July 22nd, 2007: Seattle at New York

Seattle Storm 77, New York Liberty 75

Erin Thorn may have said some bad words, Stormfans are rather awesome, and Patty Coyle is That Moron.


Ah, the New York Maalox Moments, taking years off your life since 1997. I love these kids, I really do, but they have almost no killer instinct and they do need a whack upside the head sometimes, although I'm inclined to believe that it's the coach who needs more of a whack upside the head. Next year they'll win that game, book it.

So I got to meet a batch of Stormfans, and that was pretty awesome, because Stormfans are rather awesome. Turns out I've got something else in common with SF.org's norwester besides ridiculously long game notes (seriously, between us, we probably will have done a better job of covering the game than the New York papers). Dropped off a whole passel of cards with them, plus a check and two backpacks for Simone Edwards's charity (for those not in the loop, a Stormfan whimsically offered to color her hair if a certain amount were raised). The last I saw of most of them, they were in the hands of a couple of Liberty Board Junkies, which should really concern y'all.

I love Izi's shot. I love the high arc of it, the grace of it… okay, I don't like when it goes in against my team, as it seems to do an awful lot, perhaps because no one on the Liberty remembered to defend her until it was too late. I'd forgotten how much I don't really like LJ- I respect her talent, but there's something reckless in the way she plays that makes me nervous. That being said, she was a superstar against us. She took the team on her back, fought through physical defense that eventually did include double-teaming her (took way too long for That Moron to realize that none of our players could handle her one-on-one), and made sure that they were in position to win it. By now, everyone knows how Bird played- what surprised me was how long Donovan held her out in the fourth corner. I guess she liked the play-calling from Lennox- yes, I did say Lennox. Donovan seems to have finally gotten the memo that Tanisha Wright =/= point guard, and played Lennox and Wright together for surprisingly long stretches. Wright is competent as a backup shooting guard, but I don't trust her judgment, and I would be surprised to see her back next year. Lennox didn't dazzle me the way I'm used to her making her presence known on the court, but I still find myself fascinated by the way that she moves, and seeing her matched up with Loree was flat-out disturbing- they're eerily alike, since Lennox does look and move just like the Techster she is and Loree is all but the reincarnation of T-Spoon. It's almost a family resemblance in a basketball sense. Again, Burse didn't impress me, but since I'm given to understand that she's playing injured, that would make sense. Wendy Palmer was the only other player to see any meaningful minutes off the bench, and I think enough of us have seen her over enough years to know what she brings to the table. I was disappointed that AD didn't play Gearlds more, and not just because Gearlds was my sleeper pick for ROY. I think the kid's got potential, and it's hard to tap potential when you've got splinters up your but from riding the pine. Gee, that sounds like a problem we're having here. Hmmm, Coyle coaches guards adequately and Seattle needs to bolster their guard play, especially at the backup point… Donovan develops posts, and we seem to be up to our ears in those… anyone wanna suggest an offseason trade? I'd have suggested a midseason trade, since each team seems to have squeezed all it can out of its respective coach, but by the time I got my head together it was past the trade deadline.

*sigh* I love the Libkids, let me make that clear. I love all of them. That being said, Cathrine played like she had her head stuck up her butt for most of that game. Horrible shot selection, mindless passes (seriously, there was one play where she positively whipped it to Sue Bird), tentative defense, and a lack of rebounding that made her feet seem glued to the floor. Yes, she made strides towards redeeming herself in the final couple of minutes, and the bad things wouldn't have stuck out quite as much if the Liberty had won the game- but they didn't, and the fact that she kept making mistakes and staying in the game really stuck in my craw. Not that Shameka was much more with it. She probably would have gotten more shots off if she'd been able to catch the ball a little more cleanly (yes, some of the fault lies in the passers, but she was handling the ball like rookie!Shameka). Loree was, for the most part, back to the stat-sheet stuffer we've all come to know and marvel at. Though Erin's defense left a lot to be desired, I was pleased with her effort on the other end of the court- and her fire, but that's a whole 'nother passage. Janel… I love the way she's developing- or perhaps just finally getting a chance to show what she already knew how to do, a phenomenon we're not completely unfamiliar with, both in the land of Liberty and in the land of Charlotte Sting exiles. She's tough, and that's an aspect of the game we haven't had in a long time, especially since Cathrine's gotten away from the power aspect of being a power forward. Ashley got the most run off the bench by far, and I recall long stretches of her time when I thought she was being misused, because our best defensive player should, logically, be on the best offensive player at her position, and I thought she spent too much time on Bird. Ashley's strength is in smothering a player who's shooting, not in stopping up an offense. Tiffany, I felt, didn't get a chance to get into any kind of rhythm. Barbara made a cameo, the type that gets included in the credits in very, very small text.

These notes aren't just short because they're being written a few days after the fact. They're also short because so few players actually got time in that game. It's a problem both Donovan and Coyle have, this vague lack of awareness that there are in fact other players on the bench who have proven themselves to be at least somewhat useful and would certainly give the exhausted rotation some much-needed rest. There were three DNP-CDs on the Liberty that day, and there were definitely some good opportunities for Lisa or even Jess to get some minutes- or if That Moron doesn't trust Jess yet, to at least put Barbara back in, seeing as how we could use someone who's interested in playing post defense. Donovan at least has the excuse of having fewer players on the roster, but still, I would have inserted Robinson at some point.

Illogical substitution patterns and That Moron's inability to tell when a player is either not playing well or is about to fall over led to one of the most interesting moments I've ever seen on the Liberty bench. Cathrine had just committed a series of turnovers, which may even have included that inexplicable pass to Sue Bird, and there was a timeout. Shameka was summoned back into the game… and she pointed at Erin to indicate that 'twas Erin coming out of the game. Erin… did not take it well. She was visibly pissed off, both at That Moron and at Cathrine. She had some very intense words with the coaching staff during the timeout, and the boy thinks that her body language indicated that she dropped the f-bomb. (If she did, aw, sniffle, she's growing up.) I've seen her get animated before, but never like this. Now, I don't know if it was momentary frustration, or if there's something deeper going on, but it was definitely interesting.

No real summation this time, because it's way after the fact. (That's it. No more afterparties.) I do suspect the Liberty got suckered into playing the Storm's game, much as they got suckered into playing the Comets' game, and that speaks both to the youth of the team and the inability of the coach and her staff to make the necessary adjustments in order to impose their game and their skillset on their opponent.