Seattle Storm vs. San Antonio Silver Stars: Live blog, game thread, and links

Will summarize key thoughts as soon as I finish my pre-game dinner

Coach Sandy Brondello spoke repeatedly about the value of having a healthy Becky Hammon.

“It’s tough when you have your best player sitting on the sidelines all the time,” said Brondello. “She’s our playmaker, our chemistry player so it was good to have her back on court. We’re slowly getting better. It’s still a long way to go, but I’m seeing steps forward. And the last 20 minutes against Phoenix we took a step in the right direction. So now it’s about being more consistent.”

With the Storm being tired and having better chemistry, she hopes this is an opportunity to pull a KeyArena upset to avenge their “embarrassing” 28 point loss at home against the Storm.

“We showed film and we didn’t have to hone the point in like, ‘We got our butts kicked’,” said Brondello. “We were embarrassed, we didn’t come ready to play, this is the best team in the league. They know we’re up against a touch opponent, but they know we can do better than what we did last time.”

On Jayne Appel: she missed camp and still hasn’t practiced much, but is coming along and should start seeing an increase in minutes.

The Storm have been the most efficient team in the league all season, but showed an uncharacteristic tendency to turn the ball over during their recent road trip. Although coach Brian Agler hasn’t even had time to sit down and review those game tapes, it is something he’s concerned about.

“It was something we continually talk about everyday is how efficient we play,” said Agler. “Indiana creates the most turnovers and they turned us over a little bit — that was one of two games when we’ve had more turnovers than assists. We were on the positive side in New York but we did have a little bit more than what we’d like to have.”

More importantly – and perhaps a deviation from the normally internally focused talk — Agler knows that his opponent was embarrassed in their previous meeting and likely looking to redeem themselves this time.

“Here’s what I know: I spent three years down there and I know those people really well,” said Agler. “I know that we embarrassed them down there a couple of weeks ago and I know that they didn’t enjoy that. And I know what kind of competitors they are. ..I told our team yesterday: they are going to come in here, they’re coming off a good win, and they’re gonna come in with confidence. They’re going to try to do the same thing to us that we did to them down there.”

or terrible because they can’t make 2 footers

So after those 4 consecutive orebs on the first poss it was the inability to score that played out…

The Storm are looking less than their best. Thankfully, San Antonio is struggling to find their rhythm too.

But the bottom line is that the Storm have come out looking weary, competing 4 turnovers in a little more than 5 minutes…

and for a moment it looked from media row vantage point like they were playing a rover with Lawson-Wade as Taurasi

Oh how good it feels to have a bench…

Abrosimova and Willingham came in the game and had 6 points between them.

SASS just not playing very good defense – on that Cash three, the SASS bench was yelling at the team on the court (Brondello even stepped on the court to point) to guard Abrosimova who as also open… two players open..yikes…

Well, the Storm seemed to find a rhythm with their bench in the game.

Wright cleanly stripped Hammon at the end of the quarter to get the steal and fastbreak layup, but the heroes of that quarter were the bench who really turned the tide…

In addition to the rebounding, the Storm are beating SASS in points in the paint 10-4.

..and promptly picked up 2 fouls…not a good run for her…

That might seem like an arbitrary tech on Snow…

But on the previous play, Snow was holding Jackson for the entire play with her arm locked around hers almost behind her back. Jackson was trying to get away and Snow wouldn’t let go.

After the steal and Jackson got the ball back for the shots that led to the free throws, after the foul Snow swung her arm at Jackson again… in terms of keeping things under control, the tech was warranted.

Mike McGinn, mayor of Seattle in the house… got a mix of boos and applause. But Hasselbeck got applause… interesting…

The Storm are winning this game on 2nd chance and points in the paint. Period.

It’s the type of gritty game that you almost want to see a team play so you know just how tough they are…

this time she was quite, Scotter. :)

Pac-10 ftw….

And Abrosimova hits the jumper from the wing they’ve apparently been giving her

Allie Quiqley on the bench in front of me looked at the trainer, grinned, and just shrugged like, “What can you do?”

Cash on Strom Vision with a encore dance troupe performance…

Agler was heated on the sidelines..at the refs… Cash looked like she was fouled after her oreb…

Momentum staying with the Storm…

Swin did a little dance move… Agler’s was funnier because it was Agler, mostly.

a little Bobby Brown…Storm got soul…

The Storm have been in firm control… since the rough start.

The Silver Stars’ defensive rotations, assignments, and intensity just isn’t there (please see Brondello’s comments about what happened the last time they failed to put forth adequate effort) and the Storm are just killing them on the offensive boards, 11-3 for 20 points in the paint to the Stars’ 10.

And the Storm really are not looking good either… if they can muster up the type of energy that Agler said he liked last game against NYL, they’ll be fine. As D Tierney said above, LJ is just destroying them right now and they look to be without answer.

If the Silver Stars figure out anything defensively the Storm will struggle to do anything.

There’s that 3 pt shooting from LJ that the Star’s wanted no part of!

(Playing PYT in arena…pause…dads are dancing as well… someone just puled a nice MJ impersonation in the Soul Train line, which btw is what I want to see Agler do next for the record…)

Anyway… the defense is still lax for San Antonio.

What happened?

I picked her today for WNBA Pick One…my day is done with 3 pts :|

health most important.

While the Storm are up and in control.. Bird limped off the court about a minute ago after Edwige Lawson-Wade fouled her… no word on what the injury is…

No answer for LJ – rookie Jayne Appel came in the game and guarded her literally throwing all of her weight at her trying to get an oreb…

I’m sick of the Stars losing in Seattle..enough is enough!

Strained knee for Bird…may return

Nice to see her get some run.

Yay!! Snow is back in to help me out

I do. I’m from California.

Anyway, End 3, Seattle 62 SASS 46…and it could get worse…

If it were up to me, I’d leave Bird in the Locker room and rely on the rest of the squad to pull it out…

Positive for the Stars, Appel is looking very well. Good strength, seems comfortable in the offense or more than when I last saw her.

I wonder what happens (if anything) with Riley when Appel gets good and rolling…

Agler with starters minus Sue Bird…

“I can be everywhere and nowhere at once”

This bodes well for the season.

It was something of a post pattern. I kinda wanted to see a 10 yard out.

82-61.

With that roster, they should look better than that showing

later

Been reading these threads ofter the fact and liked them. It was fun to actually participate