When it comes to the NCAA transfer portal, things seem to get more and more dramatic every year. According to On3’s Talia Goodman, nearly 30 percent of the 5,048 women’s basketball players in Division I entered the portal before it closed, and while plenty have already made their next commitments (which Swish Appeal has you covered on, of course), there are countless others whose decisions are keeping fans and coaches alike in the dark.
For a select few players, this decision also affects their future as WNBA prospects for several reasons. First, while these players’ individual skillsets may be obvious to anyone watching, the roles they are asked to play may differ from team to team, and they may show more (or less) depending on where they transfer to. Also, some programs have undeniable track records of getting their players ready for the WNBA, so those currently in the portal could help their own cause of getting drafted simply based on which school they choose. Here are a few high-impact players from the 2026 WNBA Draft class who we’ll be watching for as they make their decisions on where to finish their collegiate careers.
Serah Williams
Williams is a classic case of a highly productive player who has starred on a bad team. In her three seasons at Wisconsin, the Badgers have gone a combined 39-54, which has overshadowed some impressive individual performances. Most recently, Williams averaged 19.2 points, 9.8 rebounds and 2.3 steals per game as a junior, earning her second consecutive All-Big Ten First Team honor. She was also named the conference’s Defensive Player of the Year in 2024.
Williams’ statistical brilliance only barely kept Wisconsin afloat, however, and she’ll now look to finish her collegiate career elsewhere—presumably playing for a stronger program.
We obviously don’t yet know what that will look like, but depending on where Williams goes, it’s entirely possible that she doesn’t put up the kind of numbers did she at Wisconsin, especially if she transfers to a school that already has a go-to scorer or two. While the rebounding will certainly translate wherever she plays—Williams stands at 6-foot-4 and is a noticeably hard worker on the glass—she probably won’t match the 33.4 percent usage rate (Her Hoop Stats) she posted as a junior.
If Williams wants to win, that won’t be an issue. It will also provide a different perspective to those evaluating her as a WNBA prospect. She’s shown that she can get her own stats on a team that isn’t going anywhere, but if she ends up playing a relatively smaller role for a more successful program, it could paint her in a more positive light in draft-related discussions.
Gianna Kneepkens
It doesn’t take much of a deep dive into Kneepkens’ statistical profile to see what her strength is: shooting. The 6-foot-0 guard is one of the country’s most prolific and lethal jumpshooters, having just shot 94-for-210 (44.8 percent) on 3-pointers in her redshirt junior season at Utah.
That’s not to say Kneepkens is a one-dimensional player. She not only led Utah in scoring at 19.3 points per game, but also chipped in an average of three assists, thriving as a pick-and-roll ball handler for a Utah offense that ranked fifth in Division I in effective field goal percentage (54.9 percent) and 10th in assisted shot rate (67.5 percent). Kneepkens may have been Utah’s biggest scoring threat under head coach Lynne Roberts (who is now with the Los Angeles Sparks), but she did much more to make the team’s offense effective than just spot up from behind the arc.
Roberts won’t be the only WNBA coach keeping an eye on Kneepkens as she decides where to play next. Players who can dribble, pass and shoot are a hot commodity, especially when they’re as tall as Kneepkens is, so her name will surely be floated around as a draft prospect no matter where she commits to. What remains to be seen is what kind of a role Kneepkens will play when she ultimately transfers; Roberts’ offense at Utah fit Kneepkens’ skillset like a glove, and while her jumpshooting would be of service to any team in the country, she may not have the ball in her hands as often as she did with the Utes.
Laila Phelia
Phelia just recently entered the transfer portal out of Texas, and unlike Kneepkens or Williams, she’ll face the added pressure of needing to prove that she can bounce back from injury troubles. A detached retina kept Phelia on the bench for the vast majority of last season, and even in the eight games she played as a Longhorn, she didn’t truly look like herself. According to Horns247, Phelia needed eye surgery to correct the issue, and though it granted her an extra year of NCAA eligibility, she’ll use the medical redshirt to play her graduate season elsewhere.
Whichever program Phelia chooses will be hoping she can return to the form that earned her a pair of All-Big Ten selections as a member of the Michigan Wolverines. Phelia averaged better than 16 points per game in her sophomore and junior seasons, quickly developing from a defensive specialist to a player who could contribute at a high level on both ends of the court. At 6-foot-0, Phelia is a tall, physical perimeter defender, and she leverages that physicality on offense, too; thus far in her collegiate career, about 22 percent of her points have come at the free throw line, where she reliably shoots over 80 percent.
Phelia’s 3-point shot isn’t quite as consistent—she shot 27.8 percent on 3s as a freshman, 41.7 percent as a sophomore and 32.1 percent as a junior—but there’s enough there to hope that she can become a well-rounded scorer. Decision makers in the WNBA will be watching for Phelia because of her pro-ready physical tools, and if she ends up in the right situation for her graduate season, they may get even more than that.
