They say that rough seas make a skillful sailor, but what do they say about the skies?
No, really. What do they say about the Sky … as in the Chicago Sky?
Last season this group — led by one of the most incredible individual seasons in professional basketball history from Courtney Vandersloot — limped into the postseason with a depleted roster. A season without any opportunity to practice took its toll on the team, specifically its turnovers and its defensive cohesion.
Advertisement
But that season led to one of the best offseasons in franchise history. The Sky signed the biggest free agent available in Candace Parker; Diamond DeShields and Azurá Stevens (whose injuries forced early bubble exits) had an opportunity to get back to 100 percent; and the Vanderquigs — the WNBA power marriage of Vandersloot and Allie Quigley — won another Russian title and a Euroleague title with UMMC Ekaterinburg.
But, back to those rough seas and skies …
With championship international teams come delayed arrivals to training camp (compounded by new health and safety protocols for players and coaches across the league), so Chicago has spent much of its 2021 training camp with a depleted roster and neither of its top two point guards in camp.
But players and coaches are choosing to look at it through a glass-half-full lens, that with the team learning how to play together without its best point guard or shooter, that everyone else will raise their games (which could pay dividends come June, July and August).
“Sometimes it’s better when somebody gets into foul trouble or you’re put into a late-game situation you normally wouldn’t be in — you see who kind of rises to the occasion and you kind of learn how to adapt. And I think that’s what we’re kind of doing right now,” Parker said. “I don’t know what it’s like to play with Sloot, so I can imagine how much easier it’s going to be when she gets here. And sometimes, you have to do things hard.”
Roster analysis
Guards
Point guard Courtney Vandersloot is coming off a record-breaking 10-assists-per-game season and, in addition to facilitating at that elite level, Vandersloot created for herself, too, putting together a 50-40-90 season (50 percent from the floor, 40 percent from beyond the arc, 90 percent from the free-throw line). Her ability to find her teams in the flow of the offense allowed the Sky to shoot a 54.7 percent effective field goal percentage through the regular season — the best percentage of any WNBA team over the last 25 years — and with more offensive weapons around her this season, she’s primed to stay at the top of her game.
Advertisement
“Sloot is a perfectionist,” Sky coach James Wade said. “The way she judges herself is not just in pure numbers, it’s in how she controls the game. … She’s going to be focused on how efficient she can be with the ball, how efficient she can be without the ball and how much she can affect us winning.”
Backing up Vandersloot will be point guard Shyla Heal, the 19-year-old Australian who has been playing in the Australian professional ranks since she was 14. One of the reasons Wade was so keen on Heal (outside of how she performed against the likes of Washington’s Leilani Mitchell and Las Vegas’ Liz Cambage in recent seasons) was that her Australian team’s offense is a pick-and-roll heavy scheme that would allow her to quickly find her rhythm in the Sky’s offense.
Without her in training camp, the staff sent her a video playbook so she’d be able to study film and try and be as up to speed as possible when she does land stateside and can get out of health and safety protocol. And when she is available, expect her to take time to acclimate to the game, but since she has played against pros for the past five years, she’s certainly not going to look like a 19-year-old.
“It’s a marathon, not a sprint,” Wade said. “We’re not expecting to see who Shyla is going to be in the first two or three weeks of the season. It’s a growth process. This is the hardest league in the world to play in and adapt to, and for the point guard, it’s the hardest position. … And so we’re going to be patient with her, but at the same time we’re going to get her up to this level.”
Without either of those players through the first two weeks of training camp, Wade brought in other guards to keep practices running smoothly, while also giving some players opportunities to make the Sky’s final roster.
Point guard Brittany Boyd, who has 128 WNBA appearances over five seasons, is in camp and could potentially make this roster. She would provide depth and experience at point guard. And combo guard Lexie Brown, who has had the opportunity to show her chops at the point during training camp with Vandersloot and Heal absent, could potentially make this roster as well.
Advertisement
With injuries to key players a season ago and early bubble departures from Stevens and DeShields, perhaps it shouldn’t be too surprising that shooting guard Allie Quigley created more for herself a season ago than in the previous two seasons — her assist percentage on her makes dropped to 63 percent in 2020 versus around 73 percent in both 2019 and 2018, according to Pivot Analysis. But now, with a healthy Stevens and DeShields, as well as the addition of Parker (who joins Stefanie Dolson as an excellent passing big), there are going to be even more passers who might be able to either find themselves open because of how defenses key in on Quigley or find Quigley open because of the flow of the offense that has so many weapons.
“Because she pulls so much gravity, we like to find her in movement,” Wade said. “We don’t need her as much putting the ball down, even though she’s very talented and very underrated in that. … We kind of want to get her free for catch-and-shoot situations.”
Wings
When it comes to wing Diamond DeShields, Wade hopes people stop throwing around the “breakout season” jargon because of her numbers or performances last year. “She was playing with something that normally nobody else would even play with,” Wade said of DeShields’ undisclosed injury, “but she tried to do that for her teammates.” So, for DeShields, Wade is looking at the 2021 season more as a continuation of the 2019 season, which ended with DeShields averaging 24 points, five rebounds and two assists in the two playoff games.
DeShields spent a lot of time in the gym this offseason and even added some boxing into her cross-training regimen, and out of that, she said that her big focus this season is on consistency.
“Consistency wins,” she said. “Even on days when I’m tired or being on a plane or I’m sore, just being consistent in what I’ve been doing. Trusting my work. I’ve put so much work in, it’s like — you’ve got to trust it now when you start playing.”
The biggest breakout season for the Sky in the bubble last year was wing Kahleah Copper, who put up career bests (by more than double) in both scoring and rebounding averages. In her first full season starting for Chicago, she played an important and steadying role. With more pieces around her on the glass, it’ll be interesting to see how she continues to impact this team, but her responsibility and roles will remain key, according to Wade.
The Sky resolved the Gabby Williams issue on Sunday, trading the wing (who was placed on the full-season suspended list) to Los Angeles for rookie Stephanie Watts and the rights to Leonie Fiebich.
Advertisement
Bigs
The Sky have several versatile post weapons that will allow them to have a few different looks this season, and that starts with 14-year veteran Candace Parker, who provided the biggest surprise of free agency when she left Los Angeles, her team for her entire WNBA career, and came home to Chicago.
Through the first two weeks of training camp, coaches say they have been impressed with how well DeShields and Parker’s games complement one another, and that two-player game is very intriguing given both of those players’ skill sets.
“On paper, it could be unbelievable,” Parker said. “I keep telling her, ‘We got to actually do it in real life.’ And with that being said, I think just in terms of her athleticism, I know everybody’s talking about on the offensive end. But defensively, like we could disrupt some people.”
Coming from the WNBA’s 2020 Defensive Player of the Year — that’s saying something. And considering the Sky ranked in the bottom quarter of the league last year in opponent points off turnovers and opponent fast break points, having a duo like Parker and DeShields that could lead the charge in cutting back on those miscues would be huge for this team’s ceiling.
Alongside Parker as an excellent passing center is Stefanie Dolson, who is down 28 pounds from a season ago, which has allowed her to be more athletic, explosive and agile on the floor through training camp. The two-time WNBA All-Star, who didn’t play overseas this offseason as she rehabbed an injury, said she has gotten more confident in her game through this past offseason of individual-focused workouts.
Power forward/center Azurá Stevens came to Chicago ahead of last season and Wade admits that the organization didn’t take into account well enough how she was coming off an injury and that they should’ve controlled her minutes at the beginning of last season. Instead, for the second season in a row, Stevens ended the year early with a lower-body injury. This season, to avoid that, Chicago plans to control her minutes early and play her with a long-term approach.
Center Astou Ndour-Fall returns to Chicago after spending last season with Dallas. The 6-foot-5 center averaged about 18 minutes per game in 2019, Wade’s first year in Chicago. She’ll miss time this season as she competes with Spain in EuroBasket and the Olympics and she is another player who had a very late arrival at training camp (she got out of health and safety protocols on Friday), but she brings depth and height into the Sky’s post arsenal.
Advertisement
With Dolson (three-on-three Olympic qualifiers in May) and Ndour (Eurobasket) missing time this season, there will be opportunities for second-year power forward Ruthy Hebard and rookie Natasha Mack to get valuable game reps as the organization continues to build both its older and younger contingents. Hebard, who is still in health and safety protocol after returning from her overseas commitments in Turkey, averaged 5.7 points and 3.9 rebounds a game in limited minutes as a rookie and will likely use this year as another growth season as she learns behind the improved post players. Mack, through camp, has impressed with her athleticism and ability to get blocks and steals, but like Hebard, will still need time to climb the depth chart.
Coaching staff
This offseason, Wade added former WNBA player Tonya Edwards to the Sky staff. Edwards fills multiple voids for the Sky. Last season, Chicago had the only all-male staff in the WNBA, which drew some criticism. But Edwards also fills a void as a former WNBA player. Edwards was drafted in 1999, nearly a decade after she graduated from Tennessee (where she won two national titles), and though the league is far different now, Wade said it has been helpful to have a former WNBA player on staff.
“There are certain things that players know that … I don’t think I would ever know or could understand,” Wade said. “And to actually have a player’s perspective — especially someone who’s won — as a coach, I think that’s something that’s really special. It’s something that we needed and something that would have helped us out last year in the bubble.”
In the draft
While there were a few big surprises in the first round of the WNBA Draft, it seemed fairly obvious that the Sky were going to target a point guard. But not many assumed it would be Heal, the international player whom Wade hadn’t been able to see play in person this past year.
But Heal wasn’t the only international taken early. Of the first 15 picks this year, four were international players who are either 20 or turn 20 this year. And Wade said that it’s a balance in evaluating the skill levels of those players — especially in a pandemic year that didn’t allow for much travel — because a coach must take into account both the competition (pros) but also the age (essentially, a freshman or sophomore in college) when breaking down that player’s game.
“We see the college players play against the college players, they’re not playing against WNBA players, but we feel comfortable because they’re here, because we see them,” Wade said. “But when we see people play overseas, we don’t get to see him live as much. … So you try to study it as much as possible and you see how they make decisions, how quick they make decisions, the things that they’re thinking and what they do at game speed.”
Wade said he was not only impressed with what he saw in terms of her decision-making and the speed of it, but also how much she grew as a player between her 18-year-old season and her 19-year-old season. Projected out over time, knowing she will still gain strength and speed, he said he felt really confident that she was the right pick to be the heir apparent behind Vandersloot.
Advertisement
And when it came to getting Mack at No. 16 — a player many believed would be a first-round pick — Wade said he felt they’d be able to get her when the draft got into the second round. Mack, with her versatility, athleticism and a frame that can add some size, seems like she could be a player who could really grow into a key position in this league. And now, she gets to learn from and behind post players who are at multiple places in their careers. If she can soak up information from all of them during this rookie season and make the most out of her opportunities, she could be laying the foundation for a solid WNBA career.
In the future
When 2022 free agency rolls around, it could be a very expensive time for the Sky.
Vandersloot, Quigley, Dolson and Copper will all be unrestricted free agents while DeShields and Williams will be restricted free agents. Those six have spent a combined 38 seasons in Chicago.
But come 2022, there just isn’t a scenario in which Chicago will be able to keep everyone.
With Parker ($195,000) and Stevens ($140,000) already signed as protected veterans for 2022, they alone will take up a quarter of the salary cap. Realistically, if they want to keep players on rookie-scale contracts like Heal, Mack and Hebard, that would help the bottom line, but the Sky could probably still keep only three (or maybe four) of the six free agents.
Which brings about a lot of questions: Are the Vanderquigs Chicago lifers? Parker certainly seemed like a lock to stay in Los Angeles after such a long career in the WNBA but made the move back home. While Quigley is an Illinois native, Vandersloot is from Washington. Would there be a draw from Seattle in a post-Sue Bird era to bring someone like Vandersloot home (while adding a shooter like Quigley)? And what about Dolson? How will Parker’s minutes impact her own and would that be enough to look elsewhere? Is there something to read into when it comes to Williams’ situation?
One thing is for sure: The new CBA has changed the way business is done and decisions are made in the WNBA. Nothing is a sure thing anymore, and if the core of this group wants to do something special together, the only guaranteed time to do that is this season.
Advertisement
Best-case scenario
A defense that was ailed last season by injuries and a lack of practice time comes together in 2021 to complement a high-powered offense that leads the league in shooting percentage again. Like other teams that don’t have their full roster in training camp, the Sky take some early losses that feel winnable, but quickly, the Sky really find their identity and momentum. Parker’s versatility and Dolson’s passing ability allow for a very scary inside-outside attack/pick-and-roll game. Quigley rains 3-pointers. Vandersloot Vandersloots. DeShields gets back to her healthy and productive 2019 self. Stevens shows exactly why coaches said she was a perfect fit for this team ahead of 2020.
And ultimately, the Sky — with too many weapons to stop on the offensive end and an improved defense — make an unexpected run to the WNBA Finals as teams simply struggle to keep up the scoring pace with Chicago. While it’s not enough to win the title, the run gives a few players (specifically those unrestricted free agents) a belief that a championship is within reach in Chicago, which bodes well for their 2022 free-agency decisions.
Realistic-case scenario
With the lack of time to build chemistry during training camp, especially with a new piece as impactful as Parker, this team takes longer to jell than other teams and the results on the floor look a bit like last season early on — frustrating turnovers, lapses on the defensive end. As Chicago inches closer to the Olympic break, big individual performances turn into big team performances, and the break proves crucial as this team is able to make up for lost time. The result? The post-Olympic-break Sky look like an entirely different team than the pre-Olympic-break Sky.
This will be a team that gets better as the season goes on and by the time the playoffs kick off, Chicago is able to cruise through a first-round matchup before a close second-round loss that feels winnable. If players are able to see that the pieces are in place for a championship run in 2022, the Sky could retain key pieces while making strategic financial moves elsewhere that continue to build this team for short- and long-term success.
(Top photo of Diamond DeShields: Matteo Marchi / Getty Images; Illustration: John Bradford / The Athletic)
