This has been a year without an offseason for Lauren Betts.
Her college season ran through March Madness and into April as she won a national championship with UCLA. Less than two weeks after cutting down the nets, Betts was drafted No. 4 overall by the Mystics, and training camp started just a few days later. She played all 44 games of the WNBA regular season. Betts kept at it until the Mystics’ run ended in the first round of the playoffs. Finally, as September turned to October, she was done.
For a day.
Well, two days, technically. And then she flew to Turkey to start playing with EuroLeague powerhouse Fenerbahçe in Istanbul.
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“I’m really big on balance, and you know, there were some points I did tell myself, like, I just want to take a break from basketball,” Betts said the day after the Mystics’ season ended and two days before she left for Turkey. “But I feel like I would be doing a disservice to myself if I didn’t just continue to grow. And I feel like going to Turkey and playing overseas is going to be a really good opportunity for me.”
That used to be the norm in the WNBA. Most players spent years going straight from one basketball season in the U.S. to another in Europe or Asia. It meant developing their games, but it also meant picking up a crucial paycheck. That dynamic has changed as the sport has experienced record growth over the past few years, with players unlocking higher salaries and more choices on how to build their careers. It has become far less common for high-profile young Americans like Betts to spend the winter playing in Europe.
But it was an experience she’d always wanted to have.
Some WNBA players have talked about how much they value the opportunity to spend their offseasons in the U.S. Betts valued the opportunity to go somewhere else.
Her father, Andy, spent years playing basketball in Spain, with other stints in Italy, Greece and Ukraine. (He was drafted by the Charlotte Hornets as the No. 50 pick in 1998 but never appeared in the NBA.) His career led to an early childhood full of travel and cultural experiences for Betts and her siblings.
The family returned to the U.S. when she began third grade. She grew up in suburban Colorado, but she never forgot how enchanting she found those early years in Europe.
“I’m basically just fulfilling the family legacy,” Betts said with a smile. “It’s kind of full circle that I’m doing the same thing I watched my dad do.”
None of the American players chosen as lottery picks in 2024 or 2025 have spent their WNBA offseasons playing overseas. Betts is the only one from 2026 to do so with a traditional basketball team. (Top pick Azzi Fudd has signed on with the start-up Project B, which plans to stage a traveling global tournament beginning in January.) Some of these players have chosen to use their offseasons for rest or private development. Many have chosen to join Unrivaled, a 3-on-3 league that began play in Miami in 2025, which lets them earn another salary and work on their games while remaining in the U.S.
“I think we’re privileged now that we have so many options as women,” Mystics forward Michaela Onyenwere said at the end of the season. “We don’t have to go overseas for a full seven months. I’m very grateful for that.”
Onyenwere entered the WNBA in 2021. She spent her first several winters playing in Spain, Turkey and China, joining many of her peers in figuring out how to navigate different international leagues every offseason. But this year, for the first time in her pro career, Onyenwere felt comfortable ending one season without immediate plans to jump into another.
WNBA paychecks increased significantly this year under a new collective bargaining agreement. Minimum salaries went from roughly $66,000 in 2025 to $270,000 in 2026. (The average player earned about $580,000 — roughly quadruple the average from a year ago.) It also helps that players have seen an uptick in endorsement deals as the league has grown in popularity. Getting another paycheck in the winter no longer feels quite so necessary. For a more established, mid-career player like Onyenwere, that creates an opportunity to spend the offseason truly off.
But the chance to practice against top international competition was still a draw for Betts. Her decision to join Fenerbahçe was about development as much as it was about family tradition. A 6-foot-7 center, Betts showed growth in her rookie year, picking up extra minutes as the season wore on and becoming a more assertive rebounder. But she knows that she needs to sharpen her footwork and become more comfortable outside the paint.
Through her first two games with Fenerbahçe, Betts is averaging 11 points, 8.5 rebounds and two assists.
“Any chance that I can just get myself into uncomfortable situations and just grow my game and try to put the ball on the floor a little more, shoot a little more,” Betts said before she left for Turkey. “I feel like it’s another opportunity for me to just get better and gain more confidence.”
That, she figured, would be worth staying in season for a few extra months.
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