The Los Angeles Sparks made big organizational changes in the offseason, both on and off the court. It will take time to see if the former are enough to get them back to the playoffs for the first time since 2020, but the latter are already drawing rave reviews.
Franchise stalwart Nneka Ogwumike, who has been with the Sparks since she was the No. 1 overall pick in the 2012 WNBA Draft, told reporters at the start of training camp, “This is the first time I’ve really experienced what I believe to be a professional organization.”
“And that leaves space for me to not have to step into a manager role, which doesn’t leave me a lot of time to do the things that I really want to do, which is play basketball and hang out with my teammates,” Ogwumike continued. “I really feel like I’ve relinquished a lot of that because we have some truly phenomenal people that have turned this organization into what it deserves to be.”
That is both high praise for new general manager Karen Bryant and head coach Curt Miller, each of whom were hired during the offseason, and a damning indictment of the numerous regimes that came before them.
The Sparks are one of the league’s premier franchises; they are one of three clubs left…
