Through the first quarter, it looked like Dallas had it under control. However, heading into the third, down by 11, they kept slipping further. By the end of the night, the Aces splashed 18 triples (the most ever by a Wings opponent and the second-most in WNBA regular season history) and Vegas walked away with a clean 106-87 sweep right out from under Dallas’ feet. Even Paige Bueckers’ steady streak of double-digit scoring nights (now up to 28) couldn’t really wrestle back the spotlight from a certain three-time MVP.
It was A’ja Wilson who turned the evening into her own showcase with 34 game-high points. Now, while that left Bueckers diagnosing Dallas’ defensive flaws postgame, it also meant that a career-best night from Maddy Siegrist was reduced to a footnote. Siegrist poured in 23 points on 11-of-15 shooting, grabbing six rebounds with two steals and two blocks. However, instead of basking in her breakout, she gave her postgame breath to A’ja Wilson.
“An unbelievable player,” Siegrist said. “Whether you guard her one-on-one or with two people, she’s going to consistently shoot over the top. We just have to do a better job limiting her touches. When she catches it on the low or mid-range like that, there’s not much you can do.” Not much you can do – but Paige Bueckers didn’t feel so. When asked what Dallas could improve defensively, she had a checklist ready.
“Limiting free throw attempts, limiting threes,” Bueckers said in a postgame interview. It’s a fitting call, considering that Vegas went 18-for-34 from deep while Dallas limped to 3-for-17. It is a gap too wide to call competitive, too lopsided to call a stat. Paige Bueckers added, “I thought we did a decent job of keeping them out of the paint, but they got too many threes.” And she wasn’t wrong here: the Wings owned the glass 37–28.
Jun 27, 2025; Dallas, Texas, USA; Dallas Wings guard Paige Bueckers (5) huddles with her teammates during the game between the Dallas Wings and the Indiana Fever at the American Airlines Center. Mandatory Credit: Jerome Miron-Imagn Images
However, in the W, unless you control the whole hardwood, the game isn’t yours to keep. Her final verdict was blunt. “So being able to keep people in front, not having to be in a constant rotation and scramble. That leads to open threes, and not being so deep in the nail and in help positions, and just really paying more attention to the three-point line.” Was she hinting at a deeper rotational problem here? Could this be less about the players and more about first-year head coach Chris Koclanes’ system?
If so, is the locker room starting to turn on him and side with legends like Sheryl Swoopes, questioning the hire?
Paige Bueckers’ Coach on the Hot Seat
On her podcast Levels to This, Sheryl Swoopes didn’t hold back about what’s been obvious to everyone watching. “There’s so many times I look at this team in the timeout huddle, and they all look confused,” she said. And she’s right, just take the July 25 game against the Valkyries. Dallas was down six with 59 seconds left. To fix that, Chris Koclanes called a play, but instead of rallying the team, it just left them lost.
Through it all, Paige Bueckers’ face showed pure uncertainty. While Haley Jones’ wide-eyed stare said it all. Just seconds later, the Wings fell apart and lost by double digits. Sheryl Swoopes says those confused reactions aren’t a one-time thing. “Like, what did you just say? What are you trying to tell us? What do you want us to do?—and that’s just not a good look,” she explained. Then she dropped the hardest truth: “I can’t tell you how many times I watched the game, looked into the huddle, and saw Paige Bueckers’ face like… I’m not sure what that is. I’m just gonna do my own thing.”
That’s the reality she’s describing. The Wings are not just a team in trouble, but players are looking to their coach and finding no answers. Remember Dallas’ recent five-game losing streak? Through it all, first-year head coach Chris Koclanes took most of the blame, even walking off the court to fans chanting, “We want Nola!.” The fans were basically begging for assistant coach Nola Henry to take over.
Chris Koclanes has also admitted that it’s been rough. “Stepping into this leadership role, [I’m] being challenged to step outside of character at times, figuring out when to hold people accountable in different ways, when to discipline differently—so I’m learning,” he said. But for the Wings, that learning process is crashing into a season that’s slipping away fast.
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