Jose Fernandez didn’t take long to put his team on blast during his first head coaching stint at the WNBA. After the Dallas Wings’ second consecutive loss in the season, Fernandez tore apart his players in the media room. His calling the locker room filled with “selfishness” didn’t sit well with many, including a four-time WNBA champion and Hall of Fame inductee, who has shared her two cents on the matter.
The Hall of Famer in question here is Cynthia Cooper. Speaking on WNBA Nightcap on Prime, Cooper fired back at Fernandez, questioning the credibility of the latter’s statement when the Wings moved the ball so well in the first half. “I wanna say they have 11 assists in the first quarter. How’re you gonna be selfish? 11 on 12 baskets. 22 for the game,” she said.
“I believe at some point Dallas lost control of the game. And because they lost control of the game, they looked for ways out of it. But they’re too young of a team to figure it out all out the way, especially by themselves,” Cooper added. “Accountability is for everyone. Everyone – staff, players, let’s be accountable,”
“There’s selfishness in this locker room. You gotta look in the mirror and be accountable on how you played,” Fernandez had said of his team.
The Dallas Wings tipped off the game quite efficiently. With Jessica Shepard, Paige Bueckers, and Alanna Smith, the ball moved quite well as each movement was met with the desired outcome. The efficiency is also reflected in the results. By the end of the first half, the Wings had a 10-point lead over Minnesota, sitting comfortably.
But once the second half tipped off, the Wings suddenly began to look like a shadow of themselves. The Minnesota Lynx tightened its defense, and, as a result, the Wings’ offensive production dropped.
Fernandez believes his team didn’t move the ball as it should have in the final two quarters of the game. The Wings’ head coach emphasized that in the first half, it didn’t matter to his team who took the shot or scored those points, unlike in the second half.
“11 of the first 12 baskets were assisted,” Fernandez said. “We finished the halftime, we had 16. What did we finish with? 22. So, we go from 16 assists in the first half, 11 in the first quarter to six in the second. Go back and watch the game. The ball didn’t move like it should.”
“The ball moved side-to-side. It didn’t matter who took shots,” Fernandez added further when asked about his team’s ball movement in the first and the second half.
Now, given the Dallas Wings’ performance, Jose Fernandez’s disappointment isn’t unjustified. To give away a 10-point lead in the final two quarters of the game can be frustrating for any coach. But it must be noted that the Wings roster is largely new and young.
For instance, most of its players, like Jessica Shepard, Alanna Smith, and Odyssey Sims, joined the franchise just in the offseason. Thus, the team does need some time to gel together with core players like Paige Bueckers and Arike Ogunbowale in the forefront.
Furthermore, with veteran players like Courtney Williams and Kayla McBride guarding them, it’s never easy to move the ball freely and take shots. It might just be a one-off incident rather than a technical issue with the players’ style of play.
This is what WNBA Hall of Fame Cynthia Cooper was trying to echo in her assessment. And as Cooper stated, it’s also important that the head coach, Jose Fernandez, and his staff take responsibility to ensure that such an incident doesn’t happen going into the season.
But for Fernandez, the offense wasn’t the only thing he had complaints about, and during the press conference, he made sure to touch on those aspects of the game as well.
Jose Fernandez Comments on His Team’s Defensive Struggles Against Minnesota
While the offense struggled mightily, leading to a defeat, the Dallas Wings’ defense wasn’t formidable either. Fernandez’s team allowed around 60% from the field and 46% from the perimeter to Minnesota. These numbers clearly add weight to the fact that their half-court defense and subsequent limiting of the Lynx’s movements had been poor.
“Well, apparently, there wasn’t a lot going on. Because they got everything they wanted,” Fernandez said in the press conference when asked about his team’s defense. “We went up to touch, we went over ball screens, we switched, and we trapped. When things are not going for you offensively, you’ve got to play a lot harder on the defensive end. I think the back row and the rotations hurt us.”
Now, the defensive issues are something that the Dallas Wings have faced since last year. The team had one of the worst defensive ratings in the league (109.1). But with the inclusion of defensive stalwarts like Alanna Smith, it was expected that their situation would improve.
So far this season, the improvement is still a long way off, as the Wings struggled on defense in their last game against the Atlanta Dream. The Wings did have some silver linings to boast of in the game. Paige Bueckers recorded an impressive 27 points and 8 assists in the game. On the other hand, Maddy Siegrist had 17.
But it’s about time now that Jose Fernandez and the Dallas Wings players take a good look at their defensive schemes. With two matches already dropped, the Wings can’t go into a shell for now and will have to showcase their character in both these fronts of the court when they play the Washington Mystics on May 18.
