May 22nd, 2005: Detroit at New York

Detroit Shock 78, New York Liberty 71

Loree Moore is an attentive Libkid, and the New York sports scene is awful crowded.


There's nothing like game day, plain and simple. The adrenaline catches you up and makes the blood sing in your veins. Your step is faster. Your senses are sharper. It's easier to laugh, harder to cry. I forgot how much I missed the camaraderie of hanging out four hours before tipoff with fans who are crazy enough to have been there before you.

Worst.Scheduling.Ever. Final game of the Subway Series was at 1. Zootopia, a big concert sponsored by the local top 40 station, was at the Meadowlands at 6. Fordham Law had their graduation sometime before the game, so when we were hanging around up front, you could hardly see Liberty fans for all the proud parents and relieved graduates. Oyyyy. The cynic in me wants to believe that they did this intentionally so they would have something to point to if the attendance sucked.

Each of the rookies seems to have attached to a second-year Liberty player. Erin came in with Loree, which led to an exchange of 'there's Erin and K.B.!' 'no, K.B. got cut, that's gotta be Loree Moore...' 'no, it's K.B.!' 'no, K.B. got cut!' and so on until we actually *looked* at the roster. I was right, of course. Loree must have felt so unwanted if she heard us. La'Keshia came in with Amisha, game faces on. Ann and Edwige arrived together; everyone flocked to Ann and no one could figure out who poor Edwige was until after the fact. (Sorry 'bout that.) Everyone was in waaaaay early, earlier than usual. I couldn't help but wonder if Patty wanted them in by 1 so no one would get distracted by the baseball game.

Okay, so, MSG? If someone hurls on the floor in the box office, you might have the heat up too high. Seriously. One poor girl pulled a Jessie Hicks all over the floor. Worse, she had tried to stop it, so... I'll stop. Most of the folks I chatted with before the game were stunned an ddisappointed that K.B. got cut, and some of them even expressed disappointment over Bethany getting the axe. My opinon still remains guarded, depending on how the replacements pan out.

Shooting shirts! The shooting shirts have players' names on them! I no longer have to be the walking encyclopedia! God, that's fucking brilliant, it really is! No more guessing games, no more mistaken identity, no more confusion! Sure, the year I only go to one game, they get around to it. While I'm thinking of it, does anyone have any dish on why Chandi Jones and Stacey Thomas changed numbers?

Perfect photo op, if I'd had a camera: Val Ackerman, chatting with SFO and FFO (for those as might not know, that would be Bill Laimbeer {Shock Front Office} and Blaze {...well, if the FO stands for front office, you figure out what the F stands for!}) I'd call it Study in Contrasts, or summat like that. And yes, Val still looks like she needs a good night's sleep. Some things don't change.

Lovely anthem by Andrea McArdle, although it had a little too much vibrato for my liking. The calendars are nifty, too. Ann should never have revealed her middle names. You know she's gonna get shit for that. I *love* the new roster sheet design this year. Beautifully done.

Why the first three possessions went through Ann Wauters, I will never know. She wasn't all that strong in the first half, but kinda lit on fire in the second half- finished with 14 and 8, not bad considering that Crystal spent large stretches of the first half outrebounding her. She had her moments- very good at shotblocking and getting simple rebounds, but very soft when someone was driving on her. If a guard's going to the basket, you knock her on her ass, you don't let her go to the basket, not even if she's got a mean right cross or a rap sheet at the Garden. Elena... lose the mullet, 'kay? She had a gorgeous hook shot that made my heart stop, and some nice screens, but was kinda forgettable otherwise. What Patty thought she was doing, starting two Euros against Walker/Ford/Riley, I will NEVER know. Crystal was ice cold from the field, but scrapped for every rebound she could, even boxing out VJ at one point, and she was mostly her usual tenacious self on defense, although she got beat pretty badly a couple of times. Becky is back to thinking that the 'drive the lane into three massive defenders and throw the ball in the general direction of the basket' trick is working again, and while it worked once, it didn't work three or four times. Someone seriously needs to put her hard on her ass so that she'll think twice. She had one three-pointer from almost the G on the secondary logo, and while I shrieked in dismay as it went up, I shouted for joy when it went down. I'll admit when I'm wrong. Sometimes. She's also gotten better on defense- yay! VJ was VJ, and you have no idea how good it feels to type those words. She filled the stat lines, she played D, she got knocked down but she got up again. Meanwhile, off the bench... La'Keshia was awesome, whuppin' ass and takin' names. Shameka... not so much. Sista Christon still isn't ready for the big stage. She plays too tentatively, thinks things through too much. Such women are dangerous. What's frustrating is that I see the potential. Maybe she needs to learn to meditate? Edwige (and that would be ed-WHEEJE, for all y'all scoring at home) stole K.B.'s jumper, but was otherwise blah; had a few great defensive sequences, but nothing spectacular. Erin was... well, Erin, although her basketball IQ is improving; I loved the way she sagged off Stacey Thomas when they were matched against each other, because she knew that Thomas wasn't going to shoot, no way, no how. She also did well getting herself open, the shots just didn't go down. She looked so forlorn at the end of the game without K.B. there to gossip with. Loree Moore gets a 7 out of 10 on the fashion scale, if only because she looked presentable in a charcoal heavy-duty shirt and khakis, and let's face it, some of the Liberty, not so good with managing to look presentable. Loree and the new guy were taking a lot of notes today. I'm not sure if Patty's giving them a final tomorrow or not. I don't know if I agreed with all her moves today; I would not have put Shameka in at the end of the game, during clutch time. She's not ready for that pressure yet. Let her get over her Garden jitters first, then make her perform under pressure. Most of the time, she showed a good knack for seeing who needed to come out of the game right that second; not so good with the more subtle indicators like Ann or Elena turning bright red, though.

Swintayla, save the drama for your acting class! Good Lord, she got more heated up about the calls than the players involved did. There were a couple of times when she went to her knees on the sideline that I had to laugh (in my safe seat up in 110, well away from anyone who might take offfense at me laughing). She does clean up nice, though, I must say, although those shoes did NOT go with that outfit. Cheryl Ford is definitely her daddy's little girl- she's got the elbows, the mouth, the serious rebounding skill, and the free-throw shooting. All she needs is his scoring touch and we can start being freaked out. 18 boards was pretty freaking impressive, although that tech really was unnecessary. Ruth Riley still has the prettiest release I've ever seen on a big girl- not necessarily the prettiest shot, but the prettiest release. It's so fundamental. She used her size effectively today, although I don't recall her putting up the stats. Tweety's on fire this season. Someone's tired of being overlooked. I had forgotten how effective Elaine Powell was as a floor leader, as a ball hawk, and as the occasional offensive contributor. This Shock team is a brutally efficient offensive machine. Chandi Jones showed us some mighty pretty shooting, but I'm glad the point guard experiment is over with her. Farris and Braxton were dangerously tough inside, which is really the last thing you need when you're giving the bulk of your post minutes to two Euros and Shameka Christon. *rolls eyes* Stacey Thomas came in to match Erin Thorn, then stuck around to play with the starters. Don't know why. If Coach wants to give up his reasoning, I'd love to hear it. Niele Ivey's threes are killer- big surprise that she and Riley work well together- and good Lord but that woman registers so high on the hawtness scale that she knocked the dial off. Forgive me for leaving Ayana Walker until the end- I knew I was forgetting someone. She was very effective- Swin, hurry backk, we need some rust in the Shock or else the conference is gonna be a runaway! She's shown a nice scoring touch and the tenacity you expect from someone with Louisiana Tech background. Coach showed a knack for rebalancing the matchups; if La'Keshia came in, Farris was off the bench in a heartbeat; as soon as Ann and Elena checked back into the game, Riley and Ford leaped off the bench.

The refs suck. And verily the people spoke unto Queenie, saying, "Tell us something we don't know!" If you blinked at the beginning of the game, you didn't know how Vickie ended up on her ass under the basket. I blinked. Someone wanna fill me in?

Kym made an appearance. A'riel was with her, as was some dude who may well have been the baby daddy (he came in with Kym, carrying the baby, so...) Likewise, Suuuuuue was there, looking ridiculously good. She came by our section on her way back from getting a drink; we Suuuuuuued her, as was proper. (And only my mom could pass Sue in the aisle and completely fail to notice her. How you can miss a six-three blonde walking right next to you, I don't know.) She was sitting right over by Stephon Marbury. I couldn't help but wonder if she had to swap seats between halves so that he could get an unobstructed view; in the first half she was right on the court, but in the second half she was in the second row. Stephon came with two of the cutest kids; I'm assuming they were his and not just two random kids who were sitting with him. But they were very cute, in any case. It looks like the Knicks are getting more involved with the Liberty, which is good; one of the things that's always disappointed me about the New York franchise is the lack of synergy as compared to the other partnerships.

Halftime celebration for Val Ackerman. Lots of chatter, and VJ and Kym were involved in celebrating. Iono, I might have invited Stint to take part, since she's also a founding player. But I understand that this is the Liberty's show.

Not that I was out of it today or anything, but it took me most of the afternoon to realize that, no, the San Antonio-Phoenix score didn't mean that the Mercury and the Silver Stars were pouring on the points in double overtime. Sometimes I forget that men play basketball too.

Do we really need to be introduced to the dancers? Uh, no. And please, ditch the Timeless Torches. Besides, 35 really isn't over the hill.

This is going to be a better season than I thought, I suspect. They've shown a heart that I've missed in the last couple of years, and a hint, just a hint, of the old team-oriented Liberty squads. They may have lost by an indecent amount, but trust, most of that was from the foul derby at the end (to wit: what the fuck? Give it up if it's 14 seconds, y'all.)

This is a team you could fall in love with, the way you could fall in love with the '97 team, with the '99 team, with the '00 team.