Next year, the Seattle Storm will have to play for the first three months of the season without Lauren Jackson while she competes with her Australian national team.
For at least the next three weeks, they will get a taste of what that will be like.
Before Friday night’s game against t
he Minnesota Lynx, the news came out that Jackson has a labral injury to her left hip and will miss at least three weeks. The worst case scenario is if she doesn’t respond to treatment, surgery may be required.
But in the present, the Storm had the Lynx to deal with. Minnesota came into the game with a record of 5-1 and defeated the Storm 81-74 on June 9 to end the Storm’s 23-game home winning streak.
It’s pretty safe to say that the Storm remembered that outcome. Seattle gave a dominating defensive performance to beat Minnesota 65-55.
“Yes of course there was a little revenge factor — especially just with how that game the last time we played them went. I know we were really focused on getting a win,” point guard Sue Bird said. “Really for us, it’s about basics, playing the way we want to play, executing our offensive plan, executing our defensive plan and that is what is so great about this win.”
Two weeks ago in the Storm’s loss to the Lynx, Minnesota scored the game’s first 22 points and dominated in every phase of the game. On Friday night, it was the Storm who took on the dominant role. Seattle jumped out to a 16-4 lead and finished the first quarter with a 21-8 advantage.
The Storm defense was the story, they held Minnesota to just 21-for-68 (30.3 percent) on field goals. Seimone Augustus managed 17 points, but the rest of the team managed just 38.
Whether or not the Storm caused the missed shots, or Minnesota just missed them, it clearly frustrated Lynx head coach Cheryl Reeve.
Reeve was asked after the game what she thought the difference was, she responded, “shooting 30 percent.” In a follow up question, she was asked what the team was going to focus on for its next game, she responded, “shooting better than 30 percent.”
Camille Little led the Storm with 16 points and Le’coe Willingham, who started for Jackson, had 11.
“There is no making up for Lauren’s absence,” Bird said. “No one can be Lauren, they can just play the way they (Little and Willingham) know how, and I think they did that.”
Little and Willingham, along with reserve center Ashley Robinson played well on Friday. That effort will certainly be needed while Jackson is hurt.
The Storm may be 4-2, but to say that the early season has been a cakewalk would not be at all accurate. Seattle has struggled in many of its games this season. Defeating a good Lynx team was a step toward the Storm finding their identity.
“We had a little bit of an identity crisis and I think now we are just kind of getting back to what we need to do to win games,” Bird said. “We need to play hard defensively, and let that kind of dictate what our offense is going to bring and go from there, and I think tonight was a great example of that.
Agler picked up his 200th win as a professional coach on Friday, something he downplayed after the game.
“That will be nice 20 years from now. I’m more interested in how we played tonight. I thought we played really well and I’m proud of our team,” Agler said.
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