Unrivaled: How will Lunar Owls survive without Napheesa Collier?

One overarching story from the first season of Unrivaled basketball was the indomitable Lunar Owls.

Head Coach DJ Sackmann, a New Jersey-based skills trainer who has long been at the forefront of professional player development, led his team to a 13-1 regular season record—five games ahead of the second place team. With all the momentum of a fresh league and a dominant season behind them, few could have predicted that Lunar Owls would be kicked to the curb in the semifinal game, going home with nothing to show for their near-perfect record.

Unrivaled is a league that has built itself through fan engagement, social media and creative storytelling.

It needs narratives, and Lunar Owls’ comeback tour was likely at the top of the league’s marketing priorities. Unfortunately, Lunar Owls may struggle to meet their own expectations.

Clubs that made the playoffs in Unrivaled’s first season were allowed to protect two players from being poached in the dispersal draft ahead of the second season, while non-playoff clubs could only protect one. Lunar Owls obviously protected Napheesa Collier, the reigning league MVP. Unfortunately, Collier recently underwent surgery on both of her ankles and will miss the entire season. Sans Collier, the Owls were essentially shorted a protected player. Skylar Diggins received their other offer of immunity, but missed opening night due to a lower leg injury.

Had Collier’s surgery been decided on sooner, it’s possible that Lunar Owls would have been afforded an additional protection while Collier was on IR, allowing them to keep someone like Allisha Gray on the roster. Now, Diggins is the only returning player for Sackmann.

Lunar Owls debuted a completely new five on opening night: Rebecca Allen, Aaliyah Edwards, Marina Mabrey, Rachel Banham and Temi Fágbénlé.

Unrivaled teams have access to a pool of “development players” (essentially replacement depth for injured players), but the team must have fewer than five players available to select from the pool, meaning that the Lunar Owls were not able to add anyone yet.

Matched up with the defending champion Rose, the new-look Lunar Owls were overwhelmed, losing 80-60. To say that they leaned heavily on Aaliyah Edwards and Marina Mabrey would be an understatement: the duo took 83 percent of the Lunar Owls total shots, only connecting on 40 percent of them. No one could stop Rose’s Chelsea Gray, who finished the night with 35 points and eight assists on 14 of 20 shooting.

One game isn’t nearly enough to suggest that Lunar Owls may be outmatched in Unrivaled’s sophomore campaign, but their roster certainly looks shaky.

On paper, Edwards, Mabrey and Diggins is not a dangerously potent trio compared to most other clubs’ top threes. Banham is their only depth piece with some real isolation scoring juice—a necessary trait to thrive in 3×3 basketball—but she just doesn’t have the reps to suggest that she could take a big volume leap in her first year in the league.

Collier’s absence, and the lack of a true second player protection that could have kept some of last year’s team together, will make it difficult for Lunar Owls to find an edge in such a talented league.

However, we have certainly seen surprises in Unrivaled before. If Sackmann is able to turn a questionable roster into another championship contending season, don’t be surprised if he repeats as Unrivaled Coach of the Year.