Kysre Gondrezick waived by Chicago Sky days before WNBA contract becomes guaranteed

Chicago Sky announced Friday that second-year guard Kysre Gondrezick has been waived from the roster .

Gondrezick made a return to the WNBA in 2024 after a two-year absence, signing a contract with Chicago in February, but managed just five appearances this season — she hit a three in her first game since June 8 on Thursday against Las Vegas .

This decision comes at a particularly devastating time for players like Gondrezick signed to non-guaranteed deals. The 5'9 guard inked a training camp contract worth the minimum WNBA salary of $64,164 but was waived just days before the mid-season cutdown deadline, whereafter all contracts become fully guaranteed.

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The Michigan native developed into one of the nation's premier high-school prospects at Benton Harbor High School and, initially, she elected to keep her five-star skillset close to home and enroll at Michigan. Gondrezick enjoyed one of the best freshman seasons in Wolverines history, averaging nearly 15 points per game with a scintillating 43 percent three-point average, but abruptly departed the team during its WNIT run citing personal reasons and later announced her transfer to West Virginia.

Gondrezick was limited to just five games during her first season of eligibility in Morgantown due to injury but quickly rediscovered her scoring touch, scoring nearly 20 points a night her senior year for a West Virginia squad that finished No. 17 in the AP Poll. She was then selected No. 4 overall by Indiana in 2021.

The Fever cut Gondrezick just nine months later after she temporarily elected to step away from basketball, citing the traumatic death of her father. “My mental health was at high risk as I was under a lot of stress coping with my own personal silence of traumas,” Gondrezick said in a November 2021 statement on social media.

“After losing my father, the pressure began to mount for what I considered my job as a facet of grieving, I wasn’t present to the idea of efficiently knowing how to cope. I was so happy and proud of reaching one of my personal goals of playing in the WNBA, yet I lost sight of his presence, my focus, and ultimately, the fun in the game.”

Gondrezick has also been linked in recent weeks to Jaylen Brown, with the pair spotted together atop the party bus on Boston's championship parade. Brown also posted a picture of the WNBA player holding the NBA Finals trophy on his Instagram.

While she hasn't enjoyed the most accomplished WNBA career thus far, Gondrezick has become among the league's most prominent faces off the court, accruing more than 500,000 Instagram followers and developing a reputation around the league for her pre-game outfits and fashion-forward approach.