Liberty star Sabrina Ionescu never had a game like Saturday’s 85-66 win against the Chicago Sky.
Ionescu couldn’t hit the ground if she fell out of bed. Shot after shot rattled the rim.
She missed all 10 of her field goal attempts, including seven inside the arc. It was her first game without a field goal since May 11, 2022, and the fifth all time.
Saturday set a personal record for her most field goal attempts without a make in her WNBA career.
Ionescu’s lone two points came from the free-throw line.
At some point, Ionescu said, one can’t help but laugh.
“It’s not that big of a deal to me,” she insisted after her uncharacteristic performance. “I know who I am. I know what I’m able to do. Kind of felt like the ball was allergic to the rim there for me. Like it’s literally just toilet-bowling out. I’m not really understanding. They’re not bad misses. They’re just literally popping out, so sometimes you just gotta laugh and shake it off.”
Of course, she impacts the game far beyond her scoring. She’s a solid screen setter and keeps her Jupiter-like gravitational pull even when she’s gone cold as a shooter. She’s also one of the league’s better rebounding guards.
Against the Sky, Ionescu had five boards and four assists.
But her struggles to put the ball in the basket as of late have been startling.
Ionescu has gone 8-for-53 from deep over eight games entering the FIBA World Cup break.
The personal skid started on the eve of USA Basketball’s roster announcement, in which Ionescu didn’t make the cut.
Ionescu said she is dealing with “nothing more” than the general wear and tear of a 44-game season, though she also hinted that she might still be dealing with a back issue that sidelined her for seven games.
She’s welcoming the nearly three-week pause in the Liberty schedule for the World Cup as a chance to get her legs fresh ahead of a four-game playoff push on the other side.
“Obviously with a back injury, that’s something that is always there,” Ionescu said. “Definitely nothing more than what it has been, but will obviously take the break that I get to just rest and really use the time to have my back feeling really good.”
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It’s been a tough season for Ionescu, who missed 12 of the Liberty’s first 13 games due to injuries.
She’s averaging 15.6 points on 12.8 field goal attempts per game, her lowest marks since 2021. Her four rebounds per game are a career low.
The Liberty remain as confident in Ionescu as she is in herself.
“I know she’s gonna put the work in and she’s gonna be fine,” coach Chris DeMarco said. “Today, bad shooting night, fine. She did some other things that really helped us. … But the work’s undefeated and she’s going to put the work in. So I never worry about Sabrina.”
Breanna Stewart and Jonquel Jones aren’t worried about their fellow star either.
“We believe in her,” Jones said. “Every time it goes up, whether it goes in or not, I feel like it’s going in because that’s how much I believe in her. So the love doesn’t change, the energy doesn’t change, none of that stuff changes, and she knows that.”
“Continue to kind of give Sab confidence,” Stewart said, “… letting her know when they’re great shots, and for her to just continue to keep shooting. I feel like when you’re struggling to hit, it feels like you can’t do anything, and to have people in your circle or in your corner, bring you back and show you that it’s gonna be something minor over the course of this entire season.”
