Quick Three: Sky Continue Roster Build, Add Kia Nurse & Rebecca Allen
After bringing back Vandersloot and Onyenwere, Chicago adds a pair of new faces that align perfectly with Tyler Marsh's modern vision for the Sky.
The Sky were always due for a busy offseason with only six players under contract for the 2025 season, and the action started early with the return of franchise legend Courtney Vandersloot and the re-signing of forward Michaela Onyenwere. Chicago’s front office didn’t stop there as Saturday’s opening day of free agency saw the reported signing of former Sparks guard Kia Nurse, and the addition of Mercury forward Rebecca Allen in a trade with the Connecticut Sun (who had added the Aussie in the deal that sent Alyssa Thomas to the Desert). To understand where the Sky go next in building their 2025 roster, let’s dive into what each of the new additions will bring to the Windy City.
1. Sky sign journey woman guard Kia Nurse.
It’s hard to believe given her UConn career feels so recent, but 2025 will be Kia Nurse’s seventh professional season and Chicago will be her 5th different team in the last six years. Usually, that amount of movement ties back to deficiencies in a player’s game, but the fact Nurse keeps landing on a team in the incredibly competitive world of the W speaks more to what she can add for almost any team under any context. Head coach Tyler Marsh and the Sky will look to Nurse to do two things: defend and shoot. Given her career track record, Nurse is a pretty good bet to offer both, and the veteran presence she will bring—even for only one season—could be integral for developing a young wing prospect like Sonia Citron in 2025.
Of course, there’s also the potential for Nurse to develop into a long-term part of the Sky’s plans—with the 6’0” guard able to offer help from multiple positions both as a part of the first five or the bench group. As is the case with Vandersloot (and to some extent Allen), Marsh and GM Jeff Pagliocca’s plans for 2025 seem to be assembling a strong roster with proven players who can (1) help them win as many games as possible in 2025, (2) help them develop whatever new draft picks join Reese and Cardoso in the Sky’s core and (3) potentially end up as a role player in the team’s 2026 and 2027 rosters. In the immediate term, Nurse offers some more balance for Chicago, but they’ll also hope to see her shooting improve upon a down season where her three-point percentage dipped to 33.1% on 4 3PA per game. If she trends back towards the 35% mark she eclipsed in 3 of her last 4 seasons before 2024, Nurse will be a huge addition for the Sky who is a priority re-add for the 2026 season as she’ll only just have turned 30.
2. Allen-for-Allen swap sees Rebecca land in Chicago.
The Sky’s fourth move of the offseason saw Lindsay Allen—one of Pagliocca’s standout signings from last offseason—dealt to the Connecticut Sun in return for former New York and Phoenix lynchpin Rebecca Allen. The 6’2” Aussie—often known for her one-of-a-kind positional versatility is another who will add a dose of shooting and defensive optionality to the Sky’s unit, and her arrival is one that will wind up being extremely key if she sticks around for further seasons given her position as one of the W’s premier role players over the last four seasons. Like Nurse, Allen adds shooting, but the 32-year-old is actually coming off two-years of uptick in her three-point percentage in 2023 (34.8%) and 2024 (35.7%) after a difficult 2022 season from long-range.
If that upward trend continues, Allen will likely be the Sky’s most important floor-spacing asset in 2025, but they’ll profit from her presence regardless of the trend as her lifetime three-point percentage (36.3%) and ability to guard almost anyone on the court makes her a rare asset—especially amongst players who aren’t on a max contract (Chicago inherits the $160k contract Allen had with the Phoenix Mercury). While certainly more proven than Onyenwere, I see similar aspects to the two player’s games, and I expect the veteran to have plenty of valuable knowledge to pass on, both for her former teammate (2021-22 in NY) and Angel Reese (another versatile defender—albeit in a much different mold). In any circumstances, Allen is good enough to be a WNBA starter for many teams, and the current position the Sky find their roster in means she’ll either be a strong starting option at the 3 or a sixth-player of the year favorite when she spells Reese and Onyenwere off the Chicago bench.
3. What next for the Sky?
After the Sky signed Vandersloot, I spoke to the reasons why I didn’t see the veteran’s arrival as a clear indicator of the Sky’s ‘25 direction but mentioned that continuing to patiently rebuild still made the most sense. Having failed to make any landmark moves to this point, it seems the Sky are still very much headed towards a 2025 season that sees them, at best, contend for the playoffs and, likely, end up on the outside looking in. With the four moves they’ve made to this point, the Sky have 9 players signed for what will likely be a 12-player roster next season.
The tentative depth chart (highly subject to change and very much open to interpretation) would look something like this:
PG: Vandersloot, Jefferson
SG: Nurse, Banham
SF: Onyenwere, R. Allen
PF: Reese, R. Allen
C: Cardoso, Williams
April’s third pick, presumably, will be used on a guard to start at shooting guard and/or learn the ropes from Vandersloot as the Sky’s long-term starting point guard, but there’s other directions the Sky could go—including trading the pick for future assets or bringing in a proven veteran. Given the lack of big moves this offseason, a move for a veteran feels less and less likely by the day, but there’s an argument to be made for trading down—especially if the Sky can get their hands on a highly-coveted pick from the 2027 draft (when Juju Watkins and Hannah Hidalgo are likely to enter the WNBA).
Regardless, the Sky’s roster still looks quite a few big moves away from seriously contending during the 2025 season; so, there’s little impetus to make big swings during the remainder of free agency. With most of the league set to hit the open market after this season, Chicago can plan for a solid year of growth in Marsh’s first year on the bench—with the 3 veteran additions they’ve made to this point able to complement the growth environment that Marsh will hope to cultivate over the course of the season. With three roster spots open and both 1st-round picks in April’s draft still likely to make the team, expect to see the Sky spend the next few weeks signing a few players to training camp deals—with hopes that those additions can provide valuable competition (along with the more vulnerable 10th draft pick) for the final two roster spots in camp.
Until details on Nurse, Onyenwere and Vandersloot’s contracts come through, it’s impossible to definitively speak on the Sky’s cap position, but they should have no real financial concerns in the comings weeks as there’s space for a few max contracts in their budget as things stand.