Hailey Van Lith had a strong preseason for the Chicago Sky.
For 1 WNBA guard, getting waived has been a blessing
Just a few weeks ago, Hailey Van Lith was cut by the Chicago Sky. That already looks like a blessing in disguise.
Noa Dalzell is a senior writer covering the WNBA and all of women’s basketball for Breakaway, SB Nation’s women’s sports vertical, as well as the Celtics for CelticsBlog.
But, like many great WNBA players, that didn’t stop her from getting cut after training camp. The Sky wanted to make space for veteran guard Natasha Cloud, and Van Lith, last year’s No. 11 overall pick, was the casualty.
But getting waived has sometimes been a blessing in disguise in the WNBA. Just ask Veronica Burton, who has emerged as one of the league’s best two-way guards on the Golden State Valkyries just two years after getting waived by the Dallas Wings. Or, Betnijah Laney-Hamilton, who was waived in 2017 before eventually becoming an All-Star and WNBA champion. The list of players who got cut from a final roster, only to end up thriving elsewhere, goes on and on.
Van Lith might just be the next great player who got waived only to break out elsewhere eventually. The 24-year-old joined the Connecticut Sun on May 6th and has already broken into the starting lineup. Through 5 games, she’s averaging 11.2 points and 3.2 assists, shooting 57.5% from the field and 53.8% from three.
While the Sun have started the year 0-5, it’s been evident that Van Lith has helped make them better; since moving into the starting lineup, she’s tallied double figures in two consecutive games. And, in Monday’s 83-82 loss to the Portland Fire, Van Lith’s clutch play almost secured the win; she scored back-to-back buckets in the final minute of the ball game, a driving layup with 46 seconds to play, and a stepback jumper with 31 seconds to play that tied the game.
A Sug Sutton floater ultimately gave Portland the win, but it was noteworthy that down the stretch, Van Lith was one of Connecticut’s best offensive options.
The Sun are still winless, but Van Lith noted after the game that they are making progress.
“It sucks to lose this game, because we could have won it if we had stayed within ourselves and executed, so it’s disappointing, but I do think there’s an underlying silver lining to where we’ve made improvements at different things every game,” she said, per Deyscha Smith. “At the end of the day, we have to cross the finish line and get a win, so we can’t keep dragging this out, where we’re letting things slip by. We have to hold each other accountable, and I think we’ve done a good job with that amongst players and coaching staff.”
For Van Lith, the road to the WNBA was a long time coming
Before getting to the WNBA, Van Lith was a standout college basketball player. She spent the first three years of her career at Louisville, her fourth at LSU, and her fifth at TCU. She made the Elite Eight five consecutive times, becoming the first player in NCAA basketball history to do so with three different schools.
Across 172 career collegiate games, she averaged 15.2 points and 3.4 assists.
She averaged 12.4 minutes per game off the bench in her rookie season with the Sky, but never quite found her offensive footing. With Connecticut, she’s already seeing an opportunity that likely wasn’t going to be available in Chicago, where there’s a depth of guards.
But now, in her sophomore campaign in Connecticut, Van Lith is showing flashes of being the same player who routinely dominated in March Madness.
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