WNBA: How High Can The Dallas Wings Fly?

By Andy Lipton

 

The sky is the limit (and no reference to the Chicago Sky is intended).

 

The second half of the WNBA regular season is about to begin. 

 At the end of the first half, the Dallas Wings achieved lift-off and reached a high altitude going 5-1 in their last six games including a win over the team with the best record in the WNBA, and the favorite to win the WNBA Championship, the defending champs, the Las Vegas Aces.  

The one loss in this streak came against the Aces by seven points.  The only other team to beat the Aces this season is the Connecticut Sun, now in third place.

 

Although most of the pre-season attention went to the Las Vegas Aces and the New York Liberty, rightfully so, and who have both lived up to their billings, the Wings have put together a starting five that is very, very formidable.  The talent is palpable.  And there is serious WNBA experience from all five.  

 

Four of the starting five have played for elite college programs with championship expectations and in the case of Natasha Howard, has played on three WNBA championship teams. 

 

And its first-year head coach, Latricia Trammell, has created a culture of excellence with championship expectations while at the same time adding warmth and concern for her players on and off the court.  The players seem to like each other and feel that they have a safe space on the team. 

 

With an overall record of 11-9, the Wings sit at number six in the WNBA standings.

  They are playing old school offensive basketball, with size posting down low and a frenetic pace up and down and east and west.

  They are last in the W in three-point shooting percentage and have one of the lowest shooting percentages in the W ranking number 10, and yet are fourth in the WNBA in scoring and have increased their average amount of shots by five over last season. 

 

They are second in foul shot percentage at 83% and fourth in foul shot attempts per game at 19.7.

 

And although the offense is potent, Coach Trammell considers herself a defensive coach with help principles fundamental to success, but not afraid to go zone at times.

 The team is fourth in the W with the differential of its offensive points over the points given up at 2.8

 

The Wings are fourth in the league in steals per game and have the third best record when it comes to limiting its opponents’ three-point shooting percentage.

 

And they chair the boards, leading the W in rebounds and in limiting their opponents’ rebounding numbers.

 

 

The Starters

 

The front line might be the biggest in the W. 

Center Teaira McCowan is 6’7” and a very difficult person to guard given her size, height and skill down low.   The third overall draft pick in the 2019 WNBA Draft played at Mississippi State where she was an All-American. 

Her college team was one of the best in the country going to the NCAA Championship game twice during her four-year playing career there.

 

Strong forward Natasha Howard at 6’2’’ is in her tenth season in the WNBA and has been on three WNBA championship teams. 

 A former WNBA Defensive Player of the Year, she can  score inside and out, and is incredible physical condition.  

She is also the type of player that would run through a brick wall for her team.  She’s averaging almost 18 points a game this season and is the 7th leading rebounder in the W averaging 8.5 per game.

 

At the three is 6’4” forward Satou Sabally, the second overall pick in the 2020 WNBA Draft. 

 In her fourth season in the W, she is leading the Wings in rebounding at 9.2 per game. And she is averaging 17.6 points a game.

  A smooth ball-handling big who can drive to the hoop, pull up for a mid-range shot or hit the open player.  She was selected to be a starter in the All-Star Game this past weekend.

 

Sabally was an All-American at the University of Oregon, and her teams made the NCAA Tournament’s Elite Eight twice and Final Four once in her three years there.

 

One half of the team’s backcourt is the team’s franchise player, Arike Ogunbowale.  Now in her fifth WNBA season, she is leading the team in scoring with 21.6 points per game, third best in the W.  

 

She also was selected to be a starter in the All-Star Game this past weekend.  She can score from all over the court and has the unique ability to snake her way to the basket on drives and avoid being fouled.

 

She is also in incredible physical condition.

 

The Notre Dame All-American was a 2018 NCAA National Champion winning the championship and semi-final games making long, last second winning shots in each game.  

On the way to that championship, she faced three current teammates as opponents.  Teaira McCowan in the final game, Crystal Dangerfield from UConn in a semi-final game, and Sabally in an Elite Eight game.

 

During training camp, her teammates and coaches were impressed with Ogunbowale’s ability and desire to help the other players.  She seems to be on board with Coach Trammell’s desire to see her add more passing to her game and seems to understand that forcing shots is not in the team’s interest. 

 Her assists are up this season to 4.8 a game from 3.6 a season ago.  In her last game before the All-Star Game, she had a career high 11 assists against the Lynx.

 

She can carry a team in scoring as she showed in the fourth quarter against the Indiana Fever recently, while during that same quarter, passing up scoring opportunities to make good passes. 

 

When all is said and done though, Ogunbowale views herself as a scorer and will not hesitate to take shots that she feels are open shots. Her shots per game at 19.4 are the second highest in the W and are 26.5% of her team’s shots per game compared to 24.9% last season.  Her overall shooting percentage is just 39.3%.

 

The other half of the Wings’ starting backcourt is the WNBA’s 2020 Rookie of the Year Crystal Dangerfield who played at UConn.  She is averaging almost nine points per game and shooting 45% from the field. 

Dangerfield, with speed and quickness, has helped push the team’s offensive pace, can make plays for herself with mid-range pull-up jumpers and drives to the hoop, and can stay with her opponents on defense. Her UConn teams went to the Final Four all three years the NCAA Tournament was held.

 

The Bench

 

Although she is currently in concussion protocol, the 6’7” center Kalani Brown a NCAA National Champion and All-American at Baylor has been a big help to the Wings filling in for McCowan when she missed a number of games while playing in Europe, subbing in for McCowan, and in some situations playing alongside McCowan. 

 Her footwork, her concentration, and physical condition have gotten much better, and she should be an important part of this team in the second half.   Her fun-loving nature, I imagine, adds joy to the team.

 

The 6’6” Awak Kuier, the second overall pick in the 2021 WNBA Draft, has been recently getting more meaningful playing time and expect those minutes to continue while Brown is out, and when Brown comes back, in games where starters on the front line need a rest or are in foul trouble.

 

Second year guard Veronica Burton, a four-year starter at Northwestern, began the season as a starter.  She lost her starting position about a month ago as Crystal Dangerfield flourished and has seen her minutes diminish with the signing of Odyssey Sims.

 

Coach Trammell has expressed confidence in Burton’s shooting ability, but the small number of shots she has taken have not fallen. 

 To her credit, Burton is unselfish.  

She is primarily a playmaker and defender although she was also scorer in college, particularly her junior and senior years. 

In her senior year at Northwestern she led the nation in steals per game and was seventh in assists per game. She is loath to force shots when other Wings players around her have been providing ample scoring.

 

Veteran Odyssey Sims, in her 10th WNBA season, was a NCAA National Champion and All-American at Baylor who signed a rest of the year contract with the Wings in early June after having played a few games with the Wings before that signing.  She provides veteran guard playmaking ability and very good defensive skills.

 

The 6’2” rookie Maddy Siegrist, the nation’s leading college scorer this past season and an All-American out of Villanova, has seen limited playing time averaging about seven and half minutes a game.  

Coach Trammell loves many things about her and believes she will have a good career in the WNBA.  In college, Siegrist was an offensive stalwart, scoring from many different spots on the court and knew how and where to move without the ball, and yet she was very unselfish.

 

Maddy could create shots for herself in college. Often, teammates with lesser scoring abilities made sure to find her in the right spots she put herself in, reducing her need to spend much time dribbling and going one on one.

 

There are many adjustments college players going to the WNBA have to make. That will also depend on the chemistry of the teammates. 

One adjustment for an unselfish player is how to create shots for yourself with confidence when surrounded by players who are veterans who already have that confidence and ability. To some extent that is a challenge that Veronica Burton also faces.  

 

With the Wings, Siegrist has tried to establish a niche by crashing the offensive boards and having a can-do attitude.

 

One way to jump start Maddy Siegrist’s scoring in the second half of the season would be for Coach Trammell to call plays for Siegrist.

 

Maddy will most likely work to get faster and stronger during the offseason, a common theme for WNBA rookies.

 

Injuries have sidelined veteran Diamond DeShields and rookie Lou Lopez Senechal so far this season.

 

Coach Latricia Trammell

 

Although this is Coach Trammell’s first head coaching position in the WNBA, the first-year head coach of the Dallas Wings has plenty of experience and knows the game and her players extremely well.  

 

Coach Trammell was an assistant coach with the Los Angeles Sparks for four years prior to becoming the Wings head coach. 

 She started her coaching career in high school in the mid- 1990s and then moved into college coaching. In her three years as head coach of Oklahoma City University, she led the team to consecutive NAIA (National Association of Intercollegiate Athletics) National Championships in 2014 and 2015 and was the NAIA Coach of the Year both seasons.

 

Along with her skill, work ethic, preparation and competitive nature, Coach Trammell brings joy, warmth, personality, and a caring nature to her team, its fans, and the league.

 

Win or lose, she’s very engaging with the media, open to discussing many topics, and with the utmost respect for the media’s role.  

Befitting a first year WNBA head coach, she is wary of disclosing too much game strategy to the media, but that’s on us to watch the game carefully and understand the game.

 

She cares about her players on and off the court. She understands the fragility of confidence and ego.  She is careful not to criticize her players to the media, often focusing on what they do well.

  She uses the word enhancement to describe what a player needs to work on.

 

It’s easy to envision her in a number of years becoming a leading voice in promoting women’s basketball and the WNBA.

 

 

Second Half of 2023 WNBA Season

 

The Dallas Wings can fly high, but how far can they go?

  Will they have enough fuel to make the landing at their desired destination, winning a WNBA Championship?

 

Agunbowale, Howard, and Sabally have so far played many minutes, averaging 37.2, 33.6, and 32.8 minutes a game, respectively.

 

The Wings play at a very fast offensive pace.  Their defense is geared to helping each other out.  This style of play is physically taxing.

 

If the heavy minutes continue for these three players in the second half, combine that with a long road trip and you have to think that it is wearing for even the best conditioned athletes.

 

Starting on August 18 and ending on September 1, the Wings will be on the road for five out of six games.

 

The counter argument is that every team has to deal with long road trips.

For the five teams ahead of the Wings in the standings, only the Las Vegas Aces have more players averaging over 30 minutes a game, at four.  

But the highest minutes per game for an Aces player is 31.6 minutes.  The New York Liberty has three players averaging over 30 minutes a game.  The Dream has two players over 30 minutes. And the Mystics and Sun each have only one player averaging over 30 minutes a game. 

 

It’s also fair to say that the wearing down of one key player heavily relied on by a team can make a difference in a game.

 

Playoff games tend to be more physically and emotionally taxing than regular season games.  

Will there be enough rest days between playoff games?  

 

For most players with continuously heavy game minutes, it is more likely than not that fatigue will become a factor at some point.  And that often shows up in the last quarter of games.

 

The Dallas Wings have a very good team this season.  Will fatigue play a role in how far they go?