The Chicago Sky will play its very first regular-season game Saturday, May 20 at Charlotte. We open at home Tuesday, May 23, against the defending champion Sacramento Monarchs. Our second home game, Friday, May 26, will be another tough one when the Indiana Fever comes to town. I think it is great that we are going to be playing the best at the beginning of the season. It will be a real test for us as a team and a real treat for you as fans. Having early season games against top teams with top players should really crank up the excitement. There’s always that stereotype that expansion teams won’t win games; with this schedule we will know early on how we stack up and what we need to work on.

The schedule includes 34 regular-season games and 2 home exhibitions. That works out to about three games a week. We have a couple of extended road trips, the first being in June when we play Seattle, Los Angeles and Sacramento over four days. In July we have a trip that includes Minnesota, Connecticut and Detroit. We close out the season in August with a Detroit, Charlotte, Indiana swing.

While three games in three days can be tiring, I have to say that after 10 years of an NBA schedule that can take you from Boston to Los Angeles to New York in three days; this doesn’t look too bad to me! Although the schedule is compacted into three months, the WNBA does a good job of scheduling days off and travel days. We don’t have any back-to-back games at home and none of those schedule nightmares you find in baseball where you play an afternoon game, travel at night and play again the next day.

In late July-early August we even have four homes games in a row, which will be a really nice touch near the end of the season. We’re on a pretty solid Tuesday/Friday schedule with other games on Thursday and Sunday and one Saturday.

You will get to see all the teams once and Indiana, Detroit, Connecticut and New York come to town twice. So not only will Tamika Catchings fans get to see her twice, but those basketball fans who still have a thing or two to say to Bill Laimbeer will get two opportunities! Our home games will be at the UIC Pavilion. The TV schedule is being worked on.

Getting ready for the actual play isn’t all that’s going on right now. While the game is the biggest part of the ‘’entertainment,’’ our front office team is also busy working on the team mascot, halftime entertainment and time-out promotions. I expect to come in here soon and find them testing out giant slingshots and shooting t-shirts all over the office!

That’s a lot of news for what is traditionally a slow news week. My best wishes for the rest of the holiday season and a very Happy New Year to all.

Ready. Set. Soar.