‘I Don’t Really Have A Favorite’: Jessica Shepard Ties For Second All-Time In WNBA Triple-Doubles

BROOKLYN, New York — No other player in the WNBA has recorded a triple-double this season. Jessica Shepard has three of them.

Her latest came Tuesday in Dallas’ 88-77 win over the New York Liberty, a 22-point, 12-rebound, 11-assist night that matched a career high and pushed her total to four for her career, tying Sabrina Ionescu for second all-time in WNBA history. Three of Shepard’s four career triple-doubles have cleared 20 points, also tying her with Ionescu for the most in league history.

Climbing The Career List

Shepard matched a career high with 11 field goals on 16 attempts in 36 minutes against New York, needing to do relatively little scoring heavy lifting to reach her number given how much of the box score she filled elsewhere.

It is the kind of stat line that has become close to routine for her three months into her first season with the Dallas Wings, even as the milestones attached to it keep climbing further up the league’s all-time boards.

She Doesn’t Have A Favorite

Asked whether any of her three triple-doubles this season stands out, Shepard gave the same answer she has given after the others: none of them, individually, is the point.

“I don’t really have a favorite. Coming into New York for the third game of the road trip, I’m just proud of the team for getting the win,” she said.

She credited the environment around her rather than her own scoring for how quickly the production has piled up.

“I think it’s the coaches’ belief in me and my teammates’ belief in me. They trust me with the ball in my hands, and they do a great job reading whatever action we’re in,” Shepard said.

Head coach Jose Fernandez described a player who is enjoying the role rather than chasing a number.

“She’s having fun. She’s playing with a lot of joy and enthusiasm. She feels really comfortable with her decision-making and with the teammates around her,” Fernandez said. “She feels comfortable making decisions in those situations and facilitating.”

Recognition Still Catching Up

Shepard was asked directly about comparisons some have drawn between her game and players like Candace Parker and Alyssa Thomas, given her versatility and playmaking. Her answer suggested she believes the league is still catching up to what she can do, not that she has recently discovered a new gear.

“I think all of it. My time in Minnesota had a lot of ups and downs and a lot of different roles,” Shepard said. “There were stretches last season when Napheesa was out that I got to show more of what I could do, but a lot of it just comes down to playing more.”

She said the facilitation itself, the part of her game now showing up in the record books, has come about with little design.

“It’s developed naturally with this team,” Shepard explained. “We have a lot of players who come from programs where they play basketball the right way, and that makes it easy to make the right reads.”

Three months into her Dallas tenure, the numbers have made the case her own answers keep avoiding: this is not a hot stretch. It is what her game looks like now.