Lynx forward Napheesa Collier selected to third WNBA All-Star Game

After missing most of the 2022 season because of the birth of her daughter, Napheesa Collier has regained her All-Star form in 2023.

The Lynx forward was selected as a WNBA All-Star for the third time in her career on Saturday, as the league announced Collier will be among the 12 reserves for the game on July 15 in Las Vegas.

The No. 6 overall pick in the 2019 draft out of Connecticut, Collier entered Saturday night's game at Phoenix averaging a career-best 22.4 points per game, shooting 49.2% from the floor, to go with 7.7 rebounds, 2.5 assists, 1.7 steals and 1.3 blocks. The Lynx had won six of nine games coming into Saturday following an 0-6 start to the season.

Collier was coming off a pair of sterling midweek performances against Seattle, scoring 33 points with 10 rebounds in a 104-93 home victory on Tuesday before hitting a fadeaway jumper with 1.8 seconds left in overtime for a 99-97 road victory on Thursday, when she finished with 31 points, eight rebounds, six blocked shots and five steals.

Collier, 26, was also named an All-Star reserve in her other full seasons of 2019 and 2021; both of those games were held at the same location as this year's, the Aces' Michelob Ultra Arena. The league didn't hold the All-Star Game in 2020 — initially because of the Olympics, then because of the pandemic — and last year, Collier played in only the final four games of the season in August, after she had her first child, Mila Sarah Bazzell, on May 25.

She becomes the seventh Lynx player to be selected to three All-Star Games. Seimone Augustus was selected eight times, Maya Moore six, Rebekkah Brunson, Sylvia Fowles and Lindsay Whalen five and Katie Smith four.

The Lynx entered the WNBA in 1999, the same year the league held its first All-Star Game. The Lynx have had at least one player selected for all but one of the 19 All-Star Games; the only year a Lynx player wasn't part of the showcase was 2005.

The other reserves were Atlanta's Allisha Gray and Cheyenne Parker; Chicago's Kahleah Copper; Connecticut's DeWanna Bonner and Alyssa Thomas; Indiana's Kelsey Mitchell; Las Vegas' Kelsey Plum; New York's Courtney Vandersloot and Sabrina Ionescu; Seattle's Ezi Magbegor; and Washington's Elena Delle Donne. League coaches voted for reserves, picking three guards, five frontcourt players and four at either position. They could not vote for their own players.

Fans (whose votes were weighed 50%), players (25%) and media (25%) voted for the starters, who were announced last Sunday. Las Vegas' A'ja Wilson and New York's Breanna Stewart were selected as captains for the second year in a row after they were again the top vote-getters among fans, and they will draft teams next Saturday.

Phoenix center Brittney Griner, an honorary All-Star in 2022 when she was being detained in Russia, will also be a starter, as will Las Vegas' Chelsea Gray and Jackie Young, Dallas' Arike Ogunbowale and Satou Sabally, Los Angeles' Nneka Ogwumike, Seattle's Jewell Loyd and Indiana's Aliya Boston, the first rookie to start in the WNBA All-Star Game since Shoni Schimmel in 2014.

2023 WNBA ALL-STARS

Captains

A'ja Wilson, Las Vegas, frontcourt

Breanna Stewart, New York, frontcourt

Starters

Aliyah Boston, Indiana, frontcourt

Chelsea Gray, Las Vegas, guard

Brittney Griner, Phoenix, frontcourt

Jewell Loyd, Seattle, guard

Arike Ogunbowale, Dallas, guard

Nneka Ogwumike, Los Angeles, frontcourt

Satou Sabally, Dallas, frontcourt

Jackie Young, Las Vegas, guard

Reserves

DeWanna Bonner, Connecticut, frontcourt

Napheesa Collier, Lynx, frontcourt

Kahleah Copper, Chicago, guard

Elena Delle Donne, Washington, frontcourt

Allisha Gray, Atlanta, guard

Sabrina Ionescu, New York, guard

Ezi Magbegor, Seattle, frontcourt

Kelsey Mitchell, Indiana, guard

Cheyenne Parker, Atlanta, frontcourt

Kelsey Plum, Las Vegas, guard

Alyssa Thomas, Connecticut, frontcourt

Courtney Vandersloot, New York, guard

All-Star rosters will be drafted by Wilson and Stewart on July 8; the game is 4:30 p.m. July 15 in Las Vegas (Ch. 5).