2022 WNBA COMMISSIONER'S CUP

July 26, 2022

James Wade

Chicago Sky

Postgame

Las Vegas Aces 93, Chicago Sky 83

Q. Your team came back and won all three quarters after the first, but what was your message to them about coming out and withstanding a punch like that in the first?

JAMES WADE: I think Vegas is too good of a team to get behind like that. I thought we were a little timid. I don't know, it seems like we weren't ready to play at the beginning of the game. That may have been on me.

Q. There was a lot of talk going into this game, there was some concern expressed about Courtney obviously coming off being absent for four games. Were you at all worried about her going into this game?

JAMES WADE: No, no. I knew if we put her in a uniform, she would be ready to play. Up to this point, there's no excuses. She was in a uniform, so it was go time.

Q. Did Courtney say anything about how she was feeling after the game physically?

JAMES WADE: After the game? No, I haven't talked to her after the game, so I'm not sure.

Q. On the court, Rebekah just had another stellar game guarding on the perimeter. How much did that contribute to you all being able to cut the deficit that was 25-4 at one point in the first quarter, down to seven late in the third?

JAMES WADE: Yeah, I mean, it gave us a level of toughness that we needed. Probably should have got her in there a little bit earlier.

Yeah, I guess I've got to find some time for her to really -- especially when it seems like we're lacking some toughness, just got to find minutes for her early and just ride that out.

I really felt like the first quarter put us behind. I don't know when she came in in the first quarter, but I probably put her in a little bit too late.

Q. Would you say the Aces were doing anything on defense in that first quarter that was really giving you all a tough time, and if so, when they do play defense like that, how does that make them that much tougher of a team?

JAMES WADE: No. All respect to Vegas, they're a good team. But I don't know if they did anything to really cause us to play the way we were playing. You can go with it. I can say yes, they did. But they're a great team. They're coached great. It's a great organization. They definitely deserve the Commissioner's Cup. Kudos to them. I hope they have a good flight back, and hopefully it's charter.

Q. It seems like in the three games that you guys have played against the Aces, they have a very similar script as far as them getting off to a hot start and then you guys coming back and back and forth throughout the course of the game. Do you feel like in those games specifically is it more of a thing where you guys need to hit more shots or do you feel like it's more so the defense?

JAMES WADE: I think it's a little bit of everything. We can't give a team 33 points in the first quarter. We've got to score more than 14. We can't start from behind. We have to continue to be persistent and not look for any bailouts and not have expectations coming into the game -- well, we can have expectations, and we know what those expectations are going to be.

We're Chicago Sky, and they're Vegas. That's how it's going to be. That's how it's going to be. That's a big-market team, and we're not. So we can't expect anything going into the game. We just have to grind it out. We have to be Chicago. Just like the city, we have to grind. You can't expect s---. You can't expect s---. Even when stuff, life, doesn't seem fair, s--- doesn't matter, that's when you've got to get tough. And that's what we're going to do. We have to do it because that's the only thing I know. That's the only thing I know. As long as I'm here, that's how I'm going to be.

I might complain about stuff during the game. After the game, it's over. I don't care about what we see as even on both sides. We're not an even team. They're Vegas, and we're Chicago. That's what I want to be because that's the way I was born -- uneven. That's what I'm going to put on this team, that we're going to conquer s--- unevenly, and at the end of the day we'll be standing. So that's how it's got to go.

Q. It seems like you guys are at your best when you're able to force a lot of tough twos. When the team has players that can hit those shots, especially late in the shot clock, does that throw you off of what your alignment is typically?

JAMES WADE: I mean, normally, yeah. But when you have the best three-point shooter in the league getting nine wide-open threes, it's just not anything that we practice or anything that we worked on. You have to have that attention to detail and that sense of urgency because if you give it to them, they're going to take it.

I thought we weren't disciplined. If we were disciplined, you would have seen more of that and less of what you saw tonight early.

Q. I know you're not going to make any kind of excuses, but was there a little bit of aftereffects from the travel on Saturday to New York?

JAMES WADE: What travel?

Q. Then going into the latter seven games of the season, how do you take a game like this outside the regular-season schedule and use that as preparation, as fuel to kind of close things out against a somewhat tough schedule, games against Connecticut and then Las Vegas again?

JAMES WADE: It was a championship game, and we lost. I don't think the schedule is any tougher, though. I don't care who we play. I don't think the schedule is any tougher than whoever anybody else has got, because at the end of the day it's about when I wake up in the morning I look at myself in the mirror. When I go and talk to our team, I look at them.

They have to play us. I don't feel like we came with that approach tonight, because we weren't ourselves in the first quarter, and that was clear.

We'll learn from it. We'll learn from it.