2024 WNBA Season Preview: Seattle Storm
Are Nneka Ogwumike, Jewell Loyd, Skylar Diggins-Smith and Ezi Magbegor the core of the WNBA’s newest super team?
The Seattle Storm had a rough 2023 season, ending the year with an 11-29 record and missing the playoffs for the first time since 2015. Things in the WNBA, however, can change relatively quickly, and with the big free agent signings of Nneka Ogwumike and Skylar Diggins-Smith, as well as new rookie Nika Mühl, the Storm are prepared to come roaring back to dominance.
Star power in Seattle
It starts with the stars for the Storm.
You have the 12-year vet Ogwumike coming off a MVP-caliber season, averaging 19.1 points, 8.8 rebounds and 2.7 assists per game last year with the Los Angeles Sparks. She’s left her only WNBA home of LA for Seattle, looking to continue her legacy. Diggins-Smith had a tumultuous end in Phoenix, but her ability to perform at a high level should not be questioned. In 2022, she scored 19.7 points per game, along with 5.5 assists, and if she can replicate those numbers this season, it will be a lot of sleepless nights for opponents traveling to Seattle.
Don’t call it a comeback; Jewell Loyd has been with the Storm for years. Her role as the leader and bucket getter will continue even with the upgraded roster. In 2023, she not only was an All-Star, but averaged 24.7 points per game trying to will her team to victory. With a few new co-stars, that burden will be much easier to bear and only make Loyd that much harder to guard.
This is a “Big 3,” and one should fully expect them to be a threat to reach the top four in the league, and even have a shot of winning it all if everything breaks right.
Growing pains?
We’ve seen super teams work. But we’ve also seen them implode. The other side of this coin is this team struggles to find its footing. Diggins-Smith could cancel out some of Loyd’s greatness, while time finally catches up to Ogwumike as she begins to descend from her All-WNBA self and turn into a legacy player.
There is a lot of optimism and high hopes for Mühl, but rookies are rookies. Sometimes, they struggle or don’t pan out at all. It’s possible that this superteam experiment is a last-ditch effort to give Loyd a chance at another title that ends in vain, leaving her with two rings.
A Storm likely is coming
But barring injuries or unforeseen circumstances, the Storm are more likely to end the season closer to the top of the standings than the bottom. They have a great nucleus, stars that seem to jell together and everyone on board has something to prove. Ogwumike wants to show she has more left in the tank and can get it done outside of LA. Diggins-Smith wants to remind people how good she is. And Loyd wants to return to postseason action.
If they all buy in, and I expect they will, this will be a team to reckon with this summer.