Locked On Women’s Basketball: All-Star weekend preview, Team Clark vs. Team Collier

“I thought a lot actually about last year’s game, where this Team USA group that had not really played together, it was just like, ‘yeah, you guys figured out right’,” East said. “Like they’re all studs, they’ve all played together at various times before. But I do wonder how much actual chemistry matters in the All-Star game when the rest of your team isn’t chemistry related. Your coach is someone different, and as we’ll get to later, it’s very zany. There’s spots on the floor where you can do different things, and hey, there’s no free throws and lots of other very fun and exciting things. So I think, for the Lynx, and we’ll talk about the Fever too, players who are on the same team because they were drafted by their All-Star, and lots of players are sharing the floor with teammates in this game, if they run a two player action, perhaps there’ll be something to that in terms of the zippiness and the effectiveness of said plays. But I feel like in general, there’s so much newness and freshness [in] this for everybody involved that I don’t know how big of an advantage it is. We’ll see though maybe, like, [Skylar Diggins] and [Nneka Ogwumike] can look great together, or the Mystics rookies are going to be like, ‘oh, look at this!’ I actually kind of hope that’s how the game goes. It’s just like, clear out, get everybody on the same side of the floor as their teammate. Make something happen.”

“Becoming Caitlin Clark” is out now!

Howard Megdal’s newest book is here! “Becoming Caitlin Clark: The Unknown Origin Story of a Modern Basketball Superstar” captures both the historic nature of Clark’s rise and the critical context over the previous century that helped make it possible, including interviews with Clark, Lisa Bluder (who also wrote the foreword), C. Vivian Stringer, Jan Jensen, Molly Kazmer and many others.

Buy it now!

Later on, they discussed who has a shot at winning this year’s Skills Challenge. On Tuesday, the WNBA announced Natasha Cloud, Skylar Diggins, Allisha Gray, Erica Wheeler and Courtney Williams will participate in the challenge.

“Okay, Erica Wheeler’s participation made me smile,” East explained. “Because she was supposed to go to All-Star last year to do the Skills Challenge, and then … there was all this plane power stuff going on, and she was stuck in Atlanta, and everybody’s trying to figure out if they can get her a private charter to get there in time, and Kelsey Mitchell had to fill in for the Skills Challenge. And it’s like, that was nice of Kelsey Mitchell to do obviously, [but] Erica Wheeler was supposed to be there. So I’m excited that in Indy, where she actually became a pretty beloved vet backing up Caitlin Clark last year, and she’s playing quite well for the Storm this year, that’s been a really good fit for her. I hope she makes it, and that she’s able to actually participate this year and give herself a chance to be like, ‘hey, maybe Gray would not be going for a dual repeat if she was there in Phoenix last year.’ So I’m looking forward to the juice that she can provide actually showing up in this. But also, obviously, like seeing the repeats for Gray would be very cool. I think she’s the only player doing both years of this, so that’ll be really fun. But everybody in the skills challenge is a pretty entertaining player, both as a player and as a personality.”

They also touched on the updated rules for the All-Star game itself:

“The four point shot is back, which I’m very excited about,” Heavren said. “And for every at and four-point shot made, AT&T will make a donation to foundations supported by the WNBA and selected by players, which is an even better way to incentivize people to take those four-point shots besides just trying to make the game more fun. I love a four-point shot in an All-Star game or anything similar, and in other sports, it just adds another layer of fun to it.”

“Yeah, that’ll be sweet. I love that there’s multiple spots for it too, like set someone on both of those, pass the ball back and forth until someone’s open, rip a four pointer,” East said. “There has to be one four-pointer in these games. And it’s good that it’s gimmicky to the point that it’s not weird, like, it’s not such a deep three that it feels like ridiculous, and it’s only two spots. But also, if you’re going to do something like that too, great.”

Want even more women’s sports in your inbox?

Subscribe now to The IX Sports and receive our daily women’s sports newsletter covering soccer, tennis, basketball, golf, hockey and gymnastics from our incredible team of writers. That includes Basketball Wednesday from founder and editor Howard Megdal.

Readers of The IX Basketball now save 50% on their subscription to The IX.

Tune in to hear more about this weekend’s upcoming festivities, Heavren and East’s picks for the three-point contest and predictions for who will win the All-Star game itself. Make sure to subscribe to the Locked On Women’s Basketball podcast to keep learning about the WNBA, women’s college basketball, basketball history and much more!