Former Villanova star Maddy Siegrist secured yet another milestone Sunday in Nashville when she won her first Athletes Unlimited Pro Basketball championship.
Unlike in the WNBA or in college, teams don’t win the Athletes Unlimited competition — players win it as an individual through a complex set of statistics that make up the leaderboard.
In Athletes Unlimited, players are assigned to new teams every week, as chosen by the team captains, who were the top four people on the leaderboard the previous week. To score points, players must make good plays, win the quarter and game, and be named MVP of the game, and if they mess up on the court, they can lose points.
“You can’t even look at [the leaderboard],” Siegrist said. “I know that sounds silly, but you want to be the best basketball player you can be and then just play the best you can. It’ll reflect on the leaderboard. I wouldn’t be able to play looking up at it or being like, ‘Oh, I missed a shot this month.’ It wouldn’t work for me.”
But Siegrist’s continued dominance on the leaderboard won her the opportunity to pick her teammates for all four weeks of Athletes Unlimited’s run. She prioritized smart players with lots of game experience, like nine-year WNBA veteran Bria Hartley, for her team.
“You have to really be a high-IQ player because you don’t have that time to build chemistry,” Siegrist said. “Yes, there’s players that you’ll play with for two or three weeks, but overall, the teams really shake up, so you have to be able to adjust quickly.”
Siegrist set an Athletes Unlimited record for most leaderboard points with 7,052 in her second season with the league, over 400 more than her next closest competitor, Odyssey Sims. Siegrist also was named team MVP an Athletes Unlimited record 11 consecutive times and averaged 24 points per game on 54% shooting along with 8.8 rebounds per game. And she wasn’t the only player with local ties to stand out. Former Temple star Shey Peddy was named defensive player of the year after she notched 20 steals and 29 defensive rebounds in 12 games.
Siegrist is preparing for her third WNBA season with the Dallas Wings, who have the top overall pick and the opportunity to select UConn star Paige Bueckers in the upcoming WNBA draft.
“I feel like I grew a lot, especially from a leadership perspective, but also just taking the confidence that I’ve gained and worked on during this season and getting to compete with so many high level players, I think was huge for me,” Siegrist said. “It’s only my second year as a pro, and I’ll be entering Year 3 with Dallas, so just being able to build on that I think will be exciting. Whatever they need me to do, I’m going to do it and do it to the best of my ability.”