Aces @ Sun preview: Connecticut hoping Las Vegas continues to struggle

Yeah, there’s no other way to write it, things are baaaad right now for the Las Vegas Aces. I don’t have space for all the advanced stats that are cringeworthy for the two-time champs of the not so distant past, but their -3.4 net rating (combining offensive and defensive efficiency) is currently 10th, behind Washington and Dallas.

The Aces are somehow shooting just 53.8% on layups, by far worst in the league, and just 43.8% on two-point shots in general, also last (just behind the Sun). The defense has been slightly better, but they are still just 12th in the WNBA (14.7% of possessions) at forcing turnovers, meaning there - other than maybe A’ja Wilson - isn't much for Las Vegas to hang their collective hats on this season.

Leila Lacan arrives for her first Connecticut Sun practice.


The Aces are coming off an unmitigated disaster, an 81-54 loss to a Caitlin Clark-less Indiana team Thursday night that saw them with one of the worst shooting performances (16-for-61, 26.2%) in league history and that was with Wilson shooting 9-for-18, so the whole rest of the roster was a laughable 7-for-43.


Thankfully for the Aces, the advanced analytics don’t match their record at the moment, so it doesn’t seem like their playoff chances are in danger, yet. And Las Vegas already traded its 2026 first round pick to Seattle to acquire Jewell Loyd and just this week dealt their 2027 first-rounder to Dallas for NaLyssa Smith, perhaps just throwing anything out there to see if it will work.


If it weren’t for the two games against the Sun this season, Las Vegas’ numbers would look even worse, perhaps by a lot. The Aces beat Connecticut by 25 points at Mohegan Sun Arena in the season’s second contest, then by 26 in Sin City just two weeks ago. They have just one other double digit win this season (by 15 over Los Angeles), but of course, that’s not ridiculously surprising, given the Sun are trending toward being one of the worst teams in WNBA history.


And, as you can see below, the oddsmakers still have a lot of faith in the Aces, even if some others have all but lost hope. But there are still 27 games left to play in the regular season. For both teams. So we’ll see what the final chapters of 2025 will say about them. 


What else can we look for in Leila Lacan’s WNBA debut, finally?:




 

LAS VEGAS ACES @ SUN


Time: Sunday, 4 p.m. EDT


Place: Mohegan Sun Arena; Uncasville, Conn.


Records: Las Vegas 8-9; Connecticut 2-15


TV: WNBA League Pass, NBC Sports Boston


Line: Las Vegas -15.5 (actually down from where it opened) 


Absences: Las Vegas - Megan Gustafson (questionable, leg).

Connecticut - Marina Mabrey (out, knee); Jaelyn Brown (out, illness); Tina Charles (questionable, shoulder).

 

History between them: As mentioned earlier, Las Vegas has won both meetings this season easily. Back on May 20 at Mohegan Sun Arena, the Aces obliterated the Sun 87-62, leading 52-29 at the half and 78-46 after three quarters. It was by far their biggest win of the season to date until June 25 when the Aces scored the first 19 points en route to an 85-59 win. Las Vegas swept all three games last season from Connecticut, but the Sun lead the overall series 33-26 (not all of them as the Aces). However, the Aces won both playoff series, the final in 2022 (in four games) and the semifinal in 2020.


What to look for: Your guess is as good as mine, right? Perhaps no team in WNBA history needed a week off more than the Sun, who could at least recharge their batteries, and add a new player in Lacan they’ve been waiting a long time for. Obviously they haven’t been great at home, but the Sun have generally been more competitive at Mohegan Sun Arena than they have on the road (even if one of the wins came at Indiana).


I didn’t mention Connecticut’s advanced numbers, but, boy are they terrible, especially on offense where the Sun are .079 points per possession worse than anyone else in the league, and without Mabrey, it’s been a mess. Perhaps no one will benefit more from the break than Tina Charles (although she is now questionable with a shoulder injury), and the Sun need the likes of Jacy Sheldon and Bria Hartley to hit some outside shots an open things up a little. 


Las Vegas has looked against Connecticut how they would want to play against everyone else, and Chelsea Gray and Jackie Young have shown spurts of their usual selves, but the Aces have gotten nothing from Kiah Stokes, hence the trade for NaLyssa Smith, which still might help long-term, as ugly as it looks right now. Hopefully for the Sun, it doesn’t pay immediate dividends Sunday.


Key players:  Las Vegas: NaLyssa Smith- Smith finished third in 2022 Rookie of the Year voting (behind Rhyne Howard and Shakira Austin), then averaged 15.5 points and 9.2 rebounds for a bad Indiana team in 2023, but hasn’t really put everything together since. The Aces are hoping to see the form from two years ago, and only time will tell, I guess.


Connecticut: Leila Lacan - Finally, Connecticut’s first-round draft pick from 2024 will make her debut, but it’s easy to set the bar too high here for a 21-year-old (unofficially she’ll be the third youngest player in the league behind Dominique Malonga and Anastasiia Olairi Kosu) who has never played in America. But if she’s here for the long haul - and we hope she is - it will be fun to watch her growth the next two months.


Advanced stat:  32.6% - Usage rate for A’ja Wilson, tops in the WNBA currently, so the offense is still going through her. She is still sixth in the league in win shares (2.5), so the advanced stats say the Aces’ current struggles are not on her.


Tactical spotlight: Both teams have been downright awful against the pick-and-roll in the last few games, but that’s probably more of an issue for the Sun, because they don’t really have a guard capable of running WNBA-level pick-and-roll action at the moment. It’s something you hope Saniya Rivers develops, she has the strength and ability to get to the rim, and has shown it from time to time, just not consistently.


The Sun have done a decent job on Wilson in two meetings, but the others have buried them from the outside, so they have to hope the likes of Loyd and Young go a little colder than they were the first two times.


Inside the numbers: .714 - Regular-season winning percentage for Becky Hammon as a WNBA coach (it’s actually even better in the postseason at .760), so losing is not a thing she is terribly familiar with or likes every much.


Prediction: 80-76 Las Vegas

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