Minnesota Lynx and head coach and president of basketball operations Cheryl Reeve was always going to make a roster move, the only questions were who was it going to be and how big of a move could it be.
Turns out, pretty big.
Reeve added one of the few 6-foot-7 players in women’s basketball when the Lynx signed Teaira McCowan to the roster on May 28. McCowan fills the roster spot available after the team waived Eliška Hamzová earlier in the week. In an adjacent move, Emese Hof was released and Hamzová was brought back on a developmental contract. The Lynx are now roster compliant with 12 players under full contracts and with Hamzová and Liatu King occupying the two developmental spots.
Minnesota, playing admirably at the top of the WNBA standings as of May 28 without the services of Napheesa Collier and Dorka Juhász, is lacking depth in the bigs department. Natasha Howard and Nia Coffey are looking like two of the sneakier free agent pickups from this expedited offseason, but can’t play every minute of every game. And with the new officiating in the ‘freedom of movement’ era, foul trouble is always a risk. Howard herself has been called for more moving screens than any other player in the league.
“A player that we really enjoyed getting to know,” Reeve said of Hamzová the day after placing her on waivers. “We like what we saw from her in training camp and think she’s a good player. We just needed to make a decision on our roster to get us some help where we need it right now. We’re playing so thin on the right side of our roster and it’s been a challenge for us.”
Enter McCowan, who is intriguing for several reasons. She automatically gives the Lynx one of the biggest players in the game standing at the aforementioned height of 6-foot-7. She’s led the league in total offensive rebounds three times in her career (2020-22), is a career 10.7 points and 8.1 rebounds per game player and is still on the right side of 30.
McCowan had a less than stellar 2025 season with the Dallas Wings, as the 2025 season was less than stellar across the board in Dallas. But it’s safe to bet that she’ll revert back closer to her career mean in a steady environment with a defined role with the Lynx. About two-thirds of McCowan’s career field goal attempts have come at the rim, which will fit in well with the identity of this Lynx team that likes to get into the paint. It’s not hard to imagine McCowan on the receiving end of several Olivia Miles highlight passes and the rookie will no doubt be excited to dish the ball to a target with such a wide catch radius.
A teammate of Kayla McBride’s with Turkish giant Fenerbahçe, McCowwan is familiar with the emotional heartbeat of the team and should not have a problem assimilating to Lynx culture. Above all, the presence of McCowan helps the Lynx bridge the short-term gap of time before Collier and Juhász return to the lineup and also gives them a different kind of player who Reeve can deploy in spot matchups if and when the Lynx are ever 100% healthy.
Given the national narrative around the Lynx after their coffers got raided in the expedited offseason, the exceptional play of veterans like Howard and Coffey have been a couple of the sunnier storylines in the W this season. While national coverage of the league saw no need to send breaking news alerts and jump out of their seats for those signings, anyone who has watched players thrive under Reeve in the past can’t honestly say they’re surprised to see Howard and Coffey playing well in this system right now.
If a path is there for McCowan to get back to her 2022 self when she finished fifth in the Most Improved Player voting, it shouldn’t come as a shock to anyone if that path goes through Minnesota.