Chicago Sky: Head coach Teresa Weatherspoon speaks with reporters before battling the Indiana Fever

anyone can start yes weekend or we're not quite sure at this moment so we're just trying to make sure that she's better uh so we're just going to take care of Kenedy in the best way we possibly can so she could just heal up and be ready to play how difficult was it to adjust for you guys to adjust to playing without her and did you feel by end yeah we um uh short turn around for us to know that we weren't playing with Kennedy but you know it's that next man up mentality and and our young ladies have that mentality and we knew with Kennedy being out there's a lot that we all have to bring um and that's what we were doing everybody just trying to step up do their job and uh execute the plan that we had in place anyone else you look at the first time that you met this came to now especially with they have you feel like you've seen them grow as a team when you talk about watching a team grow and you talk about ging that chemistry that you want for any of your teams to have and when you've had an opportunity to play them and then have an opportunity to watch them play you see that they're really jelling well together playing extremely well together and Caitlyn is the head of that snake and she has that team running and and utilizing every bit of everybody's gift so they're playing extremely good basketball so it is about a 40 minutes of total focusing execution for us against this team I don't you been out to the yet and see all the p and everything Barbie night just kind of for you as Angels coach what is it like seeing you know a franchise kind of put their back in terms of just like having these special F nights where they're able to kind of like you know celebrate what makes a player like for different what means a lot that you're not you're you're really celebrating who she is as a player and a person too and you know a lot of things that they've earned Le embracing it and and this organization is making sure that everyone recognizes the things that they've done to earn what they've done and then allowing everybody else to kind of celebrate with them and it's a beautiful thing to see all you want these young women to do is live their dream live what they want out of life is what you really want to see with them and you get an opportunity to celebrate with them and celebrate with everyone stepping into the arena and your organization that put that in place it's big and it's beautiful out there when you um over the last few games you guys have talked about the experience and and in these late game scenarios needing to gain more experience in those aspects in order to get over that turdle but then when you consider how you guys have played the fever and how close they've been in all three match up this report tonight um do you think this team is ready to to to to get over that hurdle if it comes to a tech you know we better be R you know you know you know the game presents so many different things it it it presents so many different things and there so many that you can learn from and like you just said learning how to win down the stretch what's the most important thing that we want to do how do we want to execute that we have to know uh and there's a level of intensity that that you must have and a level of focus level of effort that is um so important down stretch and we're learning so many different things and when it comes down to that point there's no longer the nerves of it if that makes sense you're not nervous about it I've been here I've done it now I know how to get through it so how would you describe things Focus level right now it was it's it's absolutely amazing um it's amazing to step into the gym with them every single day uh the level of focus and understanding there's a level of understanding of where we are and the things that we must do and how we must get it done it's a level of understanding it's so precious to see every single day coach Rachel talked about that you really like for the players to coach themselves why is that important extremely important um it's very important because it you can actually hear what the players are speaking what they know and then it's easier to help guide them as well these young women have played in so many different uh philosophies and you're trying to teach them your philosophy but it's also important to hear what they know uh and then when they Talk Amongst each other you kind of move out of the way because that's what you want to see that's the togetherness you want to see you want to hear them communicating with one another so you kind of move out of the way of that and let them grow in that way and then your coaching eases in talk about well the one thing that you always talk about when you talk about quickness on one team and quickness on the other you don't ever want to use quickness on quickness it's about being smart now with knowing how quick that person is that's why the game is always talked about about angles that's about playing those angles knowing what that player likes to do and try to get them to the secondary move if you possibly can so that's the most important thing uh when you're playing against one someone is so quick and you also have someone just as quick but you want them to be smarter than the quickness you're going up against I'll take the turn there were some other things that kind of stood out that you knew that you needed to work on exu yeah you just said everything is execution for us knowing what you want to do where we want to get it to that's the most important thing and you guys don't say this all day long we can't turn it over we just can't turn on possessions are so valuable to us we have to get a shot no matter what on every possession that we have but down the stretch it is important of how we execute offensively and what we're doing defensively with that communication is so so important for us to be successful