The Minnesota Lynx announced the signing of Italian forward Cecilia Zandalasini for the rest of the WNBA season yesterday. Zandalasini is a veteran of the Italian league, where she helped lead her team to the Finals this past season. She then was a star for Italy at the recent Eurobaket tournament, making the all-tournament team and finishing among the top three in scoring, shooting percentage, and rebounding.
With an established group in the front court and limited time left in the season, we’ll see what sort of opportunities she gets to make an impact, but she’s someone the Lynx have had their eye on for a while. This is probably a signing the Lynx are hoping turns into a longer term relationship, as Zandalasini is only 21 years old.
Elsewhere, the Wolves announced that Scott Roth, who most recently has served as a Wolves scout, will be the head coach of the Iowa Wolves in the G-League. Roth has had a long career in basketball. He was a player on the first Wolves team under Bill Musselman. After a playing career that included several stops in the NBA as well as overseas, Roth went in to coaching, where he has been an assistant for multiple NBA teams. He also has consulted and/or coached for several national teams around the world, and coached the D-League Bakersfield Jam.
Tom Thibodeau was at the State Fair yesterday, because apparently you can’t avoid such things, and Jerry Zgoda reported some nuggets: The Wolves are still looking at three more signings: two wings and a point guard. Shabazz Muhammad remains in the mix.
Thibs is “hopeful” that Nemanja Bjelica is ready to go by the start of training camp about four weeks from now, and that Justin Patton will be healthy by opening night.
Bjelica has not been fully cleared, but is running and doing drills on a basketball court.
The Wolves are going to hold a week-long camp in San Diego before their trip to China with the Golden State Warriors. This is in part to allow work to be completed at Target Center. As a reminder, the games in China are scheduled for October 5th and 8th.
I suppose that’s enough to be getting along with for a late August Tuesday.