Market favorite
Lynx 42.7%
Out in the first round, 0–2 to No. 8 New York. BBMI: 24.6%.
WNBA · 2026 Playoffs · Opening-round forecast review
BBMI
8 teams · 7 series · 23 games · odds as of Sept. 27
BBMI Had Golden State at 24.7%. The Valkyries Won It All.
BBMI had Golden State and Minnesota virtually tied for the title. DraftKings was far more confident in the Lynx. Then New York knocked Minnesota out in the first round, and the Valkyries won the title. Here is what the September 27 forecasts got right, where they missed, and how they scored against the market.
BBMI Sports/November 2, 2026/WNBA forecast review
Playoff Pulse · Sept. 27, 1:42 p.m. CT · no game results entered● Final
24.7%
Valkyries’ September 27 title odds · virtually tied for first
Title odds · BBMI ● vs market ○0–50%
Valkyries
24.7 / 13.1
Lynx
24.6 / 42.7
Dream
17.6 / 10.8
First-round favorites
3 of 4
Expected 2.56
Finals matchup
14.4%
Golden State–Atlanta was the second-most-likely pairing in the original bracket.
Brier score, title
0.686 vs 0.986
BBMI vs market. Lower is better; equal odds score 0.875.
The September 27 board used data through September 25 and 10,000 simulated postseasons. DraftKings prices are from September 25, with the margin removed. Results through Finals Game 7, October 31.
In its second WNBA season, Golden State was celebrating a championship. The Valkyries beat Atlanta 68–63 in Game 7 on October 31, with Gabby Williams scoring 30 points on her way to Finals MVP. On BBMI’s opening-round board, Golden State had a 24.7% title chance, virtually tied with Minnesota at 24.6%.
DraftKings had a very different favorite. Its prices, adjusted to remove the sportsbook’s margin, gave the 33–11 Lynx a 42.7% chance to win and Golden State just 13.1%. Minnesota lost to eighth-seeded New York in the first round. Golden State won the title. BBMI’s championship probabilities finished with the better score on this one postseason.
One timing detail matters. BBMI’s September 27 board was published at 1:42 p.m. Central, about 42 minutes after Liberty–Lynx Game 1 began. Its model inputs stopped on September 25 and contained no playoff results, but the board was not public before the opening tip. An earlier September 25 board, before the final standings update, also had Golden State first at 26.7%. The full comparisons below consistently use the September 27 snapshot. The live Playoff Pulse shows the finished bracket, so the historical probabilities are reproduced here.
Exhibit 1
The board on September 27, and how far each team went
| Team | Seed | Record | Reach semis | Reach Finals | Win title | Result |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Valkyries | 2 | 32–12 | 65.7% | 41.0% | 24.7% | Won the title, 4–3 over Atlanta |
| Lynx | 1 | 33–11 | 68.1% | 42.8% | 24.6% | Lost first round 0–2 to New York |
| Dream | 4 | 30–14 | 69.7% | 35.1% | 17.6% | Lost Finals 3–4 to Golden State |
| Aces | 3 | 31–13 | 52.6% | 23.2% | 11.4% | Lost semifinals 0–3 to Golden State |
| Fever | 6 | 28–16 | 47.4% | 21.4% | 9.8% | Lost first round 1–2 to Las Vegas |
| Wings | 7 | 27–17 | 34.3% | 14.3% | 5.6% | Lost first round 1–2 to Golden State |
| Liberty | 8 | 26–18 | 31.9% | 12.8% | 4.1% | Lost semifinals 0–3 to Atlanta |
| Mystics | 5 | 28–16 | 30.3% | 9.3% | 2.3% | Lost first round 0–2 to Atlanta |
These are unconditional probabilities from 10,000 simulated postseasons: the chance that a team would reach a particular round, regardless of its eventual opponent. Shaded cells indicate rounds the team actually reached. Teams are sorted by their September 27 championship odds; records are final regular-season records. Golden State’s 0.1-point lead over Minnesota amounts to a virtual tie, not a meaningful separation at this simulation count.
Reference: equal teamsWith eight equally good teams and no byes, each would reach the semifinals 50% of the time, the Finals 25% and win the title 12.5%.
FormatFirst round best of three, semifinals best of five, Finals best of seven. The higher seed has home court in every round.
Exhibit 2
The bracket as played, alongside each team’s original chance of reaching the next round
First round · best of 3
Semifinals · best of 5
Finals · best of 7
Champion
Top half
Lynx68.1%
Liberty31.9%
NYL wins 2–0
Dream69.7%
Mystics30.3%
ATL wins 2–0
Dream35.1%
Liberty12.8%
ATL wins 3–0
Bottom half
Valkyries65.7%
Wings34.3%
GSV wins 2–1
Aces52.6%
Fever47.4%
LVA wins 2–1
Valkyries41.0%
Aces23.2%
GSV wins 3–0
Dream17.6%
Valkyries24.7%
GSV wins 4–3
Golden State had home court as the No. 2 seed.
Finals · GSV 4–3
Valkyries
24.7%
Pre-playoff chance to win the title. An equal team: 12.5%.
Each card shows a team’s September 27 chance of advancing far enough to reach the next round, not its head-to-head odds against the opponent that ultimately appeared there. For example, Golden State’s 41.0% to reach the Finals includes the chance of losing in the first round; it is not a 41.0% prediction against Las Vegas. Outlined cards show the actual series winner.
First round: three favorites advance, but Minnesota goes home
BBMI favored all four higher seeds: Atlanta (69.7%), Minnesota (68.1%), Golden State (65.7%) and Las Vegas (52.6%). Three advanced. The sum of their probabilities was 2.56 expected series wins, so three was a reasonable outcome for the forecast.
Minnesota was the big miss. But New York wasn’t a long shot in BBMI’s numbers: the Liberty had a 31.9% chance to pull the upset, almost one in three. They won 91–75 in Minneapolis and 87–71 in Brooklyn, becoming the first No. 8 seed to eliminate a No. 1 in WNBA playoff history. Jonquel Jones had 21 points and 13 rebounds in the clincher. The result was historic by seed, but it was a real possibility in the forecast.
Atlanta swept Washington. Golden State needed a deciding game after Dallas won Game 2 in overtime, then finished the series with a 77–73 victory. Las Vegas also went three against Indiana.
Exhibit 3
First-round favorites: their chance to win the series, and what happened
Favorite
0%50%100%
ChanceDream69.7%
Advanced · beat Washington 2–0
Lynx68.1%
Out · New York won 2–0
Valkyries65.7%
Advanced · beat Dallas 2–1
Aces52.6%
Advanced · beat Indiana 2–1
Expected favorites advancing: 2.56Actual: 3
Bars show the board’s chance that the higher seed would win its best-of-three series. The black tick marks 50%, a coin flip. Green bars advanced; gray went out. Expected favorites advancing is the sum of the four probabilities.
Semifinals: Atlanta and Golden State sweep
Atlanta swept New York, taking the three games 92–82, 101–98 in overtime and 85–83 to reach its first Finals since 2013. Golden State swept the defending champion Aces, winning the clincher 87–77 in overtime. Williams scored eight of her 16 points in the extra period.
BBMI had given Golden State a 41.0% chance to reach the Finals, the best of any team in its half of the bracket. Atlanta stood at 35.1%, second in its own half behind Minnesota’s 42.8%. Once the Lynx went out, Atlanta became the most likely finalist left in that half, based on the original probabilities.
Finals: Golden State goes the distance
A Golden State–Atlanta Finals was BBMI’s second-most-likely pairing at 14.4%, behind Golden State–Minnesota at 17.5%. The two halves of the bracket don’t meet before the Finals, so multiplying the teams’ probabilities of reaching it gives the estimated pairing chance: 41.0% × 35.1% = 14.4%.
Golden State had won 60.2% of its simulated Finals appearances. Atlanta’s corresponding figure was 50.1%. Those percentages average over all possible opponents, not just a Valkyries–Dream matchup. They also include no knowledge of which teams would survive the earlier rounds.
Exhibit 4
The road for the three title favorites, round by round
ValkyriesNo. 2 · Champion
Semis
65.7%
Finals
41.0%
Title
24.7%
Won the title 4–3. If it reached the Finals: won 60.2% of the time.
LynxNo. 1
Semis
68.1%
Finals
42.8%
Title
24.6%
Lost the first round 0–2. If it reached the Finals: won 57.5% of the time.
DreamNo. 4
Semis
69.7%
Finals
35.1%
Title
17.6%
Lost the Finals 3–4. If it reached the Finals: won 50.1% of the time.
Bars show each team’s unconditional September 27 chance to reach a round. Green marks a round the team actually reached; gray marks one it missed. The “If it reached the Finals” figure is title probability divided by Finals-appearance probability. It averages over possible opponents and is not a pregame prediction against the actual Finals opponent.
Golden State took Game 1, then Atlanta won the next two. The Valkyries responded in Games 4 and 5 before the Dream forced Game 7 with an 80–69 win. In the decider, Golden State trailed 30–24 at halftime and the game was tied at 57 late in the fourth quarter. Williams hit a three and two free throws, and Veronica Burton sealed the title at the line with 5.1 seconds remaining. It was the first Game 7 in WNBA Finals history.
BBMI versus DraftKings: the biggest disagreement was Minnesota
BBMI and DraftKings were fairly close on Indiana, Washington and New York. They saw the two leading contenders differently. BBMI put Golden State 11.6 percentage points above the no-vig market and Minnesota 18.1 points below it. The Valkyries won the championship; the Lynx went out in round one. Both differences helped BBMI’s title-probability score.
BBMI was also higher on Atlanta (17.6% versus 10.8%), which reached the Finals, and lower on Las Vegas (11.4% versus 16.0%), which lost in the semifinals. Those runs are interesting, but only the champion counts as a win in a championship Brier score. The DraftKings prices are from September 25; BBMI’s full comparison board is from September 27. This is a near-start-of-playoffs comparison, not a same-minute market test.
Exhibit 5
Pre-playoff title odds: BBMI against DraftKings
BBMIMarket, no-vigEqual chance, 12.5%
TeamTitle chanceBBMIMarketDiffDKResult
Valkyries
24.7%13.1%+11.6+600Won title
Lynx
24.6%42.7%-18.1+115Lost first round
Dream
17.6%10.8%+6.8+750Lost Finals
Aces
11.4%16.0%-4.6+475Lost semifinals
Fever
9.8%8.7%+1.1+950Lost first round
Wings
5.6%1.1%+4.5+8000Lost first round
Liberty
4.1%6.1%-2.0+1400Lost semifinals
Mystics
2.3%1.4%+0.9+6500Lost first round
0%10%20%30%40%50%
DraftKings championship prices published September 25. At +600, a $100 bet returns $600 profit if the team wins, implying 14.3% before the sportsbook’s margin. The eight raw implied probabilities total 108.9%; dividing each by 1.089 produces the market’s margin-adjusted, or no-vig, probabilities. “Diff” is BBMI minus market, in percentage points. The dashed line marks the 12.5% chance for each team if all eight were equal.
The Brier score lets us grade the title probabilities without pretending a 25% forecast is supposed to win every time. For each of the eight teams, take its predicted title chance, subtract the outcome (1 for Golden State, 0 for everyone else), square the difference and add the results. Lower is better. A perfect forecast gets 0; assigning every team an equal 1-in-8 chance gives 0.875.
BBMI scored 0.686 against 0.986 for the margin-adjusted DraftKings prices, a 0.300 advantage. BBMI also beat the equal-odds benchmark of 0.875; the market did not. BBMI’s higher Golden State figure and lower Minnesota figure account for more than the whole gap; the other six teams, taken together, slightly favored the market. That’s a meaningful result to record, not proof of better calibration over time. With just one champion, we cannot tell whether the underlying probabilities will hold up season after season.
Exhibit 6
Championship probability score: BBMI, DraftKings and an equal-odds baseline
Perfect forecast0.000
BBMI
0.686
Equal 1-in-8 chance
0.875
DraftKings, no-vig
0.986
00.501.00
The score shown is the sum of eight squared probability errors, one for each possible champion; only Golden State has an outcome of 1. All four reference scores are displayed on a common 0-to-1 axis. Lower is better.
What held up, and what did not
BBMI had the eventual champion virtually tied for first, gave its actual Finals pairing the second-highest probability, and saw three of its four first-round favorites advance. Its biggest bracket miss was Minnesota. The Liberty upset was already a 31.9% possibility in the September 27 probabilities, so it should not be treated as an impossible event the model failed to imagine.
The market comparison went BBMI’s way on the 2026 title question, with a lower Brier score. That’s worth showing. So are the misses and the publication timestamps. BBMI’s standard is to keep its forecasts available to be checked, not to turn one winning season into a claim of perfect prediction. The completed bracket is on Playoff Pulse; the September 27 numbers remain in this article.
How the board works
Playoff Pulse simulates the eight-team postseason 10,000 times per update, using BBMI team ratings to produce game probabilities. The league seeds the top eight clubs together, without a conference split, into a fixed 1–8, 2–7, 3–6 and 4–5 bracket. First-round series are best of three, semifinals best of five and the Finals best of seven. The documented home-court adjustment is roughly 2.5 points per game. Higher seeds receive series home-court advantage, but the actual home team varies from game to game.
The regular season ended September 24. The complete board reviewed here used data through September 25 and was posted September 27 at 1:42 p.m. Central, around 42 minutes after the first playoff game began. No playoff game result was entered in the model. An earlier September 25 board also ranked Golden State first at 26.7%, but did not yet reflect the final standings update. That earlier figure is context, not part of the table or Brier calculation here.
Playoff Pulse also displays a separately calculated head-to-head first-round series probability. According to the saved board, those differ from the corresponding tournament-advancement figures by no more than 0.7 percentage points; this review uses the tournament figures consistently. Golden State and Minnesota differed by just 0.1 percentage point in title probability, far less than the natural variation in 10,000 simulations. For the Finals pairings, the two halves of the bracket can be multiplied because they do not meet before that round.
Sources.
- BBMI odds: Playoff Pulse, September 27, 2026, 1:42 p.m. Central, from the site’s historical published data file.
- Market odds: Sports Illustrated, DraftKings WNBA Finals odds, September 25.
- Format and first-round results: NBC Washington, 2026 WNBA playoff bracket and schedule; Game 1 tip time: Just Women’s Sports.
- Game reports: Liberty sweep Lynx, Dream sweep Liberty, Valkyries sweep Aces (Associated Press); Finals Game 6 (theScore); Finals game recaps and Game 7 recap (WNBA.com); Finals MVP (NBC Sports Bay Area).
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