Quick Three: Sky Hire Tyler Marsh as New Head Coach
Why Chicago decided to hire the former Aces assistant coach, how he fits with the team's existing framework and what his hire means to the franchise's future.
Tyler Marsh hadn’t been directly linked with the Sky job by many (or possibly any) sources around the W over the last few weeks, but the former Las Vegas assistant coach now looks set to become the eighth permanent head coach in franchise history. Let’s dive into the hiring of a candidate who, sooner or later, was always wind up as a frontrunner for WNBA head coaching gigs.
1. Chicago bets on championship pedigree.
Hiring an assistant coach from one of the gold-standard franchises in your league is certainly not a new formula. By following this path, the Sky take one of sports’ biggest (and most traditional) gambles—believing that an assistant coach who has been around a championship culture has the ability to bring that culture with them to your organization. That being said, Marsh has a leg up on your average candidate given he’s been around multiple championship cultures over the last half decade. After working with Sixers coach Nick Nurse in the NBA’s G League, Marsh was a part of his staff again with the Raptors in 2019 when they won an NBA title before working with former championship winning coach Rick Carlisle (albeit a decade removed from his title in 2011 and with a different organization) in Indiana during the 2021-22 season.
Of course, his resume since then is about as good as it gets in WNBA terms—having spent the last few years a couple chairs down from 2022 Coach of the Year Becky Hammon. By virtue of working on Hammon’s staff, Marsh, though perhaps only in a theoretical sense, has connections to the Gregg Popovich coaching tree—which has produced the coaches of several recent NBA and WNBA champions including Hammon, Steve Kerr and Mike Budenholzer. Some of this, of course, is purely anecdotal and won’t help Marsh win any games, but when you’re specifically focused on establishing a culture with a young core like the Sky has these types of connections and experiences in the world of basketball aren’t ones every candidate can offer.
And while Marsh has never served as a head coach of a game at any professional level, that “cultural” experience he brings from working under a trio of championship-winning coaches in succession seemingly serves as a differentiator between him and other candidates (or even Teresa Weatherspoon) in the eyes of the Sky front office. Weatherspoon, to her credit, had every intention to build a strong culture in Chicago (and made some in roads in her first season), but Marsh’s direct experience contributing to a “no excuses” culture with the W’s standard bearers for much of the last three years should position him to quickly cultivate a similar one with the Sky.
2. Expect Sky’s style to be more modern/adaptable in ‘25.
Until Marsh coaches his first WNBA game, we can’t say for certain what style of play he’ll bring to Chicago. But if Las Vegas’ approach in recent seasons is any indication, you can expect to see a much more flexible approach than the one that the previous staff employed last season. Vegas, especially at the defensive end, became notorious for their willingness to switch coverages throughout the course of the game—regularly suffocating opposing offenses as a result. That flexibility was key to the Aces’ back-to-back title runs in 2022 and 2023, but it’s also not something that any group of players can go on the court and do without encountering issues. Luckily for Marsh, he’ll inherit a core group of players in Chicago that—like the ones in Las Vegas—have a high basketball IQ. Even then, that’s not to say that the Sky’s group are ready to replicate Vegas’ approach early in the season (or perhaps at any point next year). The Aces’ approach was one that was carefully developed over time, and the goal for Marsh in year one will likely be to—first and foremost—develop a consistent and dominant defensive identity and then work to mix in variability as the season goes on.
At the offensive end, the Sky may see an even bigger leap forward tactically than on D—even if the options Marsh has to copy Vegas’ game are limited without an all-world scorer like A’ja Wilson and a variety of dynamic shooter/scorers like Jackie Young and Kelsey Plum on the perimeter. In any case, there was still plenty of opportunity lost as a result of an oversimplified offensive approach last season and whatever shooters the Sky do have should benefit from a playbook that will be much more caught up with what the best teams in the league (or both leagues thanks to Marsh and Hammon’s recent NBA experience) run on a night-to-night basis.
Of course, if Marsh can bring his player development skills to the table to help improve one or more of the Sky’s shooters like he did with the aforementioned Young (whose 3PT% jumped 18% in Marsh’s first year in LV), that too would pay huge dividends for the overall progress of the offense. And to that point, expect Marsh to work closely with the Sky’s young front court duo on the development of their range—having watched up close as Wilson develop into the game’s most dangerous mid-range player over the last 18-24 months. Even if Chicago’s core players don’t take these big leaps forward (it’s important to temper expectations since Wilson and Young are one-of-a-kind stars), it’s fair to expect considerable gains simply from Marsh implementing a more dynamic offensive approach that’a able to compromise the opposition’s defensive shape more regularly.
3. What Next for Marsh & the Sky?
Focus now naturally turns to preparing for a year that will be critical in setting the Sky on the right course for the future with the start of a new collective bargaining agreement, further expansion teams and the opening of a (potentially) franchise-altering practice facility all on the horizon. After the draft lottery on November 17th, the next step is preparing for the Golden State expansion draft on December 6th, but I don’t see that as much of a threat to the Sky’s core given the options for protecting players. After that, it’s time to get serious with free agency decisions set to be made throughout the months of January and February before the Sky make another lottery pick in April’s draft. That 90-day period—between the decision on restricted free agents Onyenwere, Evans and Carter in mid-January and the draft in mid-April—may decide whether Marsh’s future in Chicago is (or even has a chance to be) successful.
If the Sky strike out on the free agent market (again) and enter 2025 with only their top four pick as a major addition to last season’s core, there’s no coach in the league who’s going to turn the Sky’s roster into a championship contender in their first season. Of course, that wouldn’t be a concern under most normal circumstances. But, Chicago is far from a “normal” rebuilding team at this point—having just jettisoned a coach who outperformed most expectations in her first season on the bench despite a free agency period that produced nothing, the departure of the team’s two best players in trades and a raft of key injuries. With Angel Reese and Kamilla Cardoso—the franchise’s centerpieces—one year closer to free agency, the pressure will be on Marsh to win from the jump—whether the roster is realistically ready to or not. If the Sky struggle in 2025, there’ll (in theory) be no justification to give Marsh a second season as he’s being dealt an “easier” hand than Weatherspoon was fired for struggling with, but you’d have to think he’ll get at least two years on the bench—with the Sky hoping to avoid picking up a reputation (or, perhaps, furthering their existing one) as a slightly dysfunctional ownership group.
My Verdict
Marsh was an incredibly popular assistant with the Vegas roster, and his ability to endear himself to players should help him quickly replicate some of the bonds that Weatherspoon built with Reese and others in 2024. That being said, it’s also fair to point out that Marsh—like Weatherspoon a year ago—has never been the head coach of a professional team before (Weatherspoon, at least, had once been a college head coach). Regardless, most of the names the Sky could have gone for this winter would bring a similar lack of head coaching experience, and it’s extremely hard to claim for certain that hiring a retread like Christie Sides or Latricia Trammell would’ve been a better directional choice for the franchise—even if they have faced the unique challenges of this type of job before.
By going for Marsh, the Sky, at least in theory, fix a pair of problems that seemed present during the 2024 season under Weatherspoon (and were more or less confirmed by players during exit interviews): a lack of accountability and an oft-oversimplified playbook—especially at the offensive end. The Aces’ no-nonsense culture was what made it possible for them to produce the performance they did in their epic, shorthanded 2023 Finals win (though standards seemed to waver at times last season), and the coaching staff’s approach to the game has always been first class (not only because of their exceptional two-way personnel).
Of course, the biggest obstacle Marsh will face in Chicago is that—regardless of your personal feelings towards the Sky’s promising young core—the roster is a long way off of the one he’s leaving behind in the desert. If Jeff Pagliocca and the Sky front office can put the right pieces in place around their standout rookie duo, then Marsh seems to bring plenty of the traits needed to wind up as another in the long line of successful coaches with some kind of link to Popovich or, alternatively, as one of the first in Hammon’s newly formed coaching tree. If the right improvements to the roster aren’t made (or if top players continue to depart when opportunity arises), no amount of change to the organization’s culture or tactical approach can compensate for talents like Vegas won their 2 titles with.