2024 Chicago Sky Player Report Card: Chennedy Carter
Carter was never your average "training camp contract" player, but her exceptional performance still went well above and beyond expectation.
Chennedy Carter arrived at training camp back in April with a chance to be a difference maker for the Sky. That turned out to be true but not in the way many might have expected. Instead of being a game-changing difference maker off of the Sky’s bench (as she was in the early season), Carter wound up a starter by mid-June and, soon after, as Chicago’s decisive offensive player. Let’s reflect on some of the standout aspects of her 2024 season and highlight one area where she could be even more impactful if she returns to Chicago next season.
1. Mid-Range Ability
Only five players (C. Williams, Wilson, Ogunbowale, Loyd and Charles) attempted more mid-range shots than Carter during the 2024 season—even after she came off the bench for the opening 12 games and missed 7 more later in the season as a result of injury and illness. Of that elite group, Carter had the fourth highest-efficiency (39.6%) on those shots while she managed to finish 8th in the W in total mid-range points (118) even after missing all of that time late in the season. The mid-range is often called a dying art in the game of basketball, but if you look at the other players who excel (Williams/Wilson most notably), it’s clear that some of the W’s best teams and individuals are still leaning heavily on the unique challenge it presents for a defense. When you dig into the Sky’s context specifically, I’d argue Carter’s ability was even more important than it would be for any other team because of the (much needed) spacing and variety it helped provide for the offense. Reason being, Chicago finished 8th in the W in three-point percentage (32.5%) while also taking (4.8) and making (14.7) the fewest threes per game in the league.
Without the ability to space the floor with outside shooters, the inclination of the offense was always going to be to score inside (even Carter was amongst the top players in the W in scoring in the paint). Consequently, Chicago’s offense had a tendency to run hot and cold—with crunch-time defenses able to easily expose the inability to score consistently anywhere outside the paint. Thus, the ability of a player like Carter to score without confronting the highly-concentrated interior defense of the opponent offered an important safety valve. When Carter was able to get going in the mid-range, defenses had to react, and her ability to put the ball on the floor and go past a defender that steps out to provide tight coverage added a need for a second defender to be ready to help at the rim. That combination of factors forces defensive adjustments and, in theory, moves bodies away from the paint. For the Sky to have more success long term, they need more players who can offer variety like this in the half-court (and the front office will know that), but what Carter offered in the mid-range this season was a key part of the team exceeding expectations in 2024. Of course, if (or when) the Sky can put those other pieces in place in the offense, Carter’s skills in this area will become even more dangerous as defenses will not be able to easily send multiple defenders her way so frequently without making huge sacrifices elsewhere on the court.
2. Stamina
This may seem like a relatively rudimentary thing to highlight from a player who was so exceptional in so many areas this season, but the overall workload Carter handled this season was huge, and it wouldn’t have been possible for many players. Carter started the season as a bench spark plug, and it wasn’t all that surprising to see her limitless energy shine through in a role that asked her to play twenty or fewer minutes a game. However, her ability to keep playing at that pace, at both ends of the court while playing 30 or more minutes a game was pretty remarkable. And unlike many scorers who benefit from a reduced role at the defensive end, Carter was tasked with big defensive match-ups and heavy defensive responsibility even while handling the ball regularly in the half-court and leading the team in field-goal attempts. Granted, the WNBA as a whole asks a lot more of standout offensive players at the defensive end than the NBA, but Carter’s buy-in at the defensive end was an underrated part of her overall contributions to the Sky’s success.
With Carter on the court, the Sky’s defensive rating was almost 4 points better per 100 possessions than it was when she sat, and the tenacity she brought at the point of attack and her disruptiveness in passing lanes (1.1 steals per game) was clearly a nuisance for opposing offenses. When Carter did contribute to the opposition turning the ball over, she was also a leader on the break because of her pace and ability to attract defenders with the ball in hand. For a team that scored 13.5% of all of its points on the break, that output also can’t go unnoticed. When you roll all these factors together, it’s difficult to find the moment in the game where Carter wasn’t playing at full speed. Given the accumulation of late-season injuries that resulted in Carter missing the final two games, the Sky have to be thinking about ways to take some of this intensive workload off of their star guard’s shoulders, but the fact that she would (and could) take it all on when asked this season speaks to one of the many reasons why she’ll be handsomely paid this offseason in restricted free agency.
2025 Goal: More Playmaking
Carter was already an important playmaker for Chicago in 2024—finishing 16th in the WNBA (and second on the Sky) in assists per game after Marina Mabrey was traded to Connecticut. And if you look at the nature of Carter’s assists, there’s no shortage of vision, touch or creativity with the way she passes the basketball; so, it’s not a matter of if she can be a great playmaker. Instead, her assist numbers in 2025 will likely have more to do with how the rest of the offense looks around her than her own desire to move the basketball. This season, Chicago’s offense needed Carter’s usage to be mostly aimed towards scoring the ball—often in one-v-one situations. When opportunities arose for her to playmake (especially in scenarios where the defense swarmed to her drives), Carter was always willing to unload the ball, but her scoring was simply more consistent and effective than nearly all other sources on the team.
In 2025, things should look quite different. Whether or not Chicago can find new offensive pieces to surround Carter in free agency or the draft remains to be seen, but it’s more than reasonable to expect the two rookies in the front court to take a step forward from an efficiency perspective with a full offseason to focus on preparing for their second professional campaign. If Cardoso and Reese are able to score more consistently, it ultimately will change how defenses set-up and Carter, eventually, should get more space to operate as a result. Simply put, it’s a symbiotic relationship. More Carter scoring draws in the defense—creating bigger openings for her to pass the ball to Reese and Cardoso. More scoring from that pair opens the floor open in the opposite direction. Carter is a high-IQ player—meaning she sees all of this happening in real-time and has an understanding of how to exploit the ebbs and flows of defensive coverage. Put all that together and the natural outcome should be just as many (if not more) assists for Carter in 2025 than she had in her strong second half of 2024 (4.1 per game).