Game Preview: Sky Start Busy Week with Visit from Storm
Seattle's stars were free agency targets for the Sky this winter but now return to the Windy City as part of a formidable (though still growing) title contender.
It wasn’t too long ago that Nneka Ogwumike was visiting Chicago during the WNBA’s free agency period, and rumors of a new super team with Kahleah Copper were swirling. Copper is now in Phoenix, the Sky’s roster is built—at least in part—around the draft pick they got by trading her, and Ogwumike will return to town on Tuesday night (7 PM CT) as part of a different super team with Skylar Diggins-Smith and Jewell Loyd (two more players who were seen as Chicago targets at one point or another). And while the team sure looks super, the early results haven’t been exactly what any of the three stars envisioned when they signed on to be a part of the Storm’s new “post-Stewie” championship chase. That said, it’s only May and Noelle Quinn’s side has enough veteran leadership to know that patience is crucial during the team building process—with Saturday’s dominant win over Washington flashing the team’s potential. Likewise, Chicago—while on a completely different timeline—should also be preaching patience after a difficult loss against Connecticut, but need to gear up for a frenetic stretch of games in the next two weeks. Lets’s jump into my preview of the first of three games this week—at home against Seattle.
Matchup to Watch: Storm P&R Offense vs. Sky Defense
One of the most exciting things about this Seattle offense for Noelle Quinn (or terrifying if you’re Teresa Weatherspoon and other opposing head coaches) is the variety of options the Storm have in the half-court. Loyd and Diggins-Smith can both go iso and get a bucket while Ogwumike and Ezi Magbegor are more than capable of scoring from a post touch, but it’s the interactions between all of these players that are most concerning for Chicago’s defense on Tuesday night. There’s so many different looks you can run with this group, but let’s boil it down to the pick-and-roll where, in both principle and practice, the personnel Quinn has creates insane possibilities.
To get an idea of just how dangerous this group can be, take a look at this play from early in Saturday’s game against the Mystics:
The first action is actually a dribble hand-off (DHO) rather than a traditional pick-and-roll, but the strong screen by Ogwumike gives it the look and feel of a P&R action anyways. Ariel Atkins goes over the screen and Loyd could probably pull-up as soon as she sees Stefanie Dolson is giving her space—which is a strong first option for Seattle’s offense. The second option, then, is for Loyd to find a pass to Ogwumike on the roll to the basket which—in this instance—Dolson is in position to prevent. With nothing coming from the DHO, Loyd just unloads across to Diggins-Smith who runs a true P&R with Magbegor who, like Ogwumike, can score at multiple levels. Aaliyah Edwards focuses on containing Diggins-Smith (the contrast between Loyd as an elite mid-range scorer and Diggins-Smith as a great slasher is another inevitable source of confusion for the defense) and lets Magbebor slip into a position that Diggins-Smith can find her in with a bounce pass. Even then, help comes from a couple of teammates and Magbegor struggles to control the pass, but Seattle still get a high-quality look for Loyd from the play.
In other words, you can defend these Seattle sets really well and still give up a score because (1) Seattle have two unique pick-and-roll tandems on court at once, (2) each of the four players has a multi-faceted game (crucially, both of the bigs can fade to shoot threes at a good clip) and (3) the individual talent of a player like Loyd allows her to hit a big shot at any point when the play breaks down. So, with stopping the Storm’s offense proving an unlikely goal, what can the Sky do to limit Seattle’s P&R success?
Beyond sticking to and consistently communicating whatever plans (switch, blitz, etc.) that Weatherspoon and her staff lay out pre-game, a good start is for the Chicago guards to fight through screens like Atkins does in the play above. There’s only so much a defensive player can do to get past a well-set screen, but the effort to try and hassle the ball-handler probably deters Loyd from taking a mid-range shot she’s definitely capable of hitting. Another key is for the players guarding the screen to be as active with their hands as possible. The reason Magbegor struggles to field the bounce pass from Diggins-Smith is because Edwards’ bottom hand forces the pass to be thrown at a low trajectory—resulting in an awkward bounce. And lastly, those not involved in defending the P&R have to provide strong help whenever the Storm do create an advantage. For instance, Diamond DeShields shows below how helping across—even when you’re giving up a lot of size to the roller—can make the shooter think twice and disrupt what’s otherwise an easy lay-in.
Numbers Game: Bench Scoring
Despite only three bench players getting consistent run early in the season, the Sky bench is producing an impressive 18.0 PPG so far (6th in the W). And while a focus on bench scoring would typically reflect a desire for a team’s role players to add to what the starters do, the focus for Teresa Weatherspoon at the moment is quite different as Chennedy Carter is, perhaps, the team’s second most consistent source of offense behind Marina Mabrey after four games. Thus, the Sky aren’t just relying on their bench to add an extra dash of impact when their stars sit, but instead, for Carter and Lindsay Allen to add valuable scoring which—on most nights—the team simply won’t be able to live without. The Sky are 1-1 when they lose the bench scoring battle and 1-1 when they win it; so, it’s not as if outscoring the opponent’s bench is the decisive factor, but in the last three games where the Sky have been more consistently competitive, their bench scoring average has gone from 11 PPG to 20 PPG with Carter (4 PPG to 11.7 PPG) responsible for a lot of that impact. In short, the closer the Sky get to that 18 PPG season average (and the closer Carter gets to double figures) the better chances there are for them to win on any given night.
Meanwhile, Seattle’s bench operates in a more traditional role. The four stars that make up the core of the Storm’s starting line-up score more than enough (67 PPG) to sustain an offense all on their own, but the bench can act as a ‘swing’ factor that pushes them over the edge on any given night. Case in point: Seattle’s bench scored 30 points in Saturday’s lopsided 32 point victory over the Mystics. The aforementioned core four put up 75 in total and, in theory, would have pulled out the result against Washington’s final score of 69. But the impact the bench—especially Jordan Horston (8 pts) and Sami Whitcomb (12 pts on 4/5 3PT)—added made the game a blowout. In five previous games this season before Saturday night, Seattle’s bench had not scored more than 15 points in a regulation game (they had 18 in the 2OT loss to MIN); so, the Washington game—at least for now—looks like the exception rather than the rule.
Yet, the difference in the need for the bench to score underlines a key difference between these two franchises at this stage in their development. The Sky have something of an “all hands on deck” approach with each player needing to add value while Seattle have the luxury of a starting five stacked with star power that’s capable of deciding the outcome all on its own—with the bench more key in determining whether the Storm wind up as great or just really good team.
Sky-Zone: Patience, Patience + More Patience
It would be silly to suggest that the Sky winning two of their opening three games was a bad thing, but for some outside of the team’s locker room (namely certain fans and media), early season results of any kind are always likely to create unrealistic expectations. Yet, it’s important for everyone inside the Sky locker room to remember that this is a new team which figures to encounter hurdles as the season goes along. A key challenge for last season’s team—especially during the mid-season slump after the coaching change—was establishing continuity and Courtney Williams, one of the team’s most important leaders, repeatedly emphasized in her media appearances how it important it was for the team to give themselves grace as they continued to learn how to play with one another.
And while Williams is gone, it’s key for this team’s veteran group—led by Mabrey, Elizabeth Williams and, of course, Weatherspoon—to permeate a similar mindset through the new look roster. After all, the Sky could easily have four lopsided losses at this point given they’ve already faced four relatively unchanged playoff teams from a season ago in the opening two weeks. Instead, the Sky are .500 and look well ahead of most people’s (mine included) pre-season expectations. And given that foundation that’s been laid early on this season, the future does look very bright for the Sky, but it’s important for all to remember that this team—and many of its key players—still need at least a full season to settle into what they can become long term. Any success that comes sooner than that can only be positive and shouldn’t create unnecessary expectations that so often hamper young, overachieving teams. Luckily for Chicago, it seems that Weatherspoon is the perfect coach to help insulate the team from those types of potentially dangerous narratives and keep them focused on doing what they can to improve individually and build continuity over the course of a long WNBA season.