The Greatest Passers in WNBA History

David October 8, 2025 Fact checked by: Arek Kissoyan 4 Comments


Point Gawd Chelsea Gray is celebrating her (Larry Bird year) birthday today. And in a few days, she will likely be celebrating something that now happens as often as her birthdays: a Championship!

If the Las Vegas Aces win their third championship in four years, it will be the fifth championship she has won since 2022 and her fourth WNBA one.

  • 2016 WNBA Champion
  • 2022 Commissioner’s Cup Champion (MVP)
  • 2022 WNBA Champion (Finals MVP)
  • 2023 WNBA Champion
  • 2025 UNRIVALED Champion (Finals MVP)
  • 2025 WNBA Champion

What’s missing from this shelf is a trophy showing her throwing a behind-the-back pass above the words “MOST EXCITING PASSER.” In honor of Gray’s birthday and all of the passing wizards in WNBA history, I wanted to celebrate the women who should have one of these imaginary awards.

CHELSEA GRAY (2015-PRESENT)

Chelsea Gray on the art of passing:

“Initially, it was definitely nature. Like, I just had a gift growing up and seeing the ways passing a basketball, I just saw it. Maybe the bounce pass is the right pass but somehow I had to spin it. And then I started curating this, if it’s a 3-on-2, I need to get this angle. If it’s to this person that’s a big than I need to get this angle. The actual art of actual passing I think is nature, but it had to develop.”

Source: Dice City Sports

TICHA PENICHEIRO (1998-2012)

Caitlin Clark on Penicheiro:

“She’s not a player a lot of people always talk about, but somebody that – you watch her highlights, and you pull up some of the plays she had in the league, and it’s like she was making crazy passes behind her head and stuff.”

Here’s a short quiz to determine if you are an OG fan of the WNBA.

  1. Did you know that the WNBA didn’t have a commissioner until 2019?
  2. Did you know that the league used to have two 20-minute halves instead of four quarters?
  3. Did you know the regular season used to be just 28 games?
  4. Did you know Sacramento had two of the flashiest passers in basketball history in the late 90s: Jason Williams on the Kings and Ticha Penicheiro on the Monarchs.

The legendary mixtape legends DUNK COMP even created a great montage of the two, as well as the go-to solo mix of the 5’11” 2005 WNBA Champ who led the league in assists seven times and was recently inducted into the FIBA Hall of Fame. 

CAITLIN CLARK (2024-PRESENT)

Basketball legend Rebecca Lobo called Caitlin Clark the best passer in the league during Clark’s historic rookie season, which ended with her breaking the single-season assist record with 337. Obviously, since she broke the league record, it meant she had also broken the rookie record. That record belonged to Penicheiro, who congratulated Clark with this message.

“Congratulations. A record that stood since 1998, and you come here and you break it. Super proud of you. I know the work that you put in. A lot of people always talked about your shooting—I was always mesmerized about your passing, your court vision, and how you make your teammates better. So this record is in great hands. Continue to do what you do, continue to elevate your game and the women’s game and the WNBA.”

Clark also broke a very long list of other records, including Courtney Vandersloot’s record for most assists in a single game with 19.

And if you are one of those miserable people who has something negative to say every time Caitlin’s name is mentioned, this guy says hello.

 

SUE BIRD (2002-2022)

When Caitlin Clark was asked about her list of all-time great passers, the first name she said was Sue Bird.

“I think for myself, growing up, like that was Sue Bird for me. Sue was the player that I loved getting to watch. (When I went to my first WNBA game, don’t tell Sue this, but I was more so there for the Lynx. But they were playing the Storm at the time.) So, I got to see her play, and the way she passed the ball.”

Bird isn’t just one of the greatest passers in WNBA history; she is one of the greatest women basketball players ever. You could even make a case that she’s the GOAT of Seattle basketball (sorry, GP). Look at these bullets about the 2x NCAA Champ, 5x EuroLeague Champ, and 4x WNBA Champ:

  • Only WNBA player with 3K career assists
  • She’s only lost 1 game in 4 WNBA Finals
  • Won a championship in 3 different decades
  • At age 39, she broke the record for AST in a Finals game
  • Made her 13th WNBA All-Star at the age of 41
  • Has a statue out the Seattle Storm arena

The craziest thing about her playing 20 years is that she missed an entire season in 2013 with a knee injury, came back, missed an entire season in 2019 at the age of 38, and came back to play three more years.

Seattle Storm coach Dan Hughes on Sue Bird:

“A lot of passers see offense, even better passers see defense. She sees both. She sees the space and the position that the ball is going to be caught, and she figures in who she’s throwing it to.”

COURTNEY VANDERSLOOT (2011-PRESENT)

Some call her SLOOT, others call her THE FLOOR GENERAL, and I call her underrated. Everyone knows who she is, but the 2x WNBA Champion doesn’t get mentioned enough for someone who can say the following:

  • Most seasons leading the WNBA in Assists (7 – tied with Ticha)
  • 2nd all-time in assists (2,886)
  • 2nd all-time in playoff assists (390)
  • 2nd most assists in a game (18)
  • 3rd most assists in a season (314)
  • Most games with 20 points & 10 assists (10)
  • Most points & assists double-doubles (62)
  • Only player in WNBA history with 100 assists in a single playoff run (102)

ALYSSA THOMAS (2014-PRESENT)

If Chelsea Gray doesn’t win another WNBA Championship this month, then you will be seeing Alyssa Thomas holding up that trophy for the first time. It would be the perfect ending to a spectacular season that saw Thomas break the WNBA assists record, make her third All-Defensive First Team, average career-highs in points (15.4) and assists (9.2), and break Sloot’s record for most 10-assist games in a season (10) and postseason assists (390). 

The accomplishment that I don’t hear talked about enough is that she’s the first player in WNBA history to hold both a rebounding and an assist title. Wilt Chamberlain once led the NBA in total assists, but he finished second in assists per game. This makes Thomas the only professional basketball player to achieve this accomplishment.  

MARINE JOHANNES (2019-PRESENT)

I don’t care how few minutes THE WIZARD from France plays or how few assists she averages. Marine Johannès is one of my favorite players and absolutely deserves to be on this list, even though a lot of her best highlights are outside of the WNBA.

She’s also known for her one-legged threes.

BECKY HAMMON (1999-2014)

The last person on this list would also love to see Chelsea Gray win another championship. That person is Hall of Famer Becky Hammon, and that is because she is Gray’s coach on the Aces.

Hammon was more known for her crafty shots and scoring during her playing days, but her five assists per game in 2007 were actually enough to lead the league. It also remains the lowest league-leading assists average in the league’s history.

The following is a cool video from 2013 about the best passers in the league. Most picked Ticha and Bird but there’s a segment near the end about Hammon and Lindsay Whalen, who led the league in assists three times.

HONORABLE MENTION: NANCY LIEBERMAN (1997 & 2008)

The great Nancy Lieberman, whom I get to hang out with each summer on THE BIG3 tour, played only 26 games in the WNBA, but I can’t exclude the woman known as LADY MAGIC. The craziest thing about those 26 games is that 25 of them took place during the league’s inaugural season (1997), and the final one occurred a decade later, when she played a game at the age of 49. And at the age of 49, she threw a pass that landed her on SportsCenters’ Top Plays of the Night.

Did you know LADY MAGIC actually played with MAGIC for a summer? Jerry West and Jerry Buss invited her to play with the Lakers during the summer of 1981. She told me Pat Riley was against her being there.

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