Wings Things: Aziaha James is Paige Bueckers’ best backcourt partner — where has her playing time gone?

The future is now for the young, rebuilding Dallas Wings. Friday’s 88-78 loss to the Indiana Fever is further evidence that the team needs to play fellow rookie Aziaha James more.

DALLAS, TX — Paige Bueckers was Paige Bueckers again on Friday in the Indiana Fever’s (16-12) second and final visit of the season to American Airlines Center. She was lethal in the midrange against whichever defender Fever head coach Stephanie White sent her way.
Bueckers scored 15 of her 22 points in the first half of the Wings’ 88-78 loss.

The problem? No one in the starting lineup rode shotgun alongside Bueckers. The rest of Dallas’ starting five scored just 12 points in the first half, and Dallas shot 0-for-5 from 3-point range in the first two quarters (2-of-15 for the game), as the Fever took a 48-42 lead into the break. Indiana built on that lead and held the Wings at arm’s length throughout much of the second half, again without Caitlin Clark, who sat out with a groin injury in the Fever’s second swing through Dallas.

Make no mistake, Bueckers’ buckets didn’t come easy. Her defenders were draped all over her all night long, forcing the rookie phenom to come off multiple screens and work hard for every inch of space she got.

She needs someone to run with who consistently brings some additional scoring punch.

You know who has been instant offense for this 8-21 Wings team, despite her workload being cut nearly in half since the Dallas roster worked its way closer to full health? Fellow rookie Aziaha James, who the Wings selected with the 12th pick of this year’s WNBA Draft.

James shook Sophie Cunningham out of her shoes in the mid-range, issuing a series of crossover jukes to work her way to the basket for her first score of the game with 3:55 left in the first half. She scored in transition a minute later on a nice find from Arike Ogunbowale to keep the Wings within five, down 41-36 at the time.

“I’m just trying to be that instant offense off the bench — that energetic rookie,” James said. “Do what I’ve got to do and get the ball in the basket. You’ve just always got to stay ready.”

With Ogunbowale back and firmly entrenched in the starting lineup, it’s a good thing to have a weapon like James available off the bench. JJ Quinerly, the third member of the Wings’ Draft Class of 2025, may be the closest thing to a pure point guard on this Wings roster, despite her lack of size defensively, and Dallas needs someone dependable to bring the ball up among the overstock of off-guards on the roster.

So I get the decision-making calculus facing Wings head coach Chris Koclanes when it comes to the distribution of minutes among this group of guards. The fact remains — James can no longer be the odd guard out in this rotation.

“You want to try to establish rhythm and normality with your subbing and rotations, and you go into every game thinking that’s going to be the case,” Koclanes said. “And then the game unfolds, and things change. And I loved Aziaha’s answer, when she said, ‘No, you just have to stay ready.’”

When Koclanes put James in the starting lineup out of pure necessity earlier this year with both Ogunbowale and DiJonai Carrington on the shelf with injuries, she immediately blossomed alongside Bueckers and Quinerly. James scored in double figures for seven straight games in late June and early July, including a 28-point outburst in the Wings’ 98-89 upset win over the Phoenix Mercury, which was sandwiched between two 15-point outings.

James proved she can make a difference for the Wings in that span. The team can’t afford to let that kind of potential and production wilt on the bench any longer.

News flash: Dallas isn’t making the playoffs. The name of the game is building for the future, especially when the starting lineup brings zero juice in winnable games. James needs to be featured more prominently. She needs to, at very least, be the first guard off the Wings’ bench.

Photo by Ron Jenkins/Getty Images

There is no reason Carrington should be getting more minutes than James on this team. After winning the W’s 2024 Most Improved Player Award, Carrington has been underwhelming, then injured, then underwhelming again this season. Are the Wings playing the more established Ogunbowale and Carrington heavier minutes in hopes of drumming up potential value in the market with the WNBA trade deadline next Thursday? Who’s to say?

“Yea, they sure do,” Koclanes admitted, when asked whether trade rumors swirling affect the locker room vibe this time of year.

James didn’t play in the third quarter on Friday after coming in and making two plays right off the bat in the second. She started the fourth and immediately pulled down a defensive rebound and then pulled up for a 3-pointer near the top of the key with nine minutes to play to keep the Wings within shouting distance, down 70-60 at the time. To that point, James had played seven minutes and netted seven points. She finished with nine points in 16 minutes and hasn’t played more than 20 minutes in any of the Wings’ last seven games.

It should be noted, however, that nine of those 16 minutes on Friday came in the fourth quarter. Those nine minutes came at the expense of Ogunbowale, who didn’t play at all down the stretch and scored just eight points on 1-of-6 shooting for the game. It was the eighth game this year in which Ogunbowale, who scored 22.2 points a year ago, was held to single digits. Koclanes, who was uncharacteristically animated and showed some frustration in Friday’s postgame press conference, said Ogunbowale’s absence wasn’t due to any kind of injury.

“She’s fine,” Koclanes said. “That group got it rolling there, so we went with them. That young group — I like their fight, their tenacity, their grit that they were applying in the fourth quarter, so we went with them.”

It’s becoming more and more clear to everyone involved. The offensive efficiency and defensive tenacity this team is begging for is seated at the end of Koclanes’ bench. The rest of Friday’s starting lineup certainly didn’t bring any. Bueckers finished with 22 points on 7-of-14 shooting in 34 minutes, while the rest of the Wings’ starters shot 8-of-26 for 25 points in the loss to Indiana.

The future is now for this team. It’s time for the Wings to get on with it.