It’s hard to believe that the WNBA has been around since 1997. It feels like yesterday that the sister league was being introduced in partnership with the NBA a couple decades ago now. Twenty-five years later, the WNBA has seen significant milestones: a dynasty off the bat with the Houston Comets winning the first four WNBA Championships, an infusion of ABL players that improved the quality of the league.

The WNBA featured game-changing players in Cynthia Cooper, Sheryl Swoopes, Candace Parker, Lauren Jackson, Lisa Leslie, Maya Moore, Diana Taurasi, Tamika Catchings, and Brittney Griner that are considered among not only the best WNBA players, but some of the best womens basketball players in the history of the game.

While Cooper and Lauren Jackson, Catchings and Sue Bird, Maya Moore and Taurasi are no doubt league’s legends with gaudy numbers, you won’t find them on the list of WNBA triple doubles. That shows you how difficult it is to garner at least 10 points, 10 rebounds and 10 assists in the same game.

Every WNBA Triple Double in League History

Throughout the league’s history, only a select group of players have achieved this milestone, with a few standing out for their multiple triple-double performances. Sheryl Swoopes was the first player to record a triple-double in the WNBA, achieving this in 1999. She was later joined by other legends such as Margo Dydek and Lisa Leslie who both accomplished the only triple doubles with blocks. Here’s every WNBA triple double sorted by date.

There was a stretch where Thomas recorded eight triple doubles without any other players achieving one and she is the only player to put up multiple triple doubles in consecutive WNBA Finals games.

WNBA Players with Most Triple Doubles

In recent years, Alyssa Thomas and  Sabrina Ionescu have put up multiple triple-doubles. Thomas in particular has become the queen of triple doubles with the most triple-doubles in WNBA history. It’s safe to say that Thomas is synonymous of triple doubles so much so that if you were taking bets at NBA betting UK, you would surely put money down on Alyssa Thomas. She has more than a third of all WNBA triple doubles in league history after all.

There’s been just four players in WNBA that have accomplished multiple triple doubles: Thomas, Ionescu, Candace Parker and Courtney Vandersloot. Look for Caitlin Clark to add her name to this list sooner than later.

Triple Double Trigger Fingers in Atlanta

Back in 2017,  Layshia Clarendon appeared to have recorded a triple-double with 15 points, 11 assists and 10 rebounds. However the league reversed the triple double the following day; finding that two assists were erroneously attributed to the Atlanta Dream guard.

Does it look like the list is missing a couple triple doubles? That’s probably because no fewer than three triple doubles were announced after a game only to have them rescinded by the league shortly after. The most recent example was when Atlanta’s first time all-star Layshia Clarendon. She appeared to be the sixth player (before Candace Parker accomplished her first triple double a couple days after Claredon) in league history to achieve the statistical feat with a 15 points, 11 assists and 10 rebounds statline in July 2017. Two of those assists were later taken away in a league review due to “stat errors”.

In July 2016, two of the WNBA’s superstars Brittney Griner and Angel McCoughtry had their triple-doubles rescinded after errors in stat-taking were found afterwards when the league reviewed the statistics. Griner had two blocks removed and McCoughtry lost out on an assist making both short of the feat. The one commonality of the three almost-triple doubles? Each of the triple-doubles mentioned that were reversed took place in Atlanta. Someone has some itchy trigger fingers in the A.T.L.

Shockingly, Basketball Hall-of-Famer Catchings isn’t on this list. As a player that has one of the only recorded quintuple doubles in basketball history, you would think her name would litter a list like this. It just shows how difficult it is to achieve it in the WNBA when compared to the NBA. I liken her to the LeBron James in the sense that she has plenty of games where she fell short by a couple rebounds or assists.

One reason why there is far less triple doubles in the WNBA than in the NBA is the women’s game is more a team game that doesn’t necessarily rely on any one individual. The league also has fewer games in the season (34 vs 82) and shorter games (40 mins vs 48 mins).