Angel Reese went from one of the best college players in the country to a WNBA All-Star in less than five months, and two of her biggest supporters won’t be in Phoenix to celebrate another of the Chicago Sky star’s milestones.
Reese posted on social media Friday that her mother and brother will not be able to attend her first WNBA All-Star Game.
The news that two members of Reese’s family are unable to get to the Mercury home comes as flights are grounded around the world as part of a Microsoft service outage.
Reese didn’t explicitly blame the outage, but the timing suggests it had something to do with it since she’s from the Baltimore area.
Angel Reese’s mother’s first name is also Angel, and her younger brother, Julian, was also a basketball star at Maryland.
Angel Reese will represent the WNBA stars in Saturday’s exhibition game against Team USA.
Angel Reese and her mother, Angel, were spotted on the red carpet at last year’s ESPYs.
Before young Angel Reese was a basketball star at LSU, she played for two seasons at her home school in Maryland.
The Reese women were spotted together on the ESPYs red carpet last year, both wearing extravagant gold dresses.
Angel Reese’s parents were also college basketball players.
Reese will represent the WNBA All-Star team in the mega exhibition contest against Team USA, the dozen women who will represent the United States at the Olympics later this month.
All of the women on Team USA play in the WNBA, and the WNBA All-Stars represent many of the league’s most talented players who didn’t get the chance to play in Paris.
By playing for the WNBA All-Stars, Reese will be teammates with longtime rival Caitlin Clark for the first time on a major stage after dueling with her in college and at the professional level.
Reese is likely to hand defensive assignments to veterans Brittney Griner and A’ja Wilson during the All-Star break in a tough test for the star rookie.