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Ultimate Guide
Perth Lynx: Five things you need to know
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Three Grand Final series in five years, and three defeats. Perth have not won a title since 1992.
- Perth have lost three Grand Final series in five years, the last in overtime
- Sami Whitcomb returns on a two-year deal after winning the title with Bendigo
- Han Xu, Ally Wilson and Amy Atwell have all left the Lynx
Perth were three points and one overtime period away from sending the WNBL26 Grand Final Series to a deciding third game in a bid to end a 34-year wait.
Instead the Lynx lost Game 2 of the WNBL26 Grand Final series 108-105 in overtime, at home, and Townsville swept it. It was Perth's third Grand Final series in five years and their third defeat.
Then the off-season took their leading scorer, their All-WNBL First Team guard and their captain.
What they got back was the captain of the Australian Opals.
Why it matters
Perth finished WNBL26 second at 18-5 and beat the defending champion Bendigo Spirit 2-0 in the semi-finals, 86-76 in Perth and 81-75 at Red Energy Arena.
Ryan Petrik's plan for Game 1 was to make Bendigo uncomfortable for 40 minutes.
"Obviously happy to have won it," Petrik told basketball.com.au afterwards.
"But I thought we had multiple chances to try and knock them out, and every time we were in that process, they'd come down and hit a big shot, or we'd blow a bunny, or we'd get a scheme wrong.
"The reality is we'd love to play champagne basketball every second and every minute of the game, but elite teams and elite coaches like Bendigo and Kennedy Kereama just won't let you do that. So can you play enough of it to win?"
They could. Then they ran into Townsville.
The Fire won Game 1 88-79 in Townsville. Game 2 in Perth finished 92-92 in regulation and Townsville won the extra period 16-13. Perth have now lost Grand Final series in 2022, 2024 and 2026, all under Petrik.
The one who left
Han Xu was the biggest signing in the club's history and she lasted one season.
The 211cm centre led Perth in scoring at 16.1 points a game across 18 games, won the WNBL Defensive Player of the Year award and made the All-WNBL Second Team. On July 28, 2026 the Geelong Venom confirmed her for WNBL27.
Her arrival had changed how Perth played. On debut she had 22 points on 10-from-12 shooting in a 91-67 win against the UC Capitals, and the Lynx shot 65 per cent from the field.
"Han makes a lot of things offensively a lot easier for us," Petrik told basketball.com.au that night.
"To put up 91 points, shoot 65% from two and 50% from the field, and finally sort out some of the rebounding problems, we're getting there."
Amy Atwell put it more simply after Perth beat Adelaide 109-82 in December.
"The addition of Han, like Ryan said, gives us shooting all over the floor. It opens things up for me, Chibbas getting downhill, and it really could be anyone's night," Atwell told basketball.com.au.
"They did a really good job on Han tonight, but that opened the rest of us up. I'm loving it."
Atwell has also gone, to the Canberra Capitals. So has Ally Wilson, an All-WNBL First Team selection in WNBL26, to the Sydney Flames on a two-year deal. Imports Brianna Turner and Yemiyah Morris are not returning either.
The one who came back
Sami Whitcomb signed a two-year deal on May 14, 2026, returning to the club where she made her name.
Whitcomb, 37, played five seasons at Perth across two stints between 2015 and 2023 and earned four All-WNBL First Team selections there. In 2016-17 she led the WNBL in scoring at 24.1 points a game and set single-season league records for three-pointers with 105 and total points with 652. She scored 41 in a semi-final against the Dandenong Rangers, the highest semi-final score in WNBL history at the time.
She arrives a season removed from winning the championship, the league MVP and the Grand Final MVP with the Bendigo Spirit, and she will captain the Australian Opals at the FIBA Women's World Cup in Berlin in September.
"Committing to the Lynx and being based in Perth, with my family around me, is a dream scenario," Whitcomb said in a club statement.
"It's great to come home and join a club that I know has such a rich history, strong culture and plays really exciting basketball."
Lynx general manager Chris Earl called it a coup.
"Sami is one of the most accomplished players in women's basketball, so to add someone of her calibre and with her basketball IQ to the roster is a real coup for us," Earl said in a club statement.
"Her winning pedigree across multiple leagues, her experience with the Opals, and her ties to Perth make her return hugely exciting for our program and fans."
The one who stayed
Anneli Maley is the reason Perth are still a contender.
Maley, 27, led the WNBL in rebounding in WNBL26 at 14.4 a game, made the All-WNBL First Team, won the club MVP and the league's Fans MVP, and finished second in the MVP voting behind Isobel Borlase. She averaged 15.6 points, 14.4 rebounds, 3.7 assists and 1.5 steals across 27 games, with a double-double in each of her last nine.
On February 7, 2026 she posted WNBL26's only triple-double, 18 points, 10 rebounds and 10 assists in a 108-93 win against the Sydney Flames. It was the first by a Lynx player in 17 years, and only the fifth in club history.
"I didn't know until right at the very end," Maley told the post-game press conference, in comments published by basketball.com.au.
"One of the coaches told me and I was like, 'Oh, no way'. Who would have thought. It was the rebound that was letting me down.
"I think over my career, this is my eighth season in the league. I've been through so many ebbs and flows of things I'm good at, things I'm bad at, things I need to work on. I work really, really hard. I really do, and I try really hard.
"I'm never chasing stats anyway. That's not something I do. That's not something I've ever done. I'm just trying to try really hard."
Petrik was less restrained.
"No one's got a triple-double in 17 years of this club, and only four people have done it in club history," he said in the same press conference.
"I reckon I've killed about four of them this season. The best defender in league has been me subbing you out, so I apologise for that.
"You can move her anywhere one through four and she'll excel. Clearly we speak with a bias, but we wouldn't trade Maley for the world."
Maley was left out of the Opals squad for the World Cup qualifiers in Istanbul, and is not in the final 12 for Berlin. Petrik was asked about the first omission in December.
"Do you want the diplomatic answer or the brutally honest one? I'll get fired if I give the brutal one," he said, in comments published by basketball.com.au.
"She's playing really, really well. I think all of us are a little bit shell-shocked that she wasn't in that Opals squad, because her form has been elite.
"Everyone who made that roster is really talented, so I'm not taking anything away from them. But if you're picking on form, with how she's playing and with us sitting where we are on the ladder despite being at half to three-quarter strength most of the season, I'm not sure what else she's meant to do."
Maley answered on April 10, 2026, scoring 65 points for the Perth Redbacks against Willetton in NBL1 West. It is the all-time NBL1 single-game scoring record, and it came on 85 per cent true shooting: 21-from-29 from the field, 4-from-7 from three, 19-from-21 at the line, with 17 rebounds and five assists.
She has since been signed by the New York Liberty as a development player for the remainder of the 2026 WNBA season. That deal expires before WNBL27 tips off, and she is contracted to Perth through the season.
Thirty-four years
Perth's roots go back to 1985, when the Western Australian Basketball Federation sent a senior women's team to the national club championships as the WAIS Rockets. They won the 1987 WBC title, which secured WNBL entry, and debuted in 1988 as the Perth Breakers.
Michele Timms arrived in 1991. The championship came in 1992, a 58-54 win against the Dandenong Rangers. It remains the only one.
The near-misses started immediately. Perth lost the 1993 Grand Final by a point to Sydney and lost again in 1999.
Then came the collapse. The club was rebranded the Perth Lynx in 2001 under Basketball WA ownership and finished no better than seventh for 15 consecutive seasons, spending part of that stretch as the West Coast Waves. They won one game across the 2004 and 2005 seasons combined.
The licence was taken from Basketball WA in 2015 and the Lynx name restored. Grand Final appearances followed in 2016, 2022, 2024 and 2026. None of them ended in a title.
WNBL26 season summary
- Finished second at 18-5
- Beat the defending champion Bendigo Spirit 2-0 in the semi-finals
- Lost the Grand Final series 2-0 to the Townsville Fire, Game 2 in overtime at home
- Anneli Maley: All-WNBL First Team, league rebounding leader, club MVP, Fans MVP, second in MVP voting
- Ally Wilson: All-WNBL First Team
- Han Xu: Defensive Player of the Year, All-WNBL Second Team
- Alex Ciabattoni: All-WNBL Second Team
Five fast facts
1. Perth have won one WNBL championship, in 1992, as the Perth Breakers.
2. Ryan Petrik has coached three Grand Final series and lost all three, and was WNBL Coach of the Year in 2021-22.
3. Anneli Maley holds the all-time NBL1 single-game scoring record with 65 points.
4. Sami Whitcomb set WNBL single-season records for three-pointers and total points as a Lynx player in 2016-17.
5. The Lynx finished no better than seventh for 15 straight seasons from 2001.
Club timeline
- 1985: Western Australian Basketball Federation enters a senior women's team as the WAIS Rockets
- 1987: Win the WBC title, securing WNBL entry
- 1988: WNBL debut as the Perth Breakers
- 1991: Michele Timms joins the club
- 1992: Win the WNBL championship, beating Dandenong 58-54
- 1993: Lose the Grand Final to Sydney by one point
- 1999: Reach the Grand Final again
- 2001: Rebranded the Perth Lynx under Basketball WA
- 2001-2015: Fifteen straight seasons no better than seventh, part of it as the West Coast Waves
- 2015: Licence taken from Basketball WA, Lynx name restored
- 2016: Grand Final appearance
- 2021-22: Ryan Petrik named WNBL Coach of the Year, Lynx reach the Grand Final
- 2023-24: Third Grand Final series appearance
- 2025-26: Second at 18-5, lose the Grand Final series to Townsville in overtime
- 2026: Han Xu, Ally Wilson and Amy Atwell depart, Sami Whitcomb returns
What's next
The WNBL27 season opens on Thursday, October 15, 2026, when the expansion Tasmania Jewels host the Geelong Venom in Hobart.
Perth's season has one date on it that nobody else's does. Round 14, from January 13 to 17, 2027, is HoopsFest: all five WNBL games of the round played at RAC Arena in Perth, including Southside, Canberra and Geelong playing nominal home games there. NBL27 stages a five-game hub round at the same venue across the same five days.
Ten games, one arena, one week, in the Lynx's own city.
