Courtney Vandersloot never really left Chicago.
When she exited in 2022, the change was a necessity. The last two years with the New York Liberty lifted Vandersloot to a new level of competition. But part of her was always stuck on the Sky, the team that drafted her in 2011, where she met her wife, won her first title and grew into the person and player she is today.
And this year, Vandersloot is coming home — even though she knows it won’t be the same. At all.
No players remain from Sky’s 2022 roster. The team has a new coach and new general manager. The Sky brought in new investors and broke ground on a new training facility. And the team has exploded in popularity due to drafting stars Kamilla Cardoso and Angel Reese, selling out Wintrust Arena throughout the 2024 season and preparing to host games this season at the United Center for the first time in team history.
This is what Vandersloot wanted. The guard is trying to go forward, not back to a past version of herself. And signing with the Sky is a fresh start, even if it’s happening in a familiar place.
“Chicago has a big part — like, a huge part — of my heart,” Vandersloot told the Tribune. “I was always very cognizant of what was going on there because I want the Chicago Sky to be successful whether I’m there or not. But this is another new place. It’s never going to be the same as it was — and that’s OK.”
By the end of the 2024 season, Vandersloot knew she couldn’t stay in New York.
It was a hard year. She spent nearly a quarter of the season away from the Liberty to be with her mother, Jan, who died in mid-June after a two-year battle with advanced multiple myeloma. When Vandersloot returned, heavy with grief, she returned to her starting point guard role. But things were different.
Vandersloot’s 3-point shooting dipped to a career low. Her assists were down too. And at the start of the playoffs, the Liberty quietly benched Vandersloot in favor of 25-year-old forward Leonie Fiebich, opting to play without a point guard in the starting lineup.
It hurt. Even another WNBA title wasn’t enough to offset the clear pendulum swing in how the Liberty were prioritizing Vandersloot.
Vandersloot didn’t know her role. She hated being benched. And there’s no good way to convince a starter — especially one like Vandersloot, a five-time All-Star with multiple WNBA assists records — that moving to the bench is the best path forward.
Liberty coach Sandy Brondello regularly praised Vandersloot for the humility with which she navigated her changing role. But in the offseason, it became clear to Vandersloot that the Liberty no longer saw her as their starting point guard.
“I still felt like I had a lot to give,” Vandersloot said. “I want to be on the floor, I want to play to my strengths and I want to be the player that I’ve been in this league for a really long time. If I wasn’t going to be able to be that player that I wanted to be, I wanted to go somewhere else.”
Vandersloot didn’t want her free-agency decision to be driven by nostalgia.
Sure, she missed Chicago and the Sky. But Vandersloot left in 2022 for a reason. The team was falling apart by her last season, both on the court and in the front office. The Sky had turned into a place where Vandersloot felt she could no longer grow.
Vandersloot already knew what to expect from general manager Jeff Pagliocca, who had spent long hours in the gym forging a relationship with her and her wife, Allie Quigley, over the last decade as an offseason trainer. But it was new coach Tyler Marsh who truly convinced Vandersloot to return to Chicago.
Marsh was insistent there was still more to unlock in Vandersloot — even at 36, even in Year 15 in the league. As a first-year WNBA coach, Marsh believed that Vandersloot was the right person to write the next chapter for the franchise.
“I think he sees me as the best version of myself,” Vandersloot said. “I can make people around me a lot better, but I have to be in a really good situation. Tyler has created that.”
Choosing a new home wasn’t Vandersloot’s only decision. In joining Unrivaled, Vandersloot was focused on one priority: growing her game in the offseason.
There was nothing left for her in Europe, where she won the EuroLeague three times for an overseas club in every offseason from 2011-23. Vandersloot didn’t want to be stagnant. And she also needed to figure out a better offseason training regimen.
After being forced to leave her longtime team, UMMC Ekaterinburg, due to the Russian invasion of Ukraine in 2022, Vandersloot tried a few seasons in Turkey with Sopron and Fenerbahçe. But in 2024, she tried to rest in the offseason.
It didn’t work. Vandersloot is known to be a certified gym rat, a player who shows up to practice an hour early and lifts on game days. That type of singular focus didn’t pair well with a solo training plan. Her body felt awful at the start of the WNBA season — and it showed.
“Offseasons were hard for me these last couple of years not playing overseas,” Vandersloot said. “I was really trying to keep my body in a really hard shape without playing games. It was really hard to grow. I felt like I was almost just beating myself up.”
Unrivaled offered her a better balance. Vandersloot feels confident in her physical fitness: strong, well-rested, sharp on the ball. Of course, the warm weather in Miami didn’t hurt.
“Being in Chicago in February would hurt my joints,” Vandersloot joked.
But on the court, Unrivaled was a different challenge. Vandersloot had never seriously competed in a 3-on-3 format and she quickly learned it was a difficult setting for a pass-first point guard.
Opponents were opting for a switch-heavy defense or utilizing drop coverage to shut off passing lanes. And with only two teammates available, Vandersloot couldn’t lean on the facilitating psyche that always has driven her style of play.
“I had to find my score-first mentality,” Vandersloot said. “You’ve got to be attacking and looking to score, because if you’re looking to make the extra pass — it’s not there.”
Vandersloot’s Unrivaled season ended last weekend after her club, Mist, was eliminated from playoff contention. The guard’s focus is now firmly on establishing a new culture in Chicago centered on young stars Cardoso and Reese — the frontcourt pairing that played a crucial part in Vandersloot’s Sky recruitment.
For every strength Vandersloot scouted on the duo as an opponent — Cardoso’s surprising speed, Reese’s defensive instincts — she also saw a slew of improvements she hoped to instill in both rookies.
Vandersloot wants to be the veteran who rewards Cardoso’s high seals with pinpoint over-the-top lobs and builds more efficient finishing opportunities for Reese at the rim. She wants to teach both bigs how to maximize their screening angles to find creases in the defense, exploiting opposing defenses with a relentless pick-and-roll attack.
There’s work to do. Marsh and Pagliocca spent the offseason stocking up on 3-point shooters who can counter the spacing problems inherent in any roster centered on two bigs. And it will be up to Vandersloot to forge balance in the offense.
But Vandersloot has never worried about the work. This is the new challenge she has embraced — molding the next era of Sky players into a truly competitive roster.
“Being able to play with two young future superstars, as a point guard, I just loved what they both brought,” Vandersloot said. “I think they could help me as much as I feel like I can help them.”
Vandersloot knows this year will be different. The Sky are trying to change for the better — and Vandersloot hopes to change with her team.
But some things never changed. The fans. The walk from the locker room to the court at Wintrust Arena, her wife’s DePaul jersey hanging in the rafters. The memory of carrying the WNBA trophy through Millennium Park.
And Vandersloot? Even after two years away, she believes the Sky already know exactly what to expect from their new — and old — starting point guard.
“I was there for so long,” Vandersloot said. “I was so young at the start and then I grew up and became an adult there. It’s been a couple years and I’m a little older now, I guess, but I still feel the same. I still have a lot to give. It’s going to be the same old Sloot.”
