Seattle Storm 82, Los Angeles Sparks 60: Live Blog & Game Thread

… if the Storm lose I’m blaming that for tarnishing their pre-game mindset….

Storm
Bird
Cash
Jackson
Little
Wright

Sparks
Parker
Thompson
DeLisha Milton-Jones
Quinn
Penicheiro

6:45 left in first 8-2 Storm

Gillom said that she wanted her team to play with intensity for more than one quarter tonight… perhaps the first quarter will be their one off quarter?

Three straight turnovers that led to Storm fast breaks and a 24 second violation to get things started is not the path to success.

Things are not going so well to start for the Sparks…

Right now they continue turning the ball over offensively…

And leaving Storm shooters wide open defensively…

The combination has not been particularly successful for them…

…and is not particularly happy looking right now…

(the one with the brace)

…and immediately turned and asked out of the game…

She didn’t even go to the bench – she signaled to the trainer and immediately left the floor….

“Ref that was horrible. That was horrible! That was a horrible call”

Again, this is not going well for the Sparks…

Parker left the game with what looked to be an injury to her left shoulder… and if she doesn’t come back things might get tougher on the Sparks, despite the fact that she wasn’t a big part of what they have been doing tonight…

She’s getting more confidence by the day… that was a beautiful pass underneath to Willingham a bit ago…

On Lauren Jackson’s last put back lay up, Jennifer Gillom threw her hands up in the air and did a little half spin…

Somehow or another, LJ went uncontested to the boards after the shot went up. One might think that she’d be a target to keep off the boards, hence the coach’s displeasure…

Right now, the Sparks just look out of sync — we’ll look at the stats later and say it was another outstanding defensive effort from the Storm, but the Sparks are literally throwing the ball away on many plays…

Little didn’t seem to care…

I’m sorry… I can’t type…

They just showed Brian Agler doing the Stanky Leg on Storm Vision here in the arena…

Wow… lol

but parker was absolutely right to get in her face

This is certainly not the best game for the Sparks, but to their credit, they made a bit of a run at the end of the half…

(Sidebar: Kevin Pelton is part of the halftime show? A judge for the trampoline dunk contest…)

..and neither is Sue Bird. Bird was trying to argue that if they called a travel on LJ earlier, they shoulda gotten DMJ for one on that last play where a foul was called…

The WNBA needs one of those “You make the call!” things that the NFL used to do…

And the dance troupe with a little Michael Jackson at the break: “PYT”… great song. Another great idea for Agler!

Anyway, there is still a game going on – the Sparks are making this a bit of an ugly one, which I would argue is to their advantage. They’ve been hitting the offensive boards even harder in the third.

Something Agler said yesterday in practice is that he wanted to limit the Sparks’ one on one play. Now the Sparks are getting it everywhere – from the wing with Parker and in the post with Thompson.

have two players with guard skills shows up in the half court offense sometimes and they get stagnant. It’s gotten better since the beginning of the season, but is still shows itself sometimes including the start to this 2nd half.

Two columns:

“Candace Parker: Points | Pouts”

I wonder what they were discussing…

The Sparks just can’t seem to crack this lead…

They’ve been playing about even, but the Storm are still hitting the boards hard….

Wow – Jana. Vesela.

I think fans were definitely in favor of Ashley Walker in the pre-season, for good reason, but Vesela is developing into quite a solid contributor and the fact that Agler is playing her so early (and often) should mean quite a bit…

She has talked a lot in practice about getting comfortable enough to “just play basketball” and she’s done it tonight…

Kevin Pelton wrote about her more on StormTracker…head over there to check it out….

Much to the delight of the crowd.

They don’t appear to like her much.

…and the Storm come out of the Sparks timeout with their full starting five on the court to finish it out…

Safe to put in Lacey and Bishop now.

Fourth quarter wasn’t a problem… but just guessing that Agler is unhappy with the 2nd and parts of 3rd…?