Wednesday night, the Toronto Tempo fell 83-75 to the Golden State Valkyries, dropping their third straight game and fourth loss in the last five. While I could come on here and pick apart exactly what went wrong for Toronto, the biggest storyline from this game is that Nyara Sabally left the game with a knee injury and did not return. The hope is that this injury was nothing major and just a minor tweak, but either way it puts a temporary halt to what has been an incredible breakout from Sabally this season.
Excluding last night, given she only saw seven minutes of action, Sabally was averaging 11.9 points, 5.2 rebounds, 1.9 assists, and 2.1 stocks (steals + blocks) per game this season. She’s done all this while being incredibly efficient from the field, converting at a 54.5 percent clip, and showing a bit of an outside game, shooting 33 percent from three. While Sabally hasn’t been an ideal rim protector or paint presence defensively, losing her offensive input will be a massive blow for this Tempo team.
It’s especially a big blow considering that both Brittney Sykes and Kiki Rice are still listed as out with no real return timeline available. Having three key starters out could kill any playoff hope the Tempo have left as they sit a game and a half out of a playoff spot around the midway point of the season.
Sabally’s injury couldn’t have come at a worse time
With Rice and Sykes out, opponents have had one focus: shut down Marina Mabrey. When looking at the Tempo’s roster top to bottom, outside of Sykes, Mabrey is the only player who can consistently drive the offense and create looks for herself and her teammates. This has fueled Toronto's struggles recently, because if you shut down Mabrey, you shut down the Tempo.
With Sabally out, things are only going to get worse because her high-level screen setting was always something the Tempo could rely on to create open looks or free up a guard from the point of attack. If she misses some time with this knee injury, that’s only going to make creating offense harder for a team that has been struggling to do that recently.
All season, Toronto has hung its hat on being a team that won’t get more stops than their opponents, but will try to outshoot and outscore them. On the season, the Tempo have the fifth-highest offensive rating and the third-worst defensive rating.
With their second, third, and fifth-leading scorers all out, that offensive identity is bound to take a massive hit. Considering Toronto doesn’t have any elite defenders, a shift in style of play feels out of the question, putting their hopes of a winning inaugural season in serious jeopardy.
The slide already started when Sykes and Rice both went down, and with Sabally now joining them on the injury report, it doesn’t feel like things will be getting easier anytime soon.
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