The Las Vegas Aces looked like they were starting to form a WNBA dynasty under head coach Becky Hammon. A'ja Wilson asserted herself as the league's best player, and the team was filled with superstars around her like Kelsey Plum, Jackie Young and Chelsea Gray.
Hammon and her team won back-to-back championships in 2022 and 2023, but an early injury to Gray threw the team off its rhythm at the start of the 2024 season. Vegas was never able to fully recover; they still made the semifinals, but they got crushed by the New York Liberty in a lopsided series.
For some reason, the Aces chose to hit the panic button this offseason and sent Plum, an All-WNBA guard, to the Los Angeles Sparks. The three-team deal netted them Jewel Loyd, also an All-Star-level player, but it has seemingly messed up the team's chemistry in the early going.
The Las Vegas Aces are no longer the team to beat in the WNBA
On opening day of the 2025 season, the Aces looked a bit disjointed against the Liberty. While they kept it close for a small portion of the game, they ended up getting routed at the Barclays Center. A'ja Wilson looked like she was fending for herself out there, as the team's supporting cast failed to get anything going.
Two straight wins against the Connecticut Sun and a sneaky-good Washington Mystics team led many to believe that the Aces were back to form and simply needed a grace period with new players. However, a 20-point defeat against the Seattle Storm was discouraging for both the team and its fan base.
This leads to only one conclusion: The Aces are no longer the WNBA's team to beat. Even though the Liberty won the title last season, Las Vegas still had the most talented roster in the league far and away. Many felt that the Aces were going to rebound and rightfully take back the championship this season, but their first four games have been uninspiring.
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Wilson is still playing at an MVP level, and both Young and Gray are consistently producing for the team. However, Loyd has been incredibly inconsistent in the early going, and starting center Kiah Stokes has played the worst basketball of her career through four games.
While Stokes is not known to be a scorer, she has played 74 minutes this season and failed scored a single point. She is 0-for-6 through four games, which is completely inexcusable for a championship team. You cannot afford to have a non-threat on the offensive end and expect teams to play honest defense.
Coach Hammon and her team still have plenty of time to figure things out, but right now, teams like the Liberty, Storm, Minnesota Lynx, Phoenix Mercury and even the Atlanta Dream look way more like championship contenders than the Aces do.