Love her or hate her, nobody in the WNBA can deny Paige Bueckers is a legend in the making. Even with her team out of playoff contention, her performances command attention. From routinely posting double-digit scoring nights to her explosive 44-point masterpiece against the Sparks, Bueckers has proven she can dominate at will, ensuring the spotlight never drifts far from her game.

However, a WNBA reporter believes this has overshadowed the coverage of an ex-championship winning team. The team in question? Angel Reese’s Chicago Sky. Undeniably, the Sky are having a strange season. They can defeat powerhouses like Minnesota and New York, but then fall into a downward spiral of nine-game losses. But the reporter believes this is not being discussed as heavily as it should be.

ESPN’s Kendra Andrews made this admission on The Women’s Hoops Show alongside Jordan Robinson. “I don’t know what’s going on in Chicago. I don’t have the answer. But I just think it’s one of those teams that we thought would take steps forward, and they’re in the bottom three. I think one of the reasons we don’t talk about them all that much is because Connecticut has a whole lot going on around them, and Dallas has a lot going on around them, too…They have Paige Bueckers, who has been absolutely incredible. As bad as they have been, you pay attention for those reasons [to Dallas], but Chicago’s been like sneaky bad,” she said.

The WNBA reporter stated that before the start of the season, she was expecting Chicago to make the playoffs while sitting in sixth spot on the leaderboard. Her reasoning? Angel Reese and Kamilla Cardoso each had a season under their belt and will be lethal under the rim. They also added veteran Courtney Vandersloot back to the roster. Furthermore, they added promising rookie guard Hailey Van Lith this season. She averaged 17.9 PPG and 5.4 APG in her senior year. But the team could not convert the promise they had on paper into reality.

However, Andrews did add a silver lining for the Chicago roster. “I feel like in some areas, before Angel missed a couple of games with her back injuries, she was doing very well. Her rebounding has been tremendous. The thing that I’ve been most impressed with her from this season is that she’s increased her facilitating a little bit,” she said. This adaptability was recently pointed out by a veteran WNBA coach, who wants another Sky player to take this responsibility.

WNBA Coach Wants Sky Players to Evolve Into a Paige Bueckers-Esque Role

With veteran guard Courtney Vandersloot out for the season, it looks like Reese has stepped up to the position of helping out. However, the Aces head coach Becky Hammon believes Kamilla Cardoso should also add this skill to her resume. Before the Las Vegas vs Chicago game, the veteran WNBA coach said, “I think her [Cardoso] development, and also Angel’s development, is coming into more of a point forward [role]. I think her playmaking ability is really what could set her apart. We talk about rebounds being her thing. But if she gets into that mode, she could be a real problem.”

Having a double role of leading the offense and facilitating teammates, something Paige Bueckers constantly does, will elevate the game of the Brazilian center. It looks like Cardoso has already begun doing that. In the last ten games, Cardoso has been the assist leader for her team in six games. In their latest win against New York, it was a Kamilla Cardoso show for the Chicago Sky. Cardoso had 22 points, grabbed 15 rebounds, and dished out 5 assists, the joint-highest on her team during that game.

On the other hand, Bueckers is slipping in this role. In her last two games, both her assists and offense took a hit. She managed to get only 20 points and 9 assists combined, far below the standard she has set for herself. While Cardoso may have taken a page out of Bueckers’ playbook, the reality remains that both teams are out of the playoff race. The only thing the two players can do now is elevate their game this season and come back stronger in the 2026 season.