2022 WNBA Draft: How the draft works, No. 1 pick predictions, and more

Ahead of Monday’s 2022 WNBA Draft, here are answers to a few frequently asked questions about how the draft works, WNBA eligibility, which players have declared, which WNBA team has first pick, and more.

The 2022 WNBA Draft will be held on Monday, April 11, 2022 at 7:00 p.m. ET (TV channel: ESPN). For the first time since 2019, the WNBA Draft will be held in-person at Spring Studios in New York.

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The WNBA draft consists of three rounds with 12 picks in each round. A total of 36 athletes will be drafted, though many of them won’t ultimately play in the WNBA.

It hurts to answer this question. The reality is that many WNBA draftees won’t ultimately play in a WNBA game. That’s because there are just 144 roster spots available in the WNBA (12 teams x 12 players per roster), and some of those will go unfilled due to the league’s salary cap.

RELATED: The odds of WNBA draftees playing in the league

In order to be eligible to play in the WNBA, an athlete must:

International athletes who don’t play college basketball in the U.S. are eligible so long as they turn 20 years old in the year of the draft.

Because of the COVID-19 pandemic, the NCAA in 2021 granted all winter athletes an additional year of college eligibility. As a result, college players were required to opt-in if they had additional eligibility remaining and wanted to be considered for the 2022 WNBA Draft.

A full list of the 108 NCAA athletes who have opted in to the 2022 WNBA Draft can be found below.

Most mock drafts predict that Kentucky’s Rhyne Howard will be the No. 1 pick in the 2022 WNBA Draft. Baylor’s NaLyssa Smith and Ole Miss’ Shakira Austin are also expected to be drafted in the first three.

The WNBA