The Chicago Sky will move their practices from Illinois-Chicago to Loyola this weekend as the team experiences more delays in the completion of a new training facility in Bedford Park.
The Sky held training camp at UIC this spring while awaiting the completion of the Bedford Park facility, which they planned to move into by May. Then that plan was pushed back to June.
Now the Sky have spent more than a quarter of the season in temporary training accommodations — and still don’t have a move-in date for the new facility.
The facility originally was scheduled to open in December. Significant delays occurred throughout 2025, including flooding and windstorms that knocked out several wall panels.
Construction was further delayed when the Sky made adjustments to the original blueprints, which included expanding the facility’s footprint and fixing issues with the orientation of the basketball courts.
Despite these hurdles, Sky leadership remained fervent that the facility would be available for the majority of the 2026 season.
“I am confident that it will be done before the season next year,” Sky co-owner and Operating Chairman Nadia Rawlinson said at a September news conference updating progress on the facility.
Sky President and CEO Adam Fox reiterated that sentiment in a February statement and promised the facility would be available by “early spring.”
The Sky have long aspired to base all of their team operations — from practices and games to player housing — on the South Side of the city to maximize convenience for players. This was a driving reason for selecting south suburban Bedford Park as the location of the training facility, with straightforward access to the team’s chartered flights out of Midway Airport and to Wintrust Arena in the South Loop.
The team confirmed Friday that practices and shootarounds will remain at Loyola and Wintrust until the new facility opens. The Sky declined to give a reason for the move from UIC.
The move to Loyola in Rogers Park will send players to the North Side, lengthening their commutes and disrupting the status quo established at UIC over the past two months. However, practicing at Loyola still keeps players significantly closer to their home base in the South Loop than the team’s previous accommodations at Sachs Recreation Center in Deerfield.
The Sky (4-9) have lost eight of their last nine games while struggling to adjust to the loss of injured forward Rickea Jackson. Their next game is Wednesday at Wintrust against the New York Liberty.
