Breaking down the stats of WNBA power couples.
The women’s basketball world was abuzz with the official marking of the marriage between Courtney Vandersloot and Allie Quigley, a pair of Chicago Sky stars and backcourt mates.
While celebrating two of the league’s most popular players in their moment of happiness, I got to wondering about something beyond the way they will navigate building a life together.
I wondered how they match up to some other married couples in WNBA history, statistically.
Let’s take a closer look, shall we?
How can we put a value on a marriage, really? Who can say what love is worth, what a life shared is valued at?
Well, we can’t, not off the court. But there is win shares for when WNBA married couples are on it.
As of today, Vandersloot and Quigley have accumulated 23 win shares—15 for Vandersloot, 8 for Quigley. It’s an impressive number, 23 more than most married couples.
But it trails Candice Dupree and DeWanna Bonner. Dupree is at 11.3 win shares for her career, and Bonner tops Vandersloot-Quigley union all by herself, at 34.8.
And even that duo, which is somehow playing at an elite level in the WNBA while raising twins and living in separate cities (none of which, alas, counts toward the win shares stat), train the duo that is Diana Taurasi and Penny Taylor. Taurasi has 65.7 career win shares all by herself, while Taylor totaled 49 in a career that lasted until 2016.
WIN SHARES, MARRIED WNBA COUPLES
- Taurasi-Taylor, 114.7
- Bonner-Dupree, 46.1
- Vandersloot-Quigley, 23.0
There is good news for the newly-betrothed Chicago duo, however. Taylor is already retired, Taurasi will presumably stop playing at some point and is 36, Dupree is 34 and Bonner is 31. Meanwhile, Quigley is 32 and Vandersloot just 29, so an extended run by both of them could eat into the gap considerably.
Taurasi’s longevity and prolific work alone makes it hard to reach the summit on any of these married lists that involve counting stats, but there is a pathway forward on the question that ultimately defines any marriage: accuracy from three-point range.
As of now, Taurasi is at 36.9 percent for her career from long distance, an impressive number even before accounting for the fact that she’s done it with incredible volume, making the most threes in WNBA history. Taylor is actually even better by percentage, 38.2 percent in her career, though in considerably fewer attempts.
However, the two-time reiging three-point contest champion, Quigley, is at 38.8 percent for her career, and posted 43 and 42 percent marks from deep over her last two seasons.
Vandersloot is a career 35 percent shooter from three, but shot 39.8 percent last season.
In this way, both couples exceed Bonner (30.6 percent career from three) and Dupree (27.4 percent from three).
THREE-POINT ACCURACY, MARRIED WNBA COUPLES
- Taylor-Taurasi, 37.3%
- Vandersloot-Quigley, 37.2%
- Dupree-Bonner, 30.3%
That’s a lot of pressure on Diana Taurasi to carry forward the long-range accuracy title of her family all by herself. Something tells me she’s up for the challenge, though.
So as the newly-married duo in Chicago plans their life together, there are many details to sort through, not least of which is the fact that both of them are free agents this winter.
But as they navigate the challenges of sharing a life and the unforgiving back-to-backs of WNBA scheduling, they can measure their progress against those other couples in the league.