Chicago Sky's Collapse: A Rant on Teresa Weatherspoon's Role in the Washington Mystics Loss

the Chicago Sky take their worst loss of the season to the Washington Mystics luckily for them Atlanta lost their game meaning that essentially nothing really happened in the standings for them but this was definitely a missed opportunity to move up in the standings and considering the play and where the sky are and the weight of this game that makes it the worst loss of the season for the pregame the day before it was reported that practice was cancelled because m multiple Chicago Sky players were sick by the end of it all only Kennedy Carter was ruled out but that's not even taking into account all the precautions that went into play like having to cancel a practice and Angel and Izzy having to wear a mask when the focus should be on basketball I'm tired of there always being something with this team first mayy wants out then Carter goes on Twitter and likes a tweet that caused drama within the fan base then she can't play in the first Mercury game then when it looks like the sky are gaining chemistry because they only lost to the sun and the aces by a combined four points when it looks like some chemistry is coming together and things are potentially on the up Kennedy gets ruled out of this game which just messes up the whole team flow chemistry and rotations and forces players to play out of position which just messes up the team Dynamic and what they're trying to build going forward this stuff matters in the NBA I'm not sure if it was the championship year or the previous season but I I saw a stat where the Denver Nuggets starting lineup played the most minutes of any fiveman team in the NBA they have yic but they're not this crazy talented team they got to where they are because of that camaraderie that togetherness that team chemistry that they built through playing so many games together so it's hard for this guy to build something special when they don't even have their full lineup available to them every night get it together but the reason why I thought that this was a winnable game was because Shakira Austin was out for the Mystic so in theory that should have leveled the playing field in the first quarter I love that they got cardoso the ball on the first possession which always seems to happen because it usually leads to scores or good offense I just wish that they didn't forget that that was an option for this quarter and for the game The Bigs were not fed the guard play and the entry passes overall were bad Lindsay and Michaela couldn't stop turning it over and to make it worse Michaela turned into a volume shooter shooting all kinds of shots and going one for four from the field to add to her two turnovers every time that she touched the ball nothing happened the saddest thing was when angel had to call her own number and hoist up a bad shot just to get something up on the rim because she wasn't being fed in advantageous positions and a bad shot from her is better than a Lindsay or Michaela turnover so the starters were subed out and the all bench lineup performed well and got them back into the game Behind Some solid scoring from Diamond definitely the standout of that run to end the quarter and the bench of diamond Briana Dana Izzy and Mariah ended the quarter with a positive plus minus but the second quarter defense was bad from them and I believe that tpoon rote the bench for way too long the skyscrapers checked in halfway through the quarter which should be normal if the team will run competently and actually had a good bench but that's not the case for this team she took way too long to get the bigs back in the game and was fortunate to only be down Five Points 4439 even when The Bigs got back in I've got to say something that I didn't like in this quarter and in the first quarter was Angel reee overh helping and getting torched by players like Dolson and angler from behind the ark the guard defense was bad and usually I'm a guy that likes to wall off the paint and force teams to take lower percentage three-point shots but this is a team that can't hit any three so it's better for them if the game gets kept at a two-point scoring ball game third quarter hits and Michaela finally wakes up and starts scoring at will which is a very welcome sight but this got neutralized and canceled out by Angel's bad third quarter she locked in on defense for sure so I somewhat like the call to play her for the whole quarter but she couldn't stop turning the ball over on travel calls and offensive fouls every time Angel touched the ball the offense came to a screeching halt and it usually ended in a turnover or just bad overall offense but despite that the sky were able to take a 58 to 54 lead over the mystics to end the quarter in the fourth quarter the sky were able to hold the mystics to three points until the 4 minutes and 202nd Mark but they couldn't capitalize on this and put the game away because for some reason teaspoon bench Camilla for a crucial three or so minute stretch 550 to around 2 minutes and 24 seconds in favor of Isabel and I actually thought that she was going to close out the game for some type of strategic reason maybe tpoon liked the matchup The Sky Had a four-point lead and some momentum so maybe she tried to steal some minutes for Camila but that's probably her biggest mistake of the night not going for the win there because at the 438 Mark the sky gave up a 13-2 run to close out the game and the two points that they scored were from Camilla when she got back in the game and cut the lead down to just two points with around 50 seconds left but on the following offensive possession to tie up the game they didn't even look for Camila at all and Dana Evans and Lindsay Allen basically dribbled out the shot clock and threw a grenade to Michaela for the turnover and even she had bad awareness because with 4 seconds left don't go into a post up just shoot just little basketball IQ there was no excuse for Camilla to not get that ball right there although Camila barely got shots she was efficient scoring wise Drew doubles and let the game in assist over point guards she is an offensive Hub and on a night where Kennedy Carter was missing she needed more minutes more touches and that didn't happen because of a mixture of the guards being selfish the guards turning it over and teaspoon not running any plays for the bigs to get post UPS also another teaspoon coaching failure was when Michaela got beat back door and had to foul and she challenged the foul which although it got reversed to an on the floor foul rather than a shooting foul which saved two points as the mystics got nothing out of that Bing possession that was nice but Michaela clearly fouled her as opposed to about a minute later when Angel was called for a foul on Britney where she got all ball and it would have been the perfect time to challenge that but she blew her Challenge on an obvious foul Angel Ree and Camila cardoso are some of the worst officiated players in the WNBA save the challenges for them another teaspoon failure came on the play to potentially tie up the game where Lindsay Dana and Michaela ate up the whole shot clock just Meandering around where's the time out she doesn't run plays but at least make an attempt at something as soon as it was clear that they weren't going to get anything in transition a timeout should have been called before the play devolved into Dana and Lindsay dribbling out the clock then on the final possession with three seconds left 7470 ball game with the game Out Of Reach she called for back-to-back giving goals from Angel back to Lindsay which not only got blown up twice in 3 seconds but it also got blown up twice in 4 seconds in the Connecticut game that they lost a few days ago that time with Rachel then angel trying to catch the ball and give it back to Lindsay you got four chances at it and it hasn't even generated a shot at him two deflections and two turnovers given up it just doesn't work stop going to it I usually don't give out coach grates because the players impact the game more but teaspoon is going to get an F for this game even without Kennedy this was a winnable game that she managed terribly run plays for the bigs there's no excuse for Camilla and Angel to combine for six field goal attempts at the half and 14 field goal attempts for the game especially with no Kennedy even with Angel not shooting great that's because teaspoon didn't put her in positions to be great because she ran no plays for her and Angel had to try and create all of her shots for herself which isn't part of her game yet in year one but her pounding the ball inside is better than watching Lindsay Allen turn the ball over and not even get a shot up even if you can't get the bigs open or get them some mismatches to work with a straightup Camila post up on anyone was the best offense all night especially going against this Mystics team but she got frozen out of the game The Bigs are top three players on the team and with no Kennedy this was supposed to be their night Feed The Bigs so yeah this loss is on teaspoon now it's time for player performance grades Michaela is going to get a d I didn't want to give her an F because she provided a good scoring punch in the third quarter but that was it she only came to play in one quarter she jacked up too many shot attempts that just weren't hers to take and she was a turnover and fouling machine Diamond the shields is going to get a B+ she provided some much needed scoring Off the Bench she played an aworthy game especially for her standards but I don't want to give out A's for this game I was willing to last game because they kept it close with the aces but this right here is the worst loss of the Season Camila cardoso is going to get a B+ still too many fouls for my liking but for what she got she provided every thing that she could have leading the team in assist and only missing two shots combining field goals and free throws she just needed to take more shots and that wasn't on her Lindsay Allen is going to get an F she can't make an entry pass she keeps on turning the ball over and she takes too long to set up plays if they even run plays and all of that dribbling around leads to shot clock violations and bad shots easy F Angel ree is going to get an F she picked up her defense in the second half but I just can't ignore how she made Emily and Stephanie look like Premier scorers and every time she touched the ball she either missed the layup or turned the ball over also she got completely exposed with about a minute and 20 seconds left she was wide open at the free throw line with a jump shot or a push shot floater to tie up the game but she charged into three Defenders and it ended in a block shot turnover that Washington scored off of the refs didn't show her any love and the coach doesn't run plays for her but even then it's still a bad game because she was able to get close to the rim on some possessions but she missed some decent layups and I can't fault the guards for that Dana Evans is going to get an F despite hitting a big three she couldn't stop turning the ball over and she opted to take floaters instead of feeding Camilla even when she got in good post position feed the hot hand Isabelle Harrison is going to get a SE minus she was fine out there six points and hit some fourth quarter free throws it's just that she shouldn't have been in the game in the fourth quarter because the run that the mystics went on overlapped with her minutes it wasn't all on her but yeah Camilla should have been out there Rachel bandam is going to get an F she only hit one three-pointer which is supposed to be her specialty and she provided no defense Mariah Jefferson is going to get a d she provided almost no scoring even when she scored it was a lucky bank shot three but she was the best at ball security out of everyone with one turnover there were players that had zero turnovers but they didn't have the ball in their hands enough to begin with so Mariah took care of the ball the best which has to count for something on a night where this guy had 21 turnovers finally Banna Turner is going to get a d she had a block and her with the bench unit held up well at the end of the first quarter but she only got Got 5 minutes to play so she can't get a higher grade the Chicago Sky played the Indiana Fever on Friday and as of now there's still no word on if Kennedy Carter is ready to go she's questionable anything can happen but I would say to have the best chance it wouldn't hurt to have Kennedy Carter also I don't make pregame videos so I'm just going to slide this in here after seeing Camilla's emergence as an offensive Force she needs to dominate the ball to day feat her in the post and she'll either score or draw a double team opening up the floor for this offensively challenge team I don't care about the angel Reed and Caitlyn Clark of it all I want Camilla to take somewhere near 20 shots in this game four or five shots per quarter with or without Kennedy she needs those touches because she's a hub on offense like it's viable to run offense through her win or lose I'd like to see more of that because it seems to be efficient and it would show some growth in teaspoon and that she's learned her lesson but yeah interested to see what happens in this game but that is all for now [Music]