SAN FRANCISCO, Calif. (Diya TV) — The Golden State Valkyries won their first WNBA championship Saturday, beating the Atlanta Dream 68-63 in Game 7 at Chase Center. They reached the title in their second season, three years after owner Joe Lacob predicted the new franchise would win one within five years.
Gabby Williams led Golden State with 30 points, including 28 after halftime. Atlanta held a 30-24 lead at the break, but Williams scored the Valkyries’ final 11 points of the third quarter and kept attacking in the fourth. After Rhyne Howard tied the game at 57 with 2:41 left, Williams answered with a three-pointer and later made two free throws. Veronica Burton secured a late jump ball and added two free throws with 5.1 seconds remaining. Williams earned Finals MVP, averaging 19.6 points and 2.6 steals in the series.
The decisive game capped a sharp rise. Golden State went 23-21 and reached the playoffs in its 2025 debut, becoming the first WNBA expansion team to make the postseason in its inaugural year. The Valkyries improved to 32-12 in 2026, earned the No. 2 seed and won nine more games than they had the year before. They beat Dallas 2-1, swept defending champion Las Vegas 3-0, then outlasted Atlanta in a seven-game Finals.
The title set a broader expansion-team record. Elias Sports Bureau lists Golden State as the fastest expansion franchise across the NBA, WNBA, NFL, NHL and MLB to win a championship since 1967. The Valkyries did it in two seasons; the Milwaukee Bucks previously held the mark, winning the NBA title in their third season, in 1970-71.
Lacob made his prediction on Oct. 5, 2023, when the WNBA awarded his ownership group the Bay Area franchise. “We will win a WNBA championship in the first five years of this franchise,” he said. After the victory, he credited team president Jess Smith, general manager Ohemaa Nyanin and coach Natalie Nakase, saying he deserved credit for hiring them but they had built the winner.
Nakase’s adjustment helped turn the series. After Atlanta took a 2-1 lead, she put Kaila Charles and Tiffany Hayes in the starting lineup and moved Kayla Thornton and Cecilia Zandalasini to the bench. Hayes, 37, had spent 10 seasons with Atlanta and returned from retirement to join Golden State; she scored 11 points in Game 7. Nakase, who won two previous WNBA titles as a Las Vegas assistant, claimed her first as a head coach.
The championship came without a Valkyries player on the season’s All-WNBA teams. Williams made the All-Defensive first team, Veronica Burton and Kiah Stokes made the second team, and Janelle Salaün won Sixth Player of the Year. Stokes grabbed 13 rebounds and blocked two shots in the clincher. The team also sold out every regular-season home game in 2026.
Golden State built from a 23-win playoff debut to a 32-win championship season, then made the key lineup change when the Finals turned against it. Lacob’s five-year target gave the franchise a public benchmark; Nakase and her players reached it three seasons early.
