Film Study: How Kia Nurse's Playmaking Could Help Reese & Cardoso Succeed
The Sky brought Nurse to Chicago for her shooting ability and defensive versatility, but an understated aspect of her game could also pay huge dividends.
When you look at the Chicago Sky’s 2025 free agency acquisitions, it’s fair to say that Courtney Vandersloot, not Kia Nurse, is expected to bring the biggest degree of improvement to the team’s playmaking. Statistically speaking, there’s little to no valid comparison between Vandersloot (the WNBA’s leading assister in six of the last eight seasons) and Nurse (1.7 APG in her six year career).
And yet, a quick parse through Nurse’s tape leaves a distinct impression that the Canadian’s playmaking could provide a similar impact for the Chicago offense—even if it comes in much smaller doses than Vandersloot’s. With second-year players Angel Reese and Kamilla Cardoso set as the franchise’s cornerstones, there’s also an opportunity for the much-younger Nurse (29) to be a long-term complement to the front court tandem than Vandersloot (36) should the Sky and the former Spark decide to work towards an extension to her one-year deal after the season.
Of course, the biggest way for Nurse to support Reese and Cardoso is with strong defense at the point of attack (lessening the amount of pressure the pair face at the rim) and consistent shooting from long-range (lessening the traffic they must combat on the way to the rim). And while Nurse is not a lights-out shooter (32.4% on 4.5 3PA per game in her career) nor a realistic all-defense candidate, her track record suggests she’ll be of great value to the Sky’s front court tandem in both of these obvious areas of need for the 2024 roster.
Thus, anything that Nurse can offer beyond those skills would be a huge win for head coach Tyler Marsh in 2025; let’s dive into how Nurse’s tape shows that her playmaking could be that above and beyond attribute.
Pick and Roll Ball-Handling
As guard-to-big assists go, it doesn’t get any more bread-and-butter than the pick-and-roll. Though it feels like a lifetime ago, the Sky are not all that far removed from the second half of the 2023 season when interim coach Emre Vatansever leaned on the concept heavily at the offensive end, and a player like Nurse (in addition to Vandersloot) should allow Marsh the option to lean heavily on the concept in stretches during the 2025 season.
Last season, we saw flashes of pick-and-roll reliance with Lindsay Allen and Kamilla Cardoso later in the season, but it felt like Teresa Weatherspoon and her staff never stuck to the concept for too long. Because the paint was so clogged throughout much of the year, a little prodding at the point of attack could’ve been beneficial, and I get the feeling Marsh will look to Nurse or Vandersloot to work with Reese and Cardoso in these sets as a makeshift way of moving opposing bigs away from the basket. Aside from the obvious opportunities for the ball handler or the roller to score, the reduction in paint traffic should also create a lot more scenarios for the big who’s not setting a screen to face a 1-on-1 match-up in the low post.
As for Nurse’s specific skill set and how it lends itself to pick-and-roll success, her strong decision-making stands out as a key attribute. In the first two plays below, you can see that, simply put, she makes the right play. Whether it be setting up the roller who’s got a valuable first step on the opposing big or kicking to an open shooter in the opposite corner, Nurse is clearly capable of making the right read when she’s entrusted with the ball.
At the same time, Nurse is also fundamentally strong enough to execute the type of passes that typically separate good and great pick-and-roll playmakers. In the third and fourth clips below, Nurse makes intelligent, well-timed bounce passes into the pocket. As a result, Dearica Hamby gets two good opportunities to score in spite of decent help defense from the Lynx and Storm.
Given Cardoso has already shown the ability to excel as a roller in the pick-and-roll and Nurse will be one of the Sky’s higher-percentage outside scoring threats behind new acquisition Ariel Atkins, expect to see Marsh insert that duo into plenty of pick-and-roll sets that aim to produce similar results. Vandersloot, of course, will be able to produce similar results with both Cardoso and Reese, but her lack of consistency shooting from the outside in the last two seasons means she has less gravity and teams will have more options to defend her pick and roll sets than Nurse’s.
Seal and Mismatch Recognition
A common complaint from the Sky’s fanbase (though, in fairness, an oft-over blown one) was that the perimeter players on last year’s team weren’t adept at providing quality entry passes for the two young bigs, and Nurse is definitely a part of Marsh and GM Jeff Pagliocca’s solution to that problem.
Indeed, one offensive area where both Reese and Cardoso really impressed as a rookies was their ability to seal a defender in the post, and Nurse’s tape with Hamby, Cameron Brink, Li Yueru and even the slightly smaller Rickea Jackson (6’2”) a year ago shows she’s capable of capitalizing on those opportunities to feed her bigs.
In addition to recognizing seals, Nurse is also good at spotting mismatches in the post like the ones you see between Yueru (6’7”) and Natasha Mack (6’3”) in the third play and Hamby (6’3”) and Bridget Carleton (6’1”) in the final play of the video above. Cardoso, like Yueru, is a walking mismatch against any defender thanks to her extraordinary height, and Reese is likely to end up with a slightly shorter or weaker defender switched onto her quite often this season thanks to Atkins, Rebecca Allen and Michaela Onyenwere’s dynamic play styles causing defenses to make often undesirable assignment hand-offs between their 2-4s.
If the Sky’s perimeter players—Nurse or otherwise—can regularly capitalize on these advantageous scenarios when they arise, it will likely have a noteworthy impact on Reese & Cardoso’s inside scoring efficiency. Much has been made of how the addition of shooting talent will open up the floor for the Sky (and that’s certainly true), but—spaced or not—athletic bigs with good sealing technique like Reese and Cardoso will always create periodic advantages in the post. The more regularly (and quickly) the Chicago offense gets the ball to them in those times, the more easy looks at the basket and one-vs.-one opportunities the duo should get—with their odds of scoring drastically improved in that favorable context.
Vision and Awareness in Transition
In many ways, this skill goes hand in hand with the previous one as both tie back to the fact that Nurse always seems to have her head up when she has the basketball. Now, to some extent, that may be expected. She’s not a dominant back down threat or face-up isolation scorer; so, why wouldn’t she constantly be looking for a teammate? Yet, anyone who has watched plenty of WNBA (or especially NBA) action can tell you that’s not always the case.
The first two plays against the Sky and the Liberty show great vision and touch but are nothing out of the ordinary. They speak to Nurse’s strengths as an outlet passer, but they’re also not so difficult that you wouldn’t expect most semi-regular ball handlers to be able to make them. The third clip, however, requires a whole lot more finesse and basketball IQ—showing that Nurse has unique skills.
When Nurse catches the pass from Rae Burrell, Hamby isn’t even really open yet. You can certainly infer that she’s got more momentum than Alyssa Thomas and will beat her to the rim, but there’s a degree of judgement needed. In addition, the lofted pass Nurse needs to safely get the ball over Veronica Burton could still be in danger of being contested in the air by Marina Mabrey if the ball is released instantly after the catch.
Instead, Nurse is patient enough to wait for Mabrey to hit the breaks and commit to guarding the trailer Burrell—meaning Thomas is now the only player with any reasonable chance left to defend Hamby.
Even then, the type of pass is just right for the situation. Mabrey’s positioning means that there’s likely just enough space to fit in a wrap around bounce pass, but such a pass would force Hamby to gather before taking the shot—allowing Thomas right back into the play. Instead, the floated option (which still has some much needed zip behind it) allows Hamby to combine her catch and gather and keep Thomas from getting back into the play.
The fourth clip above while not from a true transition scenario (this a 5-on-4 after a made basket where Jackie Young hit the ground) again shows how Nurse’s eyes are always up. She’s already looking towards Jackson in the post as she crosses half-court, and she crucially doesn’t block out the rest of the court to engage with the screen from Yueru.
Instead, she glides past the screen with her head always up and waits just long enough for Kiah Stokes to be caught between Jackson inside and Stephanie Talbot at the three-point line.
If Nurse had dropped her head to commit to the two-player game with Yueru right away, she may still have made a good pass after the screen, but Stokes would’ve had a clearer signal to protect the paint immediately and let Young scramble back to cover Talbot. By keeping all four defenders engaged with her eyes, Nurse allows Jackson to establish a favorable position inside.
Whether in scenarios like that one where the defense is a player down or in traditional fast break situations like the others above, Nurse has consistently shown herself to be a willing and capable outlet passer. Whether the decisions she’s made are as conscious as I’m portraying them to be or simply a result of her overall basketball IQ is impossible to say but is also entirely inconsequential for Reese and Cardoso.
Both young bigs have shown the ability to successfully navigate traffic when they run the floor and, crucially, have been willing runners on the break. When you combine that with the athletic advantages they have against many of their counterparts, it’s obvious how both Reese and Cardoso are prime candidates to be on the end of fast break assists from Nurse in 2025. If the Canadian’s arrival opens the floor up and provides much-needed defensive security in front of Chicago’s front court of the future, her signing will be a success, but the added threat of Nurse as a playmaker could turn this acquisition into one of the team’s most important of Pagliocca’s tenure.