If you woke up early enough for the 9:00 am PST tip, you watched the Seattle Storm and Chicago Sky (-2.5) play an incredible game of basketball this morning.
Seattle’s early lead showed a glimpse of how its style of play could be poison for this Chicago defense until the Sky made some adjustments and battled back to an impressive 78-74 victory.
From the Storm’s Big 3 to Chicago’s championship roster, the immense amount of talent that took the floor was enough to tune in for. But actually watching these two squads match up with one another for 40 minutes led me to wonder if they will inevitably meet in the WNBA Finals.
With their 5th straight win, the @chicagosky have clinched their playoff spot 👏 pic.twitter.com/ps97R9GnEK
— WNBA (@WNBA) July 20, 2022
The cases for each are obvious. Chicago won the 2021 WNBA championship and has only proceeded to get better. The Sky lost Diamond DeShields and Stefanie Dolson during free agency but added potential Sixth Woman of the Year candidate Rebekkah Gardner and former 2019 Finals MVP Emma Meesseman, who have both fit like a glove.
And Wednesday morning’s win over the Storm pulled them two games ahead of second place in the WNBA standings, making the Sky are pretty safe bet (+200 at Tipico Sportsbook) to repeat.
Seattle’s odds are longer at +380, but there’s reason to expect them back in the Finals. As we know, Seattle’s Big 3 has two WNBA championships and no postseason series losses when its core of Sue Bird, Breanna Stewart and Jewell Loyd are healthy and able to finish the season. Now with the emergence of Ezi Magbegor and the addition of Tina Charles, head coach Noelle Quinn has a lot of lineup versatility.
But should these two teams ultimately meet on the biggest stage, it won’t be a cakewalk for either.
Both the Sky and Storm have 1-1 series splits with the Las Vegas Aces (+155), who own the No. 2 spot in the standings, while the Sky have two wins over No. 3 Connecticut (+450) and Seattle has two losses. And that’s before throwing the fifth-seeded Washington Mystics in the mix who have the bulk of their 2019 championship core intact, plus other proven players with championship experience.
Playoff matchups will likely give us a better idea of what could realistically happen. So, as each team has about 10 or so games remaining before the regular season ends, the last few weeks of the year will be something worth paying extreme attention to.
Y’all ready for August?
