Capping off a record-setting season, Connecticut Sun forward Alyssa Thomas received the 2023 WNBA Peak Performer in Rebounds award.
The ten-year WNBA veteran played all 40 games this season and led the league with an average of 9.9 rebounds per game, a career best.
After being drafted fourth overall in the 2014 WNBA Draft by the New York Liberty and immediately getting traded to the Sun, Thomas now joins Sun legends Jonquel Jones and Tina Charles as just the third player in franchise history to receive the award.
On June 25, while playing against Chicago, Thomas took the franchise record for rebounds, held by Taj McWilliams-Franklin, who had 1,814. A star in the paint, she passed the 2,000 mark two months later against New York.
Advertisement
Playing against the Chicago Sky last Sunday, Thomas continued to drive up her numbers, finishing the regular season with league highs of 24 double-doubles and six triple-doubles.
Throughout her tenure with the Suns, Thomas led the team in points categories several times and racked up many team-firsts, including the first franchise triple-double. Of the 40 games she played in 2023, Thomas led the team in rebounds through 29 of the contests. In 24 games, she grabbed over ten rebounds.
Thomas is no stranger to breaking records. In Games 3 and 4 of last year’s postseason tournament, the veteran, who appeared in playoff games from 2017-2022, notched back-to-back triple-doubles, making her the first and only to do so in WNBA history.
The Connecticut Sun move on to round one of the WNBA playoffs and host the Minnesota Lynx at 8 p.m. Wednesday.
Lauren Thomas can be reached at lauren.thomas@globe.com. Follow her @lauren_thomas30.