The Dallas Wings will have to go without a pair of fan favorites for a while as they play out the rest of a trying season.
The Dallas Wings will be clipped a bit as they head into the final portions of their season.
Dallas had dire updates for two fan favorites this week, as it announced that center Li Yueru will miss the rest of the tour with an ACL sprain in her left knee, while Arike Ogunbowale will be sidelined indefinitely, as she also has a knee issue: tendinitis in her right. Ogunbowale is set to be “re-evaluated in the coming weeks.”
This tough medical break is the latest blow in what’s been a tough season for Ogunbowale, who has already missed each of the last three Wings games. She is averaging a career-low 15.5 points per game after finishing runner-up to A’ja Wilson in last year’s scoring race and already missed time earlier in the season due to a thumb issue.
Time will tell if Ogunbowale, 28, has played her final game in a Wings uniform, as she’s working through her seventh season in Arlington and the last on her current contract. Ogunbowale has been invited to four All-Star Games as a Wing and has won the exhibition’s MVP award twice, but postseason success has proved elusive since her arrival in 2019 (winning one series, the best-of-three opening round, in 2023).
The 26-year-old Li was working through her first showings in Arlington, having come over in a June trade with the Seattle Storm. As a touted international prospect, Yi averaged 7.4 points and 5.8 rebounds, both of which would be full-season career-highs for the Chinese-born draft pick.
Despite Paige Bueckers, the newest WNBA top draft pick, fulfilling and exceeding almost every rookie expectation placed upon her, the Wings (9-26) have struggled this season and are on the cusp of mathematical elimination. Dallas faces the Los Angeles Sparks on Wednesday night in SoCal (9 p.m. CT, KFAA) as it continues to work out its young breakout talents such Bueckers, Maddy Siegrist, and Haley Jones.
Geoff Magliocchetti is on X @GeoffJMags
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