It wasn’t the reason the Sky lost. Plenty of mistakes down the stretch cost them in Monday’s 106-101 loss to the Mercury. And playing the fourth quarter without leading scorer Sydney Taylor, who exited with a left groin injury, didn’t help.
But center Kamilla Cardoso once again played an entire game without attempting a free throw, and Sky coach Tyler Marsh couldn’t believe it.
“It was a joke,” Marsh said. “It’s a [expletive] joke. How many more games does she need to go without getting a free throw? It makes no sense. Zero sense.
“Now, it didn’t come down to that. We fouled our asses off today. We could have been more disciplined. Put them on the line 40 times. Not saying the officials made 40 wrong calls or 20 wrong calls or whatever it is. Not saying that at all.
“But for her to play as hard as she does consistently, she doesn’t give much pushback to the officials. I try to talk as calmly as I can to officials before it gets out of hand. It’s a joke.”
Cardoso shot 8-for-15 for 16 points but never got to the line. Marsh has raised the issue throughout the season. After the Sky’s win over the Sun last week, in which Cardoso got to the line 11 times, he made his point again.
“I can make a case that she should shoot close to 11 free throws every game,” Marsh said. “I think she gets held a ton. I think that, for someone who shoots the majority of shots in the paint, there’s just physically very little resistance that you can give without fouling her. She’s just that forceful.
“To go games where she has zero to five free throws, it just doesn’t make sense to me. And the film doesn’t lie either.”
Cardoso shoots 3.9 free-throw attempts per game, just 24th in the league, despite taking 9.7 shots per game in the paint, eighth most.