Bullet point summary by AI
- The Las Vegas Aces face a growing challenge as veteran guard Jewell Loyd endures the worst statistical slump of her professional WNBA career.
- Loyd is averaging just 6.3 points on a career-low 32.4 percent shooting, causing a stark -3.0 net rating whenever she takes the court.
- Managing her slump is vital because relying solely on Chennedy Carter’s spark is risky if Carter regresses, threatening the team’s depth.
In 2025, the Las Vegas Aces had a Jewell Loyd problem. Early in the season, the veteran guard just couldn’t seem to get anything going, and she was costing the Aces dearly. So, the team made a change, moving Loyd to the bench. It worked.
One year later, though, Loyd’s back to struggling, and there’s no “move her to the bench” solution, as she’s already coming off the bench. The Aces have a problem, and they don’t have an easy solution.
Jewell Loyd is an issue for the Aces
The numbers before and after Loyd was moved into a sixth player role in 2025 are stark.
|
Loyd’s Role |
Points Per Game |
Field Goal Percentage |
3-Point Percentage |
|---|---|---|---|
|
Starter |
10.4 |
36.3 |
35.4 |
|
Reserve |
12.1 |
42.3 |
40.9 |
It was like Loyd had been reborn with the change in role. Given a chance to be the top scoring threat on the bench unit, we saw a version of Loyd that looked much, much closer to what we saw in her prime with the Seattle Storm. Vegas went on to win the WNBA championship, and it seemed like the team could just keep using Loyd off the bench for another season and things would be fine.
Things have not, in fact, been fine. Loyd is shooting 32.4 percent from the floor, the worst mark of her career by a fairly wide margin, and her 6.3 points per game rank just sixth on the team. What’s more, her on/off numbers are…pretty bad. The Aces have a -3.0 net rating when she’s on the floor, which is 24.6 points per 100 possessions worse than the net rating when she’s off the floor. Loyd’s kind of single-handedly dragging this team down.
What can the Aces do about it? *shrug*
I suppose there’s the option of moving her back into the starting lineup. A change in role worked last year; maybe it will work this year as well? That seems like it carries with it too many concerns, though, about Loyd’s potential to tank the starting unit and destroy some of that chemistry.
You kind of just have to ride it out. Loyd is costing the team, but they’re still mostly doing fine as a team. Maybe she just needs to play through this funk?
At the moment, that’s something that the Aces can afford because they have Chennedy Carter to serve as that scoring sparkplug off the bench. Carter—who didn’t play in 2025—has returned to the league with a fire under her. She’s an elite athlete who can get from one end of the floor to the other faster than you can read this sentence, and her ability to slice to the hoop and finish is absurd considering her size.
Carter opens up a lot of possibilities for the Aces. At the same time, she’s also been a bit…chaotic during her WNBA career. Carter’s struggled to find a true home in the league and didn’t even play in two of the past four seasons. She’s playing out of her mind right now, but if Carter regresses at some point, the Aces suddenly are in a much worse spot because they can’t count on Loyd to pick up Carter’s slack in the same way that Carter has been picking up Loyd’s.
This isn’t to say Loyd’s play is going to doom the Aces to an early playoff exit or anything. It’s just going to be something that the team has to continually manage as the season goes along until Loyd either figures something out or the Aces make some kind of move to replace her minutes with someone else.
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