list.

Martin will likely be the most popular player Golden State signed on Friday. The 2024 rookie from Iowa, where she helped Caitlin Clark lead the Hawkeyes to back-to-back trips to the national title game, has had a strong start to her first WNBA season. As the Las Vegas Aces dealt with the absence of Chelsea Gray, Martin averaged 19.3 minutes in her first 10 games and made 37 percent of her three-point shots.

However, Martin appeared on the pitch less as the Aces were fully fit again and only cracked double-digit minutes twice in the second half of the season. Her postseason minutes consisted of an appearance in a blowout. Las Vegas always wanted to protect their core four players in the draft, A’ja Wilson, Kelsey Plum, Jackie Young and Gray, but Martin could have been one of the final two picks. Instead, Martin will begin the second chapter of her WNBA career with the Valkyries and the expansion team will benefit from the three remaining cost-controlled seasons of her rookie contract.

The New York Liberty have had to make some of the toughest decisions in the entire league thanks to their deep roster. The reigning champions had to prioritize their entire starting lineup and Nyara Sabally, who was the X-factor in Game 5 of the WNBA Finals. That left their entire international roster – including Marine Johannès and Han Xu – as well as critical substitutes unprotected.

Golden State is choosing one of those veteran reserves: Kayla Thornton, a player with whom general manager Ohemaa Nyanin is very familiar, as Nyanin was an assistant GM in New York before joining the Valkyries.

Thornton appeared in every playoff game the Liberty played during their title run and averaged the second-most minutes (12.5) among substitutes. Her best performance of the postseason came in Game 2 of the semifinals against Las Vegas, when she was the game’s best plus-13 and helped New York take a commanding 2-0 series lead. Golden State will be the fourth stop in Thornton’s WNBA career, and the 32-year-old veteran has one year left on a contract extension she signed with the Liberty in 2023.

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