{"id":739410,"date":"2026-04-19T21:06:25","date_gmt":"2026-04-19T21:06:25","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/739410\/"},"modified":"2026-04-19T21:06:25","modified_gmt":"2026-04-19T21:06:25","slug":"what-we-learned-on-the-1st-day-of-chicago-sky-training-camp","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/739410\/","title":{"rendered":"What we learned on the 1st day of Chicago Sky training camp"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Chicago Sky could be short-handed to start the season.<\/p>\n

The Sky opened training camp Sunday on campus at UIC \u2014 where they will train through the end of May while awaiting the completion of their new Bedford Park training facility<\/a> \u2014 with five key players off the court. Kamilla Cardoso, Elizabeth Williams and DiJonai Carrington have yet to report, while Azur\u00e1 Stevens<\/a> and Maddy Westbeld were in attendance but limited due to injury.<\/p>\n

Cardoso and Williams were both absent from the first day of training camp while completing duties for their overseas teams. Williams played for Galatasaray in the EuroLeague Final in Spain on Sunday, while Cardoso returned home to Brazil for a brief visit after wrapping up her season in China. Coach Tyler Marsh said both players are expected to return \u201cin the next few days\u201d ahead of the first preseason game.<\/p>\n

Carrington was absent while meeting with team doctors to assess a left foot injury that ended her 2025 season prematurely. The guard suffered a severe foot sprain, which sidelined her for the entire offseason. Marsh said the Sky have not yet determined whether Carrington will be available for the first game of the season.<\/p>\n

Marsh declined to offer specifics regarding the lower body injuries nagging Stevens and Westbeld, neither of whom participated in scrimmaging during the final half-hour of training camp made available to the media. Westbeld spent that time on an exercise bike while Stevens sat to the side with guard Courtney Vandersloot, who is still recovering from an ACL injury that occurred last June.<\/p>\n

\n

Chicago Sky invest in their system \u2014 and culture \u2014 by drafting Gabriela Jaquez at No. 5<\/a><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

Vandersloot knows that she will not be available for the Sky\u2019s season opener on May 9, but the guard is still unsure when she will be cleared to return to play.<\/p>\n

\u201cRight now, they\u2019re not trying to put a timeline on it just because they don\u2019t want to put pressure on it,\u201d Vandersloot said. \u201cWe are going to take our time just to make sure that I don\u2019t jeopardize all the work that we put in. I\u2019m definitely going to be on the court this season, so that\u2019s the most exciting target.\u201d<\/p>\n

Facilitating questions<\/p>\n

The Sky recentered their backcourt around veteran point guard Skylar Diggins<\/a>. But with Vandersloot sidelined for the start of the season, it\u2019s unclear who will inherit the responsibilities of a backup on-ball facilitator.<\/p>\n

This isn\u2019t new for the Sky, who have often handled playmaking in recent seasons while putting the ball in the hands of shooting guards. Marsh emphasized that the Sky\u2019s first priority is to keep Diggins available.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe first thing is to keep Skylar on the court,\u201d Marsh said. \u201cWe\u2019ve got to keep her healthy, we\u2019ve got to manage her loads from a training camp standpoint just so she feels fresh going into the season. But after that, it\u2019s going to be all hands on deck.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Sky expect to lean on shooting guards like Hailey Van Lith, Rachel Banham and Jacy Sheldon to handle ball-handling responsibilities this season. Vandersloot also voiced her hope that the Sky will give a longer look to Tonie Morgan \u2014 who the Sky drafted in the third round \u2014 as a potential option for a backup point guard.<\/p>\n

A trip out west<\/p>\n

The Sky will open their preseason game schedule this weekend with a road game in a unique setting \u2014 Sioux Falls, South Dakota.<\/p>\n

The Phoenix Mercury will host the Sky in the preseason friendly. This will mark the first time a WNBA game has ever been played in the state. The game will tip off at 3 p.m. Saturday at the Sanford Pentagon, which typically hosts the Sioux Falls Skyforce (a Miami Heat affiliate) in the NBA\u2019s G League.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Chicago Sky could be short-handed to start the season. The Sky opened training camp Sunday on campus…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":739411,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[49],"tags":[9777,1497,10586,8731,1499,73389,30231,62,67,132,68,232,305100,3357],"class_list":["post-739410","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-wnba","tag-azura-stevens","tag-chicago-sky","tag-courtney-vandersloot","tag-dijonai-carrington","tag-kamilla-cardoso","tag-maddy-westbeld","tag-skylar-diggins","tag-sports","tag-united-states","tag-unitedstates","tag-us","tag-wnba","tag-wnba-training-camp","tag-womens-basketball"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/116433412966058511","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/739410","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=739410"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/739410\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/739411"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=739410"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=739410"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=739410"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}