Angel Reese’s season is done, but the Chicago Sky’s isn’t. The question now is whether Chicago has three more games to play … or more.
A post-Olympics swoon has the Sky out of playoff position for the first time since July 1, with eight losses in their last 10 games. They are in ninth place despite being tied with the Washington Mystics due to the season-series tiebreaker, and the Atlanta Dream are one game behind. Chicago finishes the season against Phoenix, at Atlanta and at Connecticut.
Of course, a debate remains about whether making the playoffs is even the best course of action for the Sky. Dallas owns swap rights with Chicago’s first-round pick, but missing the playoffs could get the Sky as high as second in the 2025 draft, whereas making the postseason would presumably push them back to sixth since Golden State is expected to have the fifth pick.
With the lottery upside of missing the playoffs and Chicago currently sitting on the outside looking in, chasing the postseason might seem foolhardy. But the Sky have competed for a playoff spot for the entire season and the team’s mindset hasn’t changed.
As Chennedy Carter said emphatically in her return from health and safety protocols: “I want to make a run, I’m here to do that, let’s f—ing do it. Let’s turn the page, let’s forget about these last couple of games, let’s worry about these next couple that we have.”
Still in the fight, AND back at home tomorrow #skytown pic.twitter.com/8mAktVqgma
— Chicago Sky (@chicagosky) September 14, 2024
Finishing strong is complicated by the constant state of flux within the roster, forcing the Sky to adapt. First, it was figuring out how to incorporate Rachel Banham and Moriah Jefferson in place of Marina Mabrey, who was the team’s second-leading scorer and best 3-point shooter. Then, leading scorer Carter missed four games. On the day of Carter’s return, Reese injured her wrist and was lost for the year.
No player has had a bigger positive impact for the Sky this season than Reese; Chicago was 22.5 points per 100 possessions better with her on the court in 2024. Although the Sky managed to defeat the Wings 92-77 in their first game without Reese, it hasn’t been as easy since. In its first game against a team that was actually trying, Chicago suffered its worst defeat of the season, falling by 31 points to the Mystics at home. Not only did the Sky lose a game in the standings, but Washington clinched the head-to-head tiebreaker (3-1) over Chicago in the process. The Sky subsequently lost 83-66 against the Lynx, which took control of their playoff destiny out of their hands.
“I think we just need to be put in these moments more, I think that helps,” Carter said after the Minnesota loss. “Personally, I am learning how to adapt in these moments and playing more volume minutes, so it’s just my body and our bodies getting under us, and then us finding a way to come back when we are down.”
As the list of available players changes, Chicago will have to play a different style than what has worked to this point. On offense, without Reese commanding a defender, the Mystics were free to crowd Kamilla Cardoso in the paint. The rookie center managed only nine field-goal attempts, far too low for a second option, as the defensive pressure forced her to give up the ball. Minnesota was similarly able to congest the paint against Cardoso, and she had the most success when she was on the move, as a roller or a cutter, when the Lynx couldn’t just collapse on her in the lane.
Fellow bigs Isabelle Harrison and Brianna Turner need to attract attention away from Cardoso. For Harrison, that isn’t going to come as a spacer, as she is best in the post, and Chicago has managed to successfully have two bigs near the basket for most of the season. Turner won’t be treated as an individual offensive threat, so the Sky have to leverage her cutting ability.
It would be interesting to see Chicago go small on offense with Michaela Onyenwere as the power forward, especially since the former rookie of the year has shot 36.7 percent on 3s since entering the starting lineup. However, without Diamond DeShields, who is now out with an ankle injury, that could make the Sky dangerously small on the perimeter, since neither Banham nor Dana Evans can approximate the size of a small forward. However, scoring 58 and 66 points in two games isn’t going to get the job done, so coach Teresa Weatherspoon will have to get creative.
Furthermore, going small might be a good investment in the Sky’s future since Evans is a restricted free agent, and Banham and Jefferson are both under contract in 2025. Better to know what they have on the roster going forward than feeding extra minutes to Harrison and Turner, both of whom are upcoming unrestricted free agents.
See a three, send a three #skytown pic.twitter.com/T6q7DF1cFq
— Chicago Sky (@chicagosky) September 14, 2024
Reese’s absence is being felt defensively as well, first and foremost on the glass, where the rookie was one of the best defensive rebounders in the league. If Chicago is going to get outrebounded while playing two bigs, as it did in each of the last two contests, then that negates one of the disadvantages of downsizing. The other problem is that neither Harrison or Turner is best suited to play the four — they’re both centers defensively — so the Sky found themselves struggling to close out on 3-point shooters without Reese’s mobility. Washington and Minnesota are the league’s two best 3-point shooting teams, so perhaps this challenge won’t be as pronounced moving forward, but other opponents are still capable of exploiting that weakness.
It’s difficult to ask a team to completely rework its identity in the final week of the season, which is why Harrison has been the direct replacement for Reese over the past two games. But that’s the situation Chicago finds itself in. The Mystics have had to constantly reinvent themselves due to trades and injuries, yet they have surged lately as they seek to optimize the newest iterations of their roster. Being placed in new and adverse situations can help the Sky grow, even if they don’t immediately result in wins.
“To remind everybody, they had us 12th in the preseason and I don’t think that’s something we forget, and you just have to kind of carry that chip on your shoulder,” Harrison said. “We’ve proved so many people wrong this year from top to bottom, and that’s still something that we want to do. Throughout the season, we had our ups and downs, but we’re still here and we’re battling through.”
Whatever happens in the next four games, the fact that Chicago is contending for a postseason spot and has franchise cornerstones in Reese and Cardoso makes this season a success. Moving forward, those two will be the Sky’s fulcrums, so any experimentation with small-ball to end 2024 will be short-lived. If Chicago’s goal is to make the postseason, that experiment is worth a try, even if a No. 8 seed and an early postseason exit won’t change the future of this team.
(Photo of Kamilla Cardoso: Melissa Tamez / Icon Sportswire via Getty Images)
