Back on June 4, in the 10th game of her WNBA career, Olivia Miles made eight 3-pointers to break Caitlin Clark's single-game rookie record. The No. 2 overall pick in the 2026 WNBA Draft has never looked back. Over the last three-plus months, Miles has become the fastest player ever to 400 points, 100 rebounds and 100 assists (22 games) and smashed the Minnesota Lynx rookie records for points and assists.
She was the 11th rookie ever to be named a starter for the All-Star Game, has won every single Rookie of the Month honor this season, and, earlier this month, sent Clark into second place in the record books again. This time, Miles passed Clark for the most points ever scored by a rookie: 790 to Clark's 769 in 2024. That wound up being the final act of Miles' regular season.
She was ruled out of Minnesota's final two games -- against Clark and Indiana -- due to a calf injury. In the end, she played 40 games, the same as Clark did in her rookie season. Miles was named the unanimous 2026 WNBA Rookie of the Year on Monday.
It's unlikely that she'll join Candace Parker as the only rookies to win MVP, but she should join Clark and Parker as one of six players since 2000 to make the All-WNBA First Team as rookies when that honor is announced later this fall. For all that Miles has done in one of the greatest rookie campaigns we've ever seen, her most impressive accomplishment may have been leaving Courtney Williams lost for words. Standing in a tunnel deep inside the United Center an hour after the All-Star Game in July, the league's greatest hype person didn't know what to say about her bespectacled teammate.
"Man, that girl be doing so much raw stuff I can't even tell you," Williams said. Williams isn't the first person Miles has left speechless with her brilliant point guard play, and she won't be the last. Miles' playoff debut didn't go to plan.
She was held to 11 points and one assist on 3 of 12 by the New York Liberty in an upset loss in Game 1. But Rookie of the Year is a regular-season award. Let's dive into how Miles was able to immediately establish herself as one of the best players in the league, where her rookie campaign stands in history and whether, after breaking multiple of Clark's records, she's also surpassed her for the greatest debut season ever by a guard.
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