SOMEONE’S ALWAYS WATCHING THE SKY
WHATEVER MAY BE HAPPENING OFF THE COURT, ‘TEAM MOM’ CROSBY IS USUALLY INVOLVED
If Ann Crosby was stressed, she didn’t show it. Standing at the United Airlines counter at O’Hare Airport in August, Crosby, the Sky’s director of basketball operations who doubles as the strength and conditioning coach, was trying to rebook flights to Hartford, Connecticut, for a party of 18 after the team’s first flight was cancelled.
Everyone was starting to get irritable, and time was of the essence: An important game against the second-ranked Sun was less than 24 hours away.
The group was put on standby for the next flight out, but it already had been overbooked.
“It’s one of those things, unfortunately. You just have to keep everybody in the loop,” Crosby said. “‘Hey, here’s what could happen next. I’m sorry. Keep waiting. Keep waiting.’ ”
Part of the group got on a flight. The rest were forced to continue waiting. A terminal change and more than nine hours later, they finally boarded a plane just before midnight.
It was an extremely trying day — and it only got worse when the bus no-showed after the second plane landed at 3:30 a.m. — but Crosby has large-group travel down to a science at this point.
“The biggest thing is always having a Plan B,” said Crosby, the Sky’s longest-tenured employee. “When a bus doesn’t show up, I’ve got car companies in each city that I can call, and try to go from there. If not, Uber is a great way. And then, obviously, turn around and scream at the bus company after that.”
While coach James Wade and point guard Courtney Vandersloot might be the Sky’s most recognizable faces, Crosby is the backbone. The Sky have five employees in their operations department, compared to the Bulls’ 32, and Crosby, with the help of interns, is responsible for the work of about 25 people.
“If you need something done, Ann is probably going to be involved in it in some kind of capacity,” Wade said. “She knows everybody, and if there’s anything off the court, she probably knows. And if she doesn’t know how to get it done, she knows the person that knows how to get it done.”
Crosby does all of this as the mother of two kids under 12, and also leads the team’s stretches and workouts.
“I call her ‘Superwoman,’ ” forward Cheyenne Parker said. “She has to pretty much book all of our flights, all of our hotels, everything. Our cars being shipped, even personal flights — she does it all, literally, as far as being there for us. Like, she’s literally the team mom.”
How does she manage it all?
“One day at a time,” Crosby said. WNBA players are often surrounded by unfamiliar people — both with their overseas teams and in the U.S. But Crosby is a constant for the Sky, and that’s important to players such as Parker, who has ADHD, suffers from depression and relies on Crosby for professional and personal support.
“She’s always intuitive,” Parker said. “She was able to pull me out of my funk a few times and give me a few words of encouragement.”
Said Crosby: “Having someone who is consistent time after time does say something about our organization as a whole. And the players, they go overseas, they’re in different countries, they’re on different teams every year for the most part, so there isn’t much consistency in their life, and I try to offer them that as much as possible.” ✶
“i call her ‘superwoman.” cheyenne parkeR, SKY FORWARD