The Minnesota Lynx head into the 2025 WNBA season with a lot of confidence and momentum having reached the 2024 WNBA Finals. With a superstar player in Napheesa Collier and a solid core around her, the Lynx appear poised to be a contender again in the upcoming season. With the start of the season only a couple of weeks away, the Lynx continued to bolster their roster with the re-signing of veteran forward Jessica Shepard, the team announced.

The re-signing of Jessica Shepard brings the Lynx's current roster to 21 players including the players they selected in the WNBA Draft. The Lynx are only permitted to bring 18 players to training camp so they will need to move at least three players via trade or cutting them. The Lynx just added veteran wing Karlie Samuelson via trade on draft day. WNBA training camps open on April 27.

Shepard rejoins the Lynx after sitting out the 2024 WNBA season. Shepard had been playing with her overseas team, Umana Reyer Venezia in Italy when 2024 training camp began. As per the WNBA's CBA, the prioritization rule states that players must report to their WNBA team by a certain deadline, or else they cannot play in that particular season.

The prioritization rule only affects players with two or more years of experience, and they had to have ended the previous season on a WNBA roster. Shepard fit both those barometers as she was still a member of the Lynx and she had four years of experience to that point.

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Shepard was originally selected by the Lynx with the No. 16 overall pick in the 2019 WNBA Draft, and she has played for the Lynx her entire WNBA career to this point. After a solid start to her rookie season in 2019, she suffered an ACL tear that cut her year short. She ended up sitting out the entire 2020 season due to an ACL injury. 2023 was the last year that Shepard was in the league, appearing in 21 games, including 17 starts, at a little over 26 minutes per game.

She averaged 8.1 points, 7.1 rebounds and 3.2 assists with splits of 51.6 percent shooting from the field and 77.4 percent shooting from the free-throw line. Her points per game tied a career-high. Coming into her fifth season in the WNBA, she gives the Lynx additional depth in the frontcourt. She automatically becomes one of the team's best rebounders with a career average of 6.1, almost as much as her points per game career average (6.3).

With Shepard back in the fold, the Lynx have a potential logjam with solid forward depth. Collier is the starting power forward with Bridget Carleton as the starting small forward. Shepard can play both power forward and center and would give the Lynx a more experienced option at reserve power forward.