Sky First-Year HC Beats Out Sun Counterpart
Tyler Marsh and Rachid Meziane have a few things in common, aside from having their teams play each other on Wednesday night. The Chicago Sky will play the Connecticut Sun for the second time this season at the Mohegan Sun Arena.
The two WNBA Eastern Conference franchises underwent coaching changes last winter. Though the way it happened differs, both the Sky and the Sun have a male head coach that is new to their sideline this season.
Marsh took over for the fired Teresa Weatherspoon and Meziane replaced Stephanie White following her resignation. Connecticut was a playoff team last year, but after their roster (specifically their starting lineup) got dismantled, Meziane inherited a group with many challenges.
In the case for Marsh, the Sky's front office were more than just playoff hopefuls. After building around both Angel Reese and Kamilla Cardoso, Chicago expected to be doing better than its current 8-23 record. The Sun are 5-26 and in play for the first overall pick in the 2026 WNBA Draft.
Is Tyler Marsh a better coach than Meziane this season?
The Miami native was an assistant coach for the Indiana Pacers of the NBA and the Las Vegas Aces before joining the Sky. Marsh was a part of both champions for the Aces in 2022 and 2023.
That type of caliber and winning culture is what the Sky's general manager Jeff Pagliocca envisioned when he tasked Marsh to take over as the new head coach this season.
Chicago has won consecutive games just twice. With a pair of back-to-back victories this season, the Sky have been riddled with losing streaks. Furthermore, three of those four wins involved were against the Dallas Wings (9-24).
Despite the underwhelming losing record, the Sky are among the league leader's in rebounding. However, they were last year under Weatherspoon.
This year, Chicago has the second-lowest points per game average (75.8) which is only better than the Sun's. The Sky's rank in this category was the same under Weatherspoon, as well.
Connecticut has less wins but all five of theirs have come against teams that are inside the WNBA's top eight teams, including the defending champions, the New York Liberty.
Both teams have 11 losses at home on the year. Only Dallas has a worse mark with 12 such defeats. The Sky and the Sun also went 1-4 in the Commissioner's Cup. Chicago was outscored by 59 points in the five games as Connecticut had an overall point differential of over 105 points in their five games.
One could argue that Marsh is doing slightly better than Mezaine since the Sky's issues have also been injury-related. Courtney Vandersloot went down in May due to an ACL tear. Reese and Ariel Atkins have also missed time because of their own ailments.
While Chicago may not match or do better than last year's mark of 13 wins, they are on pace to exceed Connecticut's win total. The two teams can affect that on Wednesday night. They will also meet twice more, both at Wintrust Arena, before the end of the season.
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My name is Scott Conrad and I am a Contributor for the Chicago Sky with Sports Illustrated.com. I am also a Contributor with FanSided on NinerNoise, as well as Da Windy City. In addition, I am the Site Editor/Expert for The View from Avalon. I spent two seasons (2015 & 2016) with the Tampa Bay Times as a Correspondent covering high school football. I am a two-time published author with more work to come. In my teenage years, I started watching both MLS and WNBA start in 1996 and grow to be the juggernauts they are in their respective sports. Much love to the career on and off the court for fellow-Napervillian and former Sky forward Candace Parker. Outside of the sports journalism world, I am a travel volleyball coach. I accepted the Head Coach position with Greater Cincinnati Volleyball Club for their U13-2 team. In terms of active sports, I play volleyball, soccer, softball, kickball and train in mixed martial arts.