We are looking forward today on Sunday Surmising, as we ponder the WNBA future of New York Liberty guard Sabrina Ionescu. She just won her second All-Star Three-Point Contest title on Friday, and she will be a free agent after this season, able to sign wherever she wants after six seasons with the Liberty—including a league title in 2024. Ionescu went to the University of Oregon and was raised in Orinda, CA.

In college, she averaged 18.0 points, 7.7 assists, and 7.3 rebounds per game as she also was a two-time All American and the Associated Press Player of the Year in 2019-2020. Her senior season with the Ducks was cut short by Covid, and her early WNBA career was stunted by the same issue. However, in the last three-plus seasons with the Liberty, Ionescu has blossomed, putting up 17.4 Win Shares since the start of 2022.

Why do we bring this up today? Well, whispers on the street suggest she will sign the Golden State Valkyries when this season is over, to play in the Bay Area while returning to her roots. She is a big fan and now friend of Golden State Warriors rock star Stephen Curry, of course, as growing up in the East Bay just a few BART stops from the old Coliseum Arena certainly helped her forge a bond with her idol and now pal.

The two of them competed in the 2024 NBA All-Star festivities, too, if you remember. This was after the 2023 WNBA season when Ionescu hit 44.8 percent of her three-point attempts, and while her overall WNBA three-point shot rate is much lower overall (35.7), her ability to score from outside and inside is what the Valkyries need as they look to improve in their second season next year: Come home, Sabrina!

She’s a four-time WNBA All Star, a three-time All-WNBA selection, and will be in her age-28 season next year. She could close out her professional career with the Valkyries, be a hometown hero to all the fans and kids here, and also spend as much time as she can around Curry before he retires. It’s a win-win situation for Ionescu, really, especially with her family roots in the suburbs of Oakland. Basically, it makes all sense.

Hopefully for the Valkyries and the Bay Area women’s basketball scene, this scenario comes true. Ionescu had 12 points and seven assists in Saturday’s All-Star Game, despite playing on the losing side of the affair. While she shot 50 percent from the floor, her teammates were pretty brutal (shooting 29.7 percent from downtown), probably costing her some dimes in the process. Either way, her talent is clear and defined.

She belongs in the Bay.