Hi Eric!
My partner and I are Valks founding guard STH and earlier this year we adopted Violet: the name just seemed to fit. Violet doesn’t seem to care much for basketball herself but she tolerates us watching it and leaving her at home to go to the game, as long as we bring back the occasional rally towel for her to use as a blanket. We’re crossing our fingers for the team store to one day start stocking dog jackets in Valks colors.
--Kat G. and Max S.
General offer to Valkyrie Nation: if you send me a tasteful picture of your loved animal, I will add it to the rotation of Game Wrap animal pictures. Please include a couple of sentences about them and how you want your name to appear.
Extra points if they are wearing Valkyries gear, but even without is okay.
No AI please.
Email to apricotan@gmail.com
Always Close Enough To… wait for it… HURT™
It’s okay if you don’t know what all these stats are. My high-strung computer calculates some rough advanced statistics for the game.
Teal = better, blood orange = worse.
And here is a home-grown graph of the game win probability tonight. You can show your heart specialist in the emergency room.
It looks right to me, but if you use this for anything important or anything bad like gambling, then you get what you get.
Q2
6.50. Score is 12-27. I’m never beating the “no notes curse” allegations, am I?
5.59. Well, that’s what happens when you go under the screen. Vandersloot pulls up and fires a three.
3.32. Great pass from THE CHENERAL, but better chasedown block.
3.08. You can hear on the broadcast GSV players yelling to each other that they’re going to a zone, which is a common thing to do to counter after-timeout plays. GSV spent some of their Q1 run in a zone and I’m not sure CHI fully cracked it?
2.41. Oh, those Laeticia Amihere threes feel extra powerful.
The Valkyries are back in their 2-3 zone. Chicago has a play ready to counter it. Sheldon cuts baseline and gets a hammer screen on the defender all the way on the right, but she misses the shot.
1.10. What a difference it makes when Cardoso catches the ball deep in the post versus way out there. When she catches it far away, LA can bump her and threaten to attack her dribble, which discombobulates her enough to miss the layup.
0.40. I think the Valkyries are still in their zone, but I also think they are not 100% every play in the zone, which is good. Keep Chicago guessing.
0.20. Props to Amihere for athletically tracking down that offensive rebound. If she’s on the floor, she’s got to make all the plays that are special to Laeticia and not just try to be a slim version of Kiah Stokes.
Okay, here’s the halftime luck audit. GSV 1-9 from three, which is about 6 points unlucky. CHI 7-16 which is about 3 points lucky. So from one perspective, most of the 12-point lead can be explained by three-point variance. But it’s not a good sign for the Valkyries that they are getting outshot in three-point attempts. That can’t have happened often in franchise history. Also CHI 12th (very bad) at shooting threes, GSV is 7th (mid), so if CHI really wants to get into a three-point contest, then GSV should invite it. This will reduce Chicago exploiting their size advantage inside.
I imagine the second half is gonna look like vigorous Valkyries defense, mixing up zones and double teams and in general just trying to turn over Chicago. If Chicago can avoid the turnovers and have an average offense, then they’ll probably hold on to the lead.
Q3
9.21. That last play would be a fun one to re-watch to see all the Valkyries’ rotations as each player rotates to try to cover the player the previous defender left.
8.40. When do we start believing that Veronica Burton’s new three-point form is real? All hail the teeny tiny hop.
7.33. That was a very wily cut by Vandersloot while Cecilia is looking at the top of the key. Vandersloot sneaks farther away along the arc. By the way, that was the Valkyries sneaking back into their 2-3 zone.
7.24. Gabby and then Veronica taking turns iso-ing Sydney Taylor
7.07. Valkyries stay in the zone. Chicago tries to attack it, this time by flashing Stevens into the soft middle of the zone, where, in theory, she can pass to different cutters. She gives it to Cardoso, who gets either veteran-bumped by Kiah Stokes or Jedi mind-tricked or something, and she misses the layup.
6.40. Veronica isolates Sydney Taylor again. This time, Kiah Stokes’ defender steps over to help, which leaves Kiah open on the arc, which Chicago is certainly not afraid of. Kiah bricks the three.
5.40. That was the ghost screen play where someone, I think Kaila, steps up to set a screen, but she immediately slips the screen instead of holding it. That makes the defense have to make a quick choice. Kaitlyn actually drew two defenders in the paint to come help everyone on the right side of the court, which was open, but Kaitlyn sailed that pass into the stands.
There is a little bit of ambiguity about how to call the zone. Modern zones are so much more complicated than old-time zones. You count down from the top. (Remember from my video that UP always means away from the basket.) There were times when that zone looked like 1-2-2. Nowadays in the WNBA, many teams play a 2-3 zone, but with principles where the sides of the “3” in the corners step up to the wing to prevent 3-pointers from there. At any one snapshot, it could look like a 1-3-1 or 2-3. We’d have to look more carefully at the zone to see if it’s really a separate zone that’s 1-2-2, or whether it’s just the slime mold of the Valkyries defense morphing, while it being the same base defense.
22nbc22 suggests it may be related to the Blizzard zone that VB ran at Northwestern. I’ll have to watch film later as I don’t know that defense. This zone looks a lot to me like the 2-3 Merrimack zone that the Warriors and some other MNBA teams run.
2:47: I love Amihere’s hustle on this play. Kaitlyn’s drive draws the shot blocker, and her own defender gets caught watching the rebound, so LA sneaks in from behind, silent but deadly
HERE COMES THE JA-NERAL
From three: GSV 5-16, CHI 9-23 which means GSV this quarter so far 4-7, CHI 2-7.
1.12: Janelle wanted to post up Rachel Banham so bad on that play. First, she sets a ghost screen to try to get a switch to an even smaller defender, but then her roll gets her very deep position on Banham. She hops with French indignation when she doesn’t get the entry pass. Seals Banham again, gets the entry, and then yells “Trop Petit” in French.
It’s almost exactly what I wrote at halftime: throwing in heavy zones and tempting Chicago into a three-point shooting contest and being extra aggressive to force turnovers and run out. The Valks sweep all the way back to the lead.
0.29. I don’t really know how Janelle got matched up to be defended by Natasha Cloud, but you can see her hold her arms up and move as quietly as she can, almost as if to tiptoe and say, “Be vewwy quiet. I’m hunting Cloud.” Kaitlyn Chen has some good chemistry with Janelle and sees the mismatch. Janelle sets another ghost screen, which lets her roll instantly to the basket. Cloud does not have the size to keep Janelle from getting to the basket, and Banham does not have the speed to get there in time to contest the shot. Gorgeous little play.
Q4
8.50. Another ghost screen from Kaila Charles. These picks are getting extra spooky.
7.50. Ooh, Azurá Stevens with the Hakeem Dream Shake move. Ball fake one way and pulling it back one-handed.
6.41, you know all my careful analysis about three-point probabilities? It’s not really relevant if Rachel Banham starts bombing in threes from everywhere.
5.46. Oh, those Tip Hayes FT misses are going to hurt, but Laeticia Amihere with the beautiful pick two to get it back.
3.40. So no Gabby or Veronica Burton this fourth quarter, right? Gutsy move by Coach Nakase. Okay, Veronica back.
2.10. Time for TV Ballhalla to do the wave. QUIT PLAYING GAMES WITH MY HEART whoa whoa
2.10. Sorry everyone, I didn’t sing hard enough. Challenge to Chicago.
1.57. Wow, LA actually won the tip. JUMP BALL DON’T LIE
ALWAYS
CLOSE
ENOUGH
TO
HURT
(TM)
1.10. OH
MY
GOD
IN
CHENIDARY
DEVICE
0.46. Sorry, I got a little carried away. Let’s go back to the Xs and Os: SALUTE THE LIEUCHENENT WHAT IS HAPPENING
0.15. GSV goes back to the well with Kaitlyn isolating Vandersloot. Miss.
So does CHI go for the last shot, I assume? Ball in the air at the buzzer?
0.00.6. I have to say this was objectively an amazing game and the legend of Sydney Taylor continues. I have to say subjectively... ooooooooooooooof
Last play. That was a cool play, elevator doors screen for Ja. She cuts between Kaitlyn and Kiah and then the two slam together like elevator doors closing. Janelle had a clean look that was on line. Can’t ask for a better opportunity than that.
Coach Nakase postgame
Kenzo: thinking about changing the starting lineup?
Nat: No, it’s something we can fix. It’s about mental focus.
Joseph: Any injury concerns with Gabby or just the rotation?
Nat: No, just played the players that had fresher legs.
If I didn’t include your favorite player, sorry! There are only 5 slots available. Write a tribute comment at Valkyrie Nation instead.
If you don’t know what Discord is, you can ignore this. If you like how the site is now, then don’t worry. This site will still work the same and I’ll still post game previews and wraps over email and the web, etc.
However, if you are wondering where everyone is during game day, it’s the Discord server. For instance, for the IND live game chat, there were 880 messages (that’s a lot, even if 150 of them were Kaitlyn Chen puns).
Basically Discord is a group chat where you can engage with me and other readers. It’s good for conversation that’s a bit more casual than leaving a web site comment. You can also respond with emojis and multimedia.
I have been posting my live game notes in the Discord chat as I write them. I even live-commented the media-coaches game over Discord and answered questions. Questions and comments sometimes turn into things I write about for the newsletter.
For now, I’ll keep it open to everyone, but I reserve the right in the future to restrict it to paying subscribers.
Many thanks to Marisa Emi and Tac0maAr0ma for volunteering to moderate the Discord and generally reorganizing it intelligently.
The invitation link for August: https://discord.gg/3P5XTuwAd
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