Lexie Brown, the ninth pick in the 2018 WNBA was the only top ten draft pick to not display her talents on the big stage last season. This is going to change.

Lexie Brown was the player impacted the most in the 2018 WNBA draft when Azura Stevens nominated, Brown would eventually fall to the ninth spot thanks to the reshuffle. This meant she was taken by the deepest, most balanced team in the league, the Connecticut Sun.

All last season, Brown struggled to crack the rotation, playing behind Courtney Williams, Jasmine Thomas, Rachel Banham and a combination of Layshia Clarendon and Alex Bently for most of the season. That is a hard group to take minutes off, especially for a rookie. As a result, Brown only averaged 1.7 points,  0.8 rebounds, 0.5 assists and 0.2 steals per games.

However, on draft night of 2019, Brown’s fortunes may have changed for the better. She was traded to the Minnesota Lynx for their second round pick, Natisha Hiedeman, who was taken with pick 18 in the 2019 draft.

This is going to be a career defining moment for the Duke alum. Brown was always going to struggle to get minutes with the Sun and now she has a chance to show coach Cheryl Reeve that she is indeed one of the franchise talents of the 2018 WNBA draft.

With the retirement of Lindsay Whalen as well as the leave of absence taken by Maya Moore, this team will be looking for a new direction. Brown was also a decent 3-point shooter in college. She shot at 35.4 percent in her two seasons at Maryland before improving that number to 39.9 percent during her single season at Duke.

This is a skill the Lynx have been desiring for the last few seasons. However, it is not going to be an easy road for Brown. Coach Reeve is famous for wanting her players to show her that they deserve minutes during the regular season.

This should not be an issue for Brown. While there were some questions about her motor coming out of college, spending a season watching other people play will be enough motivation.

This season Brown will be fighting for minutes with Danielle Robinson, Alexis Jones and 2019 second round pick Cierra Dillard. Despite this being a much easier guard rotation to crack, Brown can not and will not be able to take it easy. She has seen other members of her draft class show what they can do. Brown will take this new opportunity to show that she deserves to be spoken about in the company of Kia Nurse, Victoria Vivians, Ariel Atkins and Kelsey Mitchell.

One thing is for sure, barring injury Brown’s numbers are going to spike this season given that she will play more than 5.6 minutes per game. This will almost certainly land her the Most Improved Player award.

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