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The more things change, the more they remain the same. The Los Angeles Sparks have returned to WNBA action, and while they have Dearica Hamby back with a bronze medal from her 3×3 play, Stephanie Talbot bringing a bronze medal from her 5×5 performance with Australia and Sparks head coach Curt Miller helping Team USA earn a 5×5 gold medal, that glory has not transferred to the W.
Instead, Los Angeles has three-straight losses since returning from the break and is now 6-21, tied for the worst record in the league. Here is the good, bad and ugly happening with the Sparks:
The Good
The losses are stacking, but so are Rickea Jackson’s stellar performances. Over the past three games, Jackson has averaged a team-high 13.6 points and 3.3 rebounds. As part of a rookie class that includes generational talents like Caitlin Clark and Angel Reese, Jackson is making the argument that she belongs in the discussion as one of the best new players in the league.
She has exceeded even the most optimistic projections of what she would be in Los Angeles, and if Jackson can keep up this level of play, she might be the best player on this team right now.
The Bad
With a 40-game season spread across five months, injuries to key players kill a team’s potential more than anything else. And while no one wants to hear about injuries, it’s hard not to focus on them when a team is missing four rotation players. While Cameron Brink is out for the rest of the season with a torn ACL, not having Aari McDonald (right foot injury), Lexie Brown (Crohn’s disease) or Layshia Clarendon (mental health reasons) means the Sparks have been forced to sign players on hardship contracts to put a decent team on the floor.
Los Angeles has started Crystal Dangerfield the last two games and she’s played well, fighting for a permanent home in the WNBA. The Sparks also brought in Odyssey Sims on a 7-day contract and she’s tried to contribute over the last couple of games, despite not knowing the offense and playing immediately after landing in Southern California.
“Our two point guards, at the highest level, don’t know the plays” Curt Miller speaking on his guards Crystal Dangerfield and Odyssey Sims being on seven-day contracts
— Edwin Garcia (@ECreates88) August 17, 2024
The injury situation is bad in LA. Hopefully, it will improve so the team can be closer to what they imagined they’d be when they constructed this team at the start of the year.
The Ugly
The offense has been tough to watch for long stretches all season long. The New York Liberty embarrassed the Sparks, beating them by 35 points with LA only producing 68 points at home. The following game against the Chicago Sky was better, but the offense still was not great. They began the game with a 24-second shot clock violation and allowed Chicago to go on a 7-0 run to start the fourth quarter. This decimated their lead and ultimately cost them the game. In that closing quarter, the Sparks only scored 12 points. It was a similar story against the Las Vegas Aces as it was against the Liberty. The Sparks scored only 71 points and lost by double figures.
On the season, the Sparks’ offensive rating is 86.8, the second-lowest in the WNBA. The franchise also is scoring the second-fewest points per game, averaging 78.5 points in each contest. Offense isn’t the end all be all, but if you can’t score, you can’t win. This team hasn’t been able to get production, particularly from its guards, all year.
That’s a bit of a personnel issue, but some of it also falls on the coaching and management. You can’t have multiple stretches in each game where the team fails to score a field goal and expect to have a successful team. Fans should keep an eye on how the offense develops and improves the rest of the way because I believe they still have enough quality on the floor to not be among the league’s worst in this category.
The uncomfortable truth is that a combination of injuries, youth and a talent gap means the Sparks will continue to lose more than they’ll win for the rest of 2024. Thanks to the trio of Hamby, Brink and Jackson, the franchise has an optimistic future. For now, they must weather this storm until the season ends, at which point they can address some of these issues. While there is still a mathematical possibility the Sparks can make the postseason, that will disappear if they continue to lose, and it’ll be “tank for Paige Bueckers” time. However, I don’t know how much different that would look compared to what we are seeing in Los Angeles now.