10 Photos of Azzi Fudd's Girlfriend Paige Bueckers: Wings Guard Confirms Romance With WNBA No. 1 Pick

Azzi Fudd and Paige Bueckers' relationship moved from rumour to something close to confirmation in New York on WNBA draft night, when the Dallas Wings guard was captured on camera wildly cheering as her former UConn teammate and apparent girlfriend was taken No. 1 overall by the Wings in the 2026 draft.

The roles were reversed the year before. In 2025, Fudd was courtside at the WNBA draft when Bueckers was taken first overall, following their glittering run together at UConn, where they won a national championship. Their on-court chemistry, built over years with USA Basketball and then in Storrs, had long fed online speculation that there was more between them than a well-oiled backcourt.

Those whispers grew louder ahead of this year's draft. Fans wanted to know whether Bueckers would show up to support Fudd. She did more than that. When the Wings used the top pick on the UConn sharpshooter, cameras cut to Bueckers celebrating in the crowd, the new face of the Dallas franchise reacting as if she had just won another title.

Before the draft, Bueckers was asked by Dallas Hoops Journal reporter Grant Afseth how she would feel if the Wings took Fudd at No 1. She tried to keep her answer within league etiquette, but the message was clear enough.

'That would be exciting,' Bueckers said. 'Again, I don't know all what I could say or what the future holds, but obviously we've had a lot of games together under our belt. We won a national championship together, so I think there's great success in that. I guess time will tell.'

Time, as it turned out, did not make anyone wait very long.

WNBA Draft Night Cements The Azzi Fudd, Paige Bueckers Story

The most explicit hint about the Azzi Fudd, Paige Bueckers relationship did not come on draft night itself but during WNBA All-Star Weekend earlier in the year. ESPN reshared a light-hearted Wag Talk segment in which Bueckers was quizzed about her 'D1 girlfriend,' the kind of throwaway content that usually produces coy smiles and non-answers.

Instead, when asked to reveal who her girlfriend was, Bueckers replied simply, 'Azzi Fudd.'

There was no elaboration, no knowing wink on camera, just the name. For fans who had been dissecting every shared selfie and bench-side joke for years, it felt like a line being crossed from rumour into something close to acknowledgement, even if it stopped short of an official statement.

If that did not do it, a separate viral image poured petrol on the fire. A photo circulated online of Fudd's phone case, emblazoned with the words 'Paige Bueckers' girlfriend.' The picture, widely shared on social platforms, 'broke the internet' in the way only a visual, easily memed declaration can.

Even so, Bueckers' answer in that Wag Talk clip sits unedited on ESPN's feeds, and the phone case photo is still doing the rounds. Now the pair are set to share not just a past at UConn, but a professional locker room in Dallas.

How Azzi Fudd And Paige Bueckers See Each Other

Away from the memes and draft theatrics, the two players have offered a more thoughtful account of their bond. In a joint appearance on Close Friends Only with Instagram, Fudd and Bueckers were asked why their partnership works so well.

Fudd's answer was straightforward. 'We complement each other perfectly,' she said, a line that could apply as neatly to their pick-and-roll as to anything off the court.

Bueckers nudged back slightly, in the way close friends often do when they are trying to be precise rather than romantic. 'I would say we don't complement each other perfectly, but we adjust to each other's complements, if that makes sense,' she replied. 'Yeah, and we also try to see each other's point of view and perspective. Like, we both try to put each other in their shoes.'

It was a small exchange, but revealing. Fudd leans into the simplicity of feeling understood. Bueckers reaches for nuance and the work involved in keeping two very different personalities aligned.

They are not entirely in sync on their origin story either. Both agree they first met as teenagers with USA Basketball, long before UConn or the WNBA or the phone cases, but their recollections diverge over when it properly clicked.

'Almost kind of immediately,' Fudd said of her first memory of Bueckers. 'I feel like we really clicked (when) we met... I felt like on the way back home, like I feel like we clicked immediately at USA Basketball when we met. On the court, we clicked. I don't remember talking to you at all off the court.

'But I remember like the plane ride home to Minnesota, talking to you and really liking you. And then that's when I thought our personality, like off the court, our personalities clicked.'

From that plane ride to a national championship, then back-to-back No 1 picks and now a shared WNBA backcourt in Dallas, the arc is hard to ignore.