May 9th, 2019: China at Liberty

Just the Facts, Ma'am: The New York Liberty answered a second-quarter run from the Chinese national team with a third-quarter run of their own in an 89-71 win at the Barclays Center in Brooklyn. Xu Han and Kia Nurse each had 19 points to lead the Liberty. Li Meng had 15 points to lead the Chinese side.

For free t-shirts, soft goods, defensive lapses, strong stances, DAT TOUCH PASS THO, dubious fashion choices, packing the house, getting the gang back together, and coming home, join your intrepid and joyous blogger after the jump.

You know what today is? That's right. Issa gameday. Sure, it might be a meaningless preseason game, and most of the players we're expecting to be rotation players are unavailable, but it's game day. More importantly, it's a game day in a real arena and essentially a test drive to see if Brooklyn is going to happen next year. It's the New York Liberty versus the Chinese national team. It's WNBA basketball, live and in color. It's a taunting, tantalizing, teasing taste of the life we should lead as fans of professional basketball before we return to That Dump. (Well, most of us return to That Dump. Your intrepid blogger will not be doing the full season there.)

I'm not thrilled with the requirement to check backpacks at Barclays, especially given how long the process is to get them back. Gotta speed that up. Also, cashless concession stands are the devil, should absolutely be illegal, are probably going to cost the team money, lock people out of purchases, and may generally utilize the left-hand egress.

Those are pretty much my only complaints about the venue. We had amazing seats- you probably saw my big stupid face behind the bench at some point, or at least saw my big stupid clipboard. I know someone heard us at some point, because when we let out our best, harmonized, Flava Flav "YEAHHHH BOYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYD" we got a look from Reshanda Gray in her street clothes behind the bench.

I liked Reshanda's dress. I liked the cut of Amanda Zahui B's suit, but I'm not feeling the 19th-century prisoner stripes. Spoon remains a timeless national treasure. For the love of God, Katie, tuck in that blouse if it's juuuuuuust a titch longer than your jacket. Charmin's velour jacket was amazing.

Okay, the Fashion Notes of Doom are done.

I was honestly expecting a little more coherency from the Chinese side. I mean, I'm assuming they've played together before. I could be wrong. We didn't get rosters, so I had to pull everything together off the uniforms and the graphics (and the graphics took their time arriving).

I have belatedly realized that I've rendered the Chinese names in the traditional East Asian order of family name first, then given name. I'm choosing to leave them this way for the members of the Chinese national team, but reversing them for Xu Han while she plays for a Western team in order to keep her consistent with her teammates. If it turns out the WNBA, in its infinite wisdom- stop giggling over there on the other side of that screen- already reversed her names for me, I'll fix it at some point in the indeterminate future.

Both full rosters were announced before the game, and there were a couple of names that the PA guy didn't know what to do with. (He had the most trouble with Li Jiacen and Wang Xuemeng. And Talia Caldwell.) There was an exchange of soft goods. Somehow Brittany Boyd ended up with the ceremonial gift banner, and she looked like she was unsure of what to do with this and why she even got it in the first place. The more experienced international veterans appeared amused.

We saw the very end of the Chinese bench in the fourth quarter, after fouls had claimed Zhang Liting and Li Yuere. Wu Tongtong and Guo Zixuan did not impress. Wang Siyu actually got a couple of minutes in the first half, but I mostly remember her coming in at the end.

Yang Liwei made an impression on first entry into the game, but it was that of an aspiring actress, looking for fouls even as she threw elbows. She calmed down a little bit after some of the fouls started going against her, and her energy focused more successfully on going after loose balls. She picked up steam as the game went on. Zhang Ru made a great defensive play in the second quarter- I think it was an interception off one of our guards, but don't hold me to that. Zhang Liting played a lot of minutes in the high post, but fouled out in the end, and I’m not sure she was as effective as the minutes her coach gave her would have indicated.

Whenever Li Yueru reports to Atlanta, they're going to get a good one. There were moments when I was reminded of Zheng Haixia, but I think that was just how the jersey hung on her. She's strong, and she's got good power in the paint. If she can stay out of foul trouble, she'll be fantastic. Wang Xuemeng got going during the big Chinese run in the second quarter, and seemed to slip our defense at the most inopportune moments; she'd be the one at the basket ready for the pass while everyone else tangled in the scrum for the loose ball. Pan Zhenqi did all right, including a three off an amazing jump pass from Yang. It might have been the best pass of the game in a lot of games, but we'll get to that later.

I don't know what it is, but I like watching Li Meng play. She's got a pretty shot, even if it didn't go down as often as it seemed to in the flow of the game. She just seems fun to watch, like she has a sense of what she's doing on the court that some of her teammates might have lacked. Li Yuan made some good hustle plays going after loose balls, but looking at that box score, I'm not sure I would have defined her as the shooting guard and Li Meng as the point guard. She keyed hard on Brittany Boyd.

China picked up the pace in the second quarter and went hard inside. Our defense wasn't ready for the change, and our offense was a pile of hot garbage in that quarter. They did eventually key on Kia Nurse, but then Xu Han found her footing.

I see on the transaction wire today that Kolby Morgan was already the first cut from camp, and I don't know if I agree with her being the first. I don't think she had a place on the final roster, but at least she's fully functional. I don't think Kolby knew what her role was. She did have the one amazing touch pass to Xu for the amazing touch finish, but that was her one highlight. I know I come down hard on Kelly Faris for things that are out of her control, and if you're expecting me to apologize for it, that's a thing that's not happening. But she played in such obvious pain in this game that I almost wanted to hug her. I think I literally saw her have a back spasm on the court (at least that's the most logical explanation for why she almost went ass over teakettle into the lane during someone else's free throw) and at the end of the game she looked ready to cry. I respect her heart and her knowledge of the game, but it's time for her to go into coaching. Tiffany Bias looked lost and committed fouls she shouldn't have. Bianca Cuevas-Moore made a lot of great hustle plays and brought energy to the floor. I'm just not convinced she can consistently keep that energy pointed in useful directions. Tanisha Wright looked like she was auditioning for the part of Sugar Rodgers. The bad version of Sugar Rodgers. T's supposed to be the veteran showing the youngsters how to play the game; if that game was any indication of how her game has devolved since her year off and her subsequent detour to Minnesota, that's not a good sign. She took terrible shots and dribbled the clock into oblivion, and even her defense was shoddy.

Rebecca Allen, if you're going to take terrible stupid shots, have the courtesy to follow those terrible stupid shots for the rebound, please. You bring shame on our name otherwise. Megan Huff shows promise, but I don't think she can make it over the hump in this training camp. She needs some seasoning, but I can see her being a regular in camp, if not eventually breaking through and making a roster. She's got a good head for the game. On the other hand, I don't see Talia Caldwell making the team. She had a lot of trouble getting into and maintaining proper defensive positioning. (I'm just saying, it's probably a bad sign when a guard who's younger than you are seems to know where your post player butt needs to be on defense better than you do.) A couple of the fouls were terrible calls, and the blonde ref seemed to have it in for her, but overall I think I prefer Talia as a writer than as a rotation player. Avery Warley-Talbert had herself a day on the glass. Good Lord, did she get herself some definition since last we met. Are we allowed to make jokes about having a license to bare arms anymore? I'd have liked to see her finish a little better at the rim, but she's undersized and the primary Chinese posts were not. She is who she is, and she's very good at being who she is. Right now, we need who she is.

It's going to take me some time to get used to Asia Durr, because my brain is wired weird and I keep seeing Alex Montgomery when I look at her. Given that Alex was a defensive specialist and Asia is... extremely an offensive specialist, you can see why this is tripping me up. I see the potential. I see the firepower. I also see the learning curve against defenses that are better than college defenses. If she's got moves, she's going to have to use more of them instead of relying on her talent to power through, because it's not happening. Brittany Boyd ran into some intense Chinese defense, and it felt like she should have finished on more drives (and yet I only see her missing one shot in the box score). When she's on, she's playing the game at a better speed than everyone else. When she's not, it's Jessica Bibby and Sherill Baker all over again, and we can get that from Bianca. But even when her speed betrayed her, her hustle remained- she forced jump balls on players she had no business forcing them with.

We were down pretty bad in the third quarter, and then Kia Nurse decided that that was going to change. She put up 14 in the third quarter alone, and I think most of them were in the same run. Eventually China started sending a triple-team at her, and as a result we lost a little momentum, but until then it was her game and everyone else was just along for the ride. She was tough, and she was fearless, and she was determined, and she played like she wanted to prove she belonged on the posters next to Tina. Tina Charles did the Tina Charles things she always does. The husband noticed that her windup has gotten more pronounced, although maybe it was just this game. She got called for some dubious offensive fouls, as one does, and objected to them, as one does. She and Xu are going to have to get used to each other on the glass in order for them to rebound better as a team. Right now they seem to be filling each other's space. But I love what we're going to get from Xu Han. She's so raw, and she needs to strengthen up a little, but there's so much potential. Just the ability to find her in the airspace so few players can even reach will do wonders for our offense, and when she and the guards get to know each other better, woo-ee will this be fun. She moves with much more grace than you'd expect from someone her size. So many tall women don't seem to know what to do with their height, but she seems at least aware of it, if not necessarily comfortable with it. I'm sure she'll have growing pains. But I also feel confident that she'll grow through them.

It's training camp, so there's some disorganization to expect. We might have a better handle on it at Mohegan (and your intrepid blogger will be there to see it). I don't know if Katie knows what she has to work with yet. I don't even know if Katie has determined what she's going to do with what she has.

We got free t-shirts! Free t-shirts are best t-shirts! Except for the ones you somehow manage to catch because holy blessed Arceus I caught a t-shirt! (sorry adorable tourist lady, but it's an XL so I'm keeping it) BANNER DAY. (I like the design on the shirts they gave us, too.)

For whatever reason, the refs were just not calling lane violations in this game. It took pretty much every player involved falling into the paint to finally get one, and they just threw up their hands and called a double violation for a jump ball. The lack of numbers on the front of the WNBA jerseys is definitely throwing the refs off; there was a foul initially called on #33 Talia Caldwell that was actually on #3 Tiffany Bias (and was a terrible call, but I'm partisan), and one ref gave up on calling the Liberty players by number when speaking to the scorer's table.

Timeless Torches need a little more synchronization to incorporate the newcomers into the routine, but again, preseason.

The crowd really got going in the second half. It sounded like a real Liberty game for the first time in ages. We did notice that there were no "Let's go Liberty" chants, which might have been in keeping with the international friendly element. Then again, we had "DE-FENSE!" sound clips, so.

Xu bowed to both sides of the floor when she came off. I thought that was sweet.

There are definitely things the crew needs to work on, and I suspect it's going to be a very disjointed season as personnel drop in and out depending on international commitments, but I like the promise of our young players. I just want to see more out of our veterans, especially if that's the whole reason we brought them in.

(No, I didn't like the Tanisha Wright signing, thanks for asking.)

A brief respite, a rummage through the wardrobe, and it'll be time to hit Mohegan for all the games!