Photo by Thearon W. Henderson/Getty Images Luke Randall · HITC Tue, November 10, 2026 at 2:25 PM UTC · 2 min read About Our Ads Advertisement Advertisement Advertisement Winning a WNBA championship doesn't seem to have gone down well with everyone.
The Valkyries blindsided the league by hoisting the WNBA championship in year two, with Natalie Nakase getting all the flowers for keeping that locker room completely locked in.
From day one, the mantra was simple. Check your ego at the door, play your role, and win as a collective unit with no room for selfish individuals. The WNBA announcing zero Valkyries players in the All WNBA first or second team speaks volumes of that.
It was the ultimate feel-good team story, but Juste Jocyte has been speaking out, showing that whole "all for one" culture came at a real cost for players stuck on the outside looking in.
Jocyte let her frustrations spill out in a sit-down with Lithuanian media, and even factoring in the clunkiness of Google Translate, the message is unmistakable.
Her relationship with Natalie Nakase is thoroughly broken. She felt frozen out of the rotation all year, writing off the team's reasoning as empty excuses and claiming she never once had an honest, serious sit-down with Nakase to address it.
Having zero interest in burning another year watching from the sideline, she's already informed general manager Ohemaa Nyanin that she's done with the Valkyries .
Some of her comments were available to read for free, where she stated:
"I'm happy for the team, but on the other hand – I didn't contribute much. It's both very cheerful and partly sad because you don't feel the same, you don't care as much. And I don't even know my position, whether I would want to go back next year; it's a very ambiguous feeling."
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Source: Sports
