The Golden State Valkyries are WNBA champions. In just their second season as a franchise, the Valkyries beat the Atlanta Dream 68-63 in Game 7 of the WNBA Finals on Saturday, October 31, 2026, at the Chase Center in San Francisco, winning the first championship in team history in the first Game 7 the WNBA Finals had ever produced.
Gabby Williams delivered one of the great Finals performances to get them there. Williams scored 30 points, including 28 in the second half — a record for most points in a half in a WNBA Finals game — and was named Finals MVP. She scored only two points in the first half, then took over after the break, at one point scoring 15 consecutive points for Golden State across the third and fourth quarters.
A comeback built on defense
Atlanta led 30-24 at halftime and had won every game in the series in which it led at the break. Golden State flipped the game in the second half, outscoring the Dream 21-14 in the third quarter and 23-19 in the fourth, in front of a sellout crowd of 18,064 at what fans call Ballhalla.
Williams singlehandedly outscored Atlanta 15-14 in the third quarter. When Rhyne Howard's layup tied the game at 57 with 2:41 left, Williams answered with a clutch three-pointer. Kiah Stokes put back a Williams miss for a 64-57 lead, and free throws from Tiffany Hayes and Veronica Burton down the stretch sealed the win. Burton finished with 10 points, 10 rebounds and five assists; Hayes scored 11; Stokes grabbed 13 rebounds.
For Atlanta, Jordin Canada scored 18 points, Allisha Gray added 16, and Angel Reese had eight points and 12 rebounds. It was the Dream's fourth trip to the WNBA Finals and their fourth loss, after sweeps in 2010, 2011 and 2013.
The fastest expansion team to a title
The Valkyries finished the regular season 32-12, earned the No. 2 seed with the league's top defense — a 99.3 defensive rating and a league-low 75.4 points allowed per game — and beat the Dallas Wings in the first round before sweeping the defending champion Las Vegas Aces in the semifinals.
They are the fastest expansion team among the major North American sports leagues to win a title, doing so in just their second year, and the first team in the league's 30-year history to win a championship without a single All-WNBA selection on the roster. Head coach Natalie Nakase, general manager Ohemaa Nyanin and team president Jess Smith built the roster largely from other teams' unprotected players — a group that heard for two seasons that it had no stars.
"They said we didn't have any stars," Williams said after the win, holding the MVP trophy. On Saturday night in San Francisco, she was the biggest star on the court.
Sources: CNN, October 31, 2026; ESPN, November 1, 2026; USA Today, October 31 and November 1, 2026; Sportsnet, November 1, 2026.