Azurá Stevens knew it was time to come home.
It has been four years since the veteran forward wore a Chicago Sky jersey. Yet Stevens never felt she strayed far from the Sky, with whom she won a WNBA championship in 2021 in her second of three seasons with the franchise.
After signing a three-year deal in free agency, Stevens is returning to a version of the Sky that has changed more than it has stayed the same. But her goal is the same: Replicate the success of that 2021 squad. Then repeat.
“It’s a new era here in Chicago,” Stevens said Monday during an introductory news conference. “I think all the OG fans know what Chicago basketball was like. We’re looking to get back to that and we’re looking to win another championship. We’ve done it before. We can do it again. We have all the pieces. We’re going to work hard for it.”
The last time she hit the free-agent market, Stevens met with seven of the league’s 12 teams at the time. This offseason she kept the list shorter — and Chicago was always at the top.
After three years with the Los Angeles Sparks, she felt stretched by the distance to her family in North Carolina. And the Sky are family in their own way. Stevens feels she grew up in the league during her tenure in Chicago, and she remained close to veteran guard Courtney Vandersloot even after they parted ways before the 2023 season.
But after the players union inked a paradigm-shifting collective bargaining agreement, Stevens had to balance her on-court desires with a more practical priority.
“I wanted to get paid,” she said.
And the Sky were able to deliver. Stevens will be the highest-paid player on the Sky roster this season, having signed a three-year, $3.15 million contract that includes a $1 million salary this season.
Stevens is experiencing a common whiplash shared by free agents throughout the WNBA. She made $195,000 last season on a one-year contract with the Sparks and will make five times that figure this season. And while players like Stevens feel these salaries are overdue, they also aren’t taken for granted.
“To get seven figures is literally life-changing,” she said. “I’ve been pretty fortunate to make some good money playing basketball, but not that much. It’s life-changing for my family. To give back to my parents — they’ve literally done more than I can imagine for me. It’s a blessing to be able to make this money. I’m going to earn every single penny.”
To land one of their most important free-agent signings, the Sky had to do more than throw money around.
The team’s leadership was one important selling point. Stevens voiced confidence in second-year coach Tyler Marsh, who she said received unilateral praise from players throughout the league, including Sparks star Kelsey Plum. Under Marsh, Stevens feels she can receive a higher attention to detail in her development, even as a veteran.
Through their moves in free agency, the Sky also offered Stevens a sense of familiarity that went far beyond the franchise. She played with Skylar Diggins as a rookie with the Dallas Wings in 2018. She spent a year at Duke with Elizabeth Williams. And she built a strong relationship on and off the court with Rickea Jackson during their last two years with the Sparks.
Stevens doesn’t have experience with her most important pairing on the Sky’s new roster — third-year center Kamilla Cardoso — but feels their partnership makes sense on paper. Stevens is a stretchy forward who can play on the perimeter and create space in the post. She can pull attention from defenders as a shooter, giving Cardoso more space and support on the low block.
“We can complement each other very well,” Stevens said. “I can stretch the floor, and obviously she’s great down low.”The Sky entered this free-agency window with a new asset in their portfolio: the team’s new training facility in Bedford Park.
Stevens spent her previous Sky tenure training at Sachs Recreation Center, a public gym in Deerfield with semi-private facilities for the Sky. She will return to a newly constructed, fully private training facility with a kitchen, players lounge and other pro-grade amenities. The facility won’t be completed in time for training camp, but Stevens said the promise of improved facilities was a crucial bargaining chip.
(Stevens noted she won a ring with the Sky while practicing at Sachs, a detail many members of the 2021 championship team will cite with light defensiveness despite their acknowledgment the team needed to improve its facilities.)
Life will be different for Stevens than the last time she played for the Sky. Players can live in downtown Chicago with no commute to the north suburbs. The team has expanded its player support staff, including the addition of athletic trainers. And while growth is still necessary, Stevens feels the franchise is heading in the correct direction — in 2026 and beyond.
“I’m just excited to see that time of investment in the org,” Stevens said. “(Organizations) don’t change overnight. It takes a process and the Sky made those changes. … This is home. I don’t really envision myself playing anywhere else.”
