Paige Buecker’s welcome to the WNBA has been far from perfect. The Wings have gone 1-7 to start the season. Adding to their woes, Bueckers has missed the last two games while sidelined by concussion protocol. Despite Coach Koclanes’ clear message after the loss to the Chicago Sky last week, “We want everyone to be hunting…we want everyone to be aggressive,” the team struggles continued. The Wings lost to a determined Seattle Storm 77-83.

This loss will definitely sting for the Wings. Despite being down by 10 points for much of the game, they were within reach, until the Storm unleashed an unstoppable 18-2 run in the final quarter. Without stars like Paige Bueckers and Tyasha Harris, the Wings had a golden opportunity to pull off the upset, but unfortunately, it just wasn’t their night.

With both guards out, players like DiJonai Carrington have had to step up, but the team’s chemistry is still a work in progress, with sources close to the team noting the challenge of staying positive after so many close losses.

Coach Koclanes, who previously served as a defensive coordinator for the Los Angeles Sparks and Connecticut Sun, has found himself under fire this season after starting the season with a 1-7 record. But after another heartbreaking loss, even he couldn’t help but feel for his team.

Speaking at the postgame press conference, he said, “We were relentless attacking the paint but missed a bunch, and then that kind of led to some easy offense the other way. We talked about crashing consistently on the offensive end, and defensively gang rebounding. Our effort to the glass was fantastic… we got enough shots on the rim to win that game. More will go in the future and we’ll be alright.”

Despite missing key guards in Paige Bueckers and Tyasha Harris, this was one of the more promising performances by the Wings. They dominated the glass, out-rebounding the Storm 48-31 and outscoring them 44-38 in the paint. But without Bueckers running the show, their shooting struggles remained. The Wings finished the night shooting just 34.9% from the field where as the Storm shot a sharp 48.4%. And that ultimately proved to be the difference. But despite the result, DiJonai Carrington chose to focus on the positives, just like the head coach. Let’s take a look at what she had to say!

Paige Bueckers’ teammate chooses to focus on the positives

Carrington put on a show, leading the Wings with 22 points, eight rebounds, and four assists. She did everything she could to keep her team in it, but despite holding the lead deep into the fourth quarter, her performance wasn’t enough to help guide the Wings over the finishing line. Despite the tough result, DiJonai chose to focus on the positives.

In the postgame conference, she said, “Each game, we’re getting more comfortable playing together, I think you can see that with less and less turnovers…the other positive is we had 20 OBoards…we were still crashing the boards hard.” 

Now that the Storm game is behind them, all eyes now turn to Paige Bueckers’ status. She’s expected to be re-evaluated soon, and there’s a real chance she could return for the Wings’ upcoming clash against the Los Angeles Sparks. Her return would be a huge boost for the struggling Wings, but will it be the spark they need to finally get back to winning ways? Stay tuned to find out!