ARLINGTON, Texas >> Paige Bueckers raised the expectations and excitement level for the Dallas Wings and their fans many months before she was even drafted by the WNBA team.

It started with the viral video of new Wings general manager Curt Miller’s reaction when the franchise won the draft lottery for the No. 1 overall pick only days after he was hired.

“I absolutely lost my mind. ... We knew what that meant at that moment,” the GM says even now.

That was in November, when Bueckers was only three games into the three-time AP All-American’s final season at UConn, which ended with the Huskies’ 12th national championship and coach Geno Auriemma’s sixth No. 1 overall pick in the WNBA draft.

Within days after the draft lottery — five months before the April 14 draft, and six months before the May 16 season opener — the Wings had sold out their season ticket allotment. The team also has an expanded regional TV broadcast deal to reach 6.2 million homes, and will move into a renovated arena in downtown Dallas next season.

Bueckers is generating the same kind of buzz around the Wings that Caitlin Clark did as the No. 1 overall pick for the Indiana Fever last year, when they made the playoffs for the first time in eight years. Clark was the WNBA Rookie of the Year, and was The Associated Press 2024 Female Athlete of the Year.

“She’s going to impact us, and she just impacts winning,” Miller said of Bueckers, referring to her as a humble superstar.

Arike Ogunbowale, the fifth overall pick by the Wings in 2019, was the All-Star Game MVP last season and second in the WNBA with 22.2 points a game. She is also one of only three returning players with Dallas coming off a 9-31 season and missing the playoffs for the first time since 2020.

The Wings did acquire DiJonai Carrington from Connecticut in a multiteam trade after she earned the league’s Most Improved Player Award last season. They also signed seven-year veteran and 2019 WNBA champion Myisha Hines-Allen in free agency.

“There’s a lot of new, there’s going to be a new facility, new arena, new GM, new coaching staff ... mostly an entire new team,” Bueckers said.

“So just to build from where we are now, continue to build for the future. ... Dallas is a sports city, so you feel the love already and the support and the excitement.”

Bueckers and the Wings’ other four draft picks were introduced last week before the start of training camp.