Skylar Diggins’ first season with the Chicago Sky is officially over after the team shut her down for the remainder of the season. Now, as the seven-time All-Star explains the decision and prioritizes her health, she also shared a candid view of an issue she described as her biggest frustration of the season.
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Her comments came via Front Office Sports’ Colin Salao, who attended the press conference Diggins held after the Sky announced she would miss the remainder of the season because of a knee injury, which has prevented her from playing since July 3. Her comments were posted to X by Salao, which included one interesting nugget.
“Diggins said that she shared with the team that her “biggest frustration” was the team not moving to their practice facility this year,” his post read.
Diggins reportedly said, “I think a lot of us were promised that. We thought that was going to be the case.”
The Sky’s new $60 million practice facility was supposed to be ready before the season, but the timeline was pushed back multiple times due to weather and project expansions. And the facility’s cost has grown from an original estimate of $38 million to more than $60 million as its footprint expanded and construction was delayed. That facility was one of the reasons Diggins signed a $1.86 million deal with the team.
In July, according to a report from the Chicago Sun-Times, team CEO Adam Fox had previously projected that the facility would be operational by ‘late spring,’ a timeline he later described as ‘aspirational. However, with construction still ongoing, the Sky moved the target opening to November and decided not to move in during the 2026 season. Until then, the Sky are expected to practice primarily at Wintrust Arena, where the team plays its home games.
According to Fox, the team would be “ahead of many, many teams in this league that don’t have” an updated training facility, but unlike those teams, the Sky have spent the season rotating among temporary practice sites. Still, if the team does stick to the November timeline, they would actually be ahead of teams like the Dallas Wings, Los Angeles Sparks, Indiana Fever, and New York Liberty, which also have new practice-facility projects scheduled for the 2027 season.
According to a report from FOS, the team even paid $160,000 to the University of Illinois in Chicago to use their facilities between April and May this year.
“When I went to Seattle, we were in the process of building a practice facility. Same with Phoenix,” Diggins added.
“I understand how those things go as far as delays or whatever the case may be… So it’s hard to say what I would have done if I knew, and to speculate, I’m sure we could sit here and play hypotheticals. But I’ll be looking forward to it next year. It is something that we need… No shade, but you know we need resources. Leading the league in injuries, I think it’s not coincidental.”
Diggins isn’t wrong. According to an injury tracker from IX Sports, the Sky leads the league in games missed due to injury with 123, something that the facility should be able to help with. Diggins and the team are expected to tour the Bedford Park facility next week to see how much progress has been made.
“I expect that next year, we won’t lead the league in games missed to injuries,” Diggins said. “And we’ll be able to put together the full vision of what we wanted it to look like with all those resources.”
With Diggins expecting to return to the Sky in 2027, only time will tell whether the team will be able to meet her expectations next season.