WNBA Today, 10/11/2013: Lynx complete sweep over Dream to finish unbeaten postseason and take another title

 

Heading into last night’s Game 3, the Atlanta Dream didn’t just have the weight of being down 2-0 on their shoulders. After suffering sweeps at the hands of Seattle and Minnesota in 2011 and 2012, the franchise was 0-8 in Finals games. Plus they hadn’t just lost the two games back in Minnesota – they’d been stuffed by 25 in each of them. They were fighting against history, against embarrassment, and against the all-conquering Minnesota Lynx team that was looking to complete an undefeated postseason with their third consecutive series sweep. It was a daunting task, and with Philips Arena hosting Disney on Ice, they didn’t even have their regular home venue to boost their chances.

 

At times in the first two games, it looked like Dream head coach Fred Williams had run out of ideas on how to challenge the Lynx. But he decided to try his third different starting lineup in three games, with Le’coe Willingham coming back in at power forward ahead of Aneika Henry (or Tiffany Hayes, if they’d wanted to go small again). It was a thoroughly random roll of the dice, seeing as Willingham isn’t really the kind of player who can turn a series, but you couldn’t blame him for trying something different. It didn’t work out too well in the opening moments, though. Janel McCarville – nominally being guarded by Willingham – decided to be particularly aggressive offensively, and drilled a series of jumpers. Willingham wasn’t doing anything particularly badly – helping away from McCarville is something you’re basically supposed to do against Minnesota – but the Lynx center fired away and refused to miss. It was clear around midseason this year that the Lynx coaching staff had asked McCarville to be more of a threat offensively, so that teams couldn’t cheat off her quite so egregiously, and she started taking some of those wide open jumpers teams offered her. Now she was stepping up in Game 3 of the Finals. This Lynx team really can hurt you from all angles.

 

It looked like we might be in for another blowout in the opening minutes. The McCarville barrage was backed up by a couple of buckets for Maya Moore, while Angel McCoughtry was out of control at the other end. She started with a hideous jacked three with 16 on the shot clock barely hit the rim, before an airball on a 1-on-3 baseline move and a couple of desperately soft turnovers when she drove into heavy traffic. There’s a thin line between ‘carrying your team’ and ‘trying to do too much’. Often, frankly, the difference is whether the bad shots you take go in or not. But Angel was dominating the ball, and it wasn’t working at all. Williams took a timeout after barely five minutes of play, with his team already trailing 13-3.

 

McCoughtry was summarily benched, in the hope that she’d calm down, or relax, or just get out of her own team’s way. And it worked. The Dream started running their offense through Erika de Souza in the low post, something that we should’ve seen more of in this entire series (although the Lynx admittedly make it very difficult with their heavy strong-side help). With McCarville resting on the bench, it was Rebekkah Brunson trying to guard her, and for a few minutes Erika was dominant. She was finishing inside, or hitting little turnarounds, or unbalancing the Lynx defense so much with her threat to score that gaps opened up for players like Armintie Herrington on cuts and offensive boards. Erika can also be an emotional leader for this team, and once she was involved in the offense she started jumping around, waving her arms and encouraging the crowd at Atlanta’s temporary home in the Gwinnett Center. The Dream had some life after all.

 

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WNBA Today, 10/09/2013: Another day, another domination – Lynx blow out Dream again to move one win from title

 

Game 1 of the WNBA Finals was frankly a little embarrassing for the Atlanta Dream. They came into Minnesota on a high after a strong performance in the Eastern Finals, and were essentially blown off the floor by the home town Lynx. So Game 2 needed to be about responding and improving. They couldn’t afford to shoot 2-36 from outside the paint again, but they also needed to find ways to simply shoot fewer shots from outside. They had to craft better avenues to the rim, and create easier looks. And they had to do a better job defensively so that they could roll that momentum into their offense. All the Lynx needed to do was be ready for the potential response from Atlanta – more of the same from Minnesota would do perfectly nicely.

 

The Dream made one conspicuous move before Game 2 even tipped off. Aneika Henry started the game in place of Tiffany Hayes, replacing a guard with a post. Hayes had a nasty fall in Game 1, resulting in some lower back pain, but was ready to play off the bench. It was an attempt by Fred Williams to shake things up, try to capitalise on their size inside, and go with the option that worked the best in Game 1. Not that anything worked particularly well in Game 1, but Henry was one of the few bright spots. Minnesota had their regular starting five in place as usual, and made the defensive adjustments you’d expect. Seimone Augustus started on Angel McCoughtry instead of Rebekkah Brunson, who moved onto Henry. Janel McCarville stayed with Erika de Souza. Of course, with two true posts on the floor for the Dream, McCoughtry had to guard one of Minnesota’s star wings rather than hide on McCarville. She started on Augustus.

 

Atlanta looked better in the opening minutes than they had in the previous game. There was a clear intent to drive and attack at every opportunity – sometimes even when there wasn’t really much of an opportunity. McCoughtry and Armintie Herrington both went barreling into the paint on early possessions, and even Erika took a step or two outside, then attacked off the dribble when she glimpsed a gap, rather than settling for a short jumper. However, they were still running into a lot of traffic, and because the Lynx knew that Atlanta wanted to drive at all costs – and that the Dream were unlikely to punish them by hitting shots from outside – multiple defenders were waiting in the lane to block the route to the basket. The mentality was good from Atlanta, but the success was limited.

 

And they still couldn’t get any stops. The same things continued to work offensively for Minnesota – solid screens, effective and purposeful movement off the ball, unselfish passing, and making shots. Once again, the game was frantic early on – just the style Atlanta like to play – but once again it was Minnesota pulling away on the scoreboard. As the first quarter wore on, we even saw the Dream make a few perimeter shots – Hayes drilled a three with virtually her first touch after coming off the bench, while Alex Bentley and Jasmine Thomas both made jumpers from the top of the key. But those were just occasional breaks in the overall Lynx dominance.

 

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WNBA Today, 10/07/2013: Lynx dominate Dream to roll to easy victory and 1-0 Finals lead

 

After what seemed like in interminable wait, last night the 2013 WNBA Finals finally got underway. After building the fanbase over three years of success, the Minnesota faithful was out in force to support their Lynx. They dropped the Finals opener at home last year, which ultimately played a key part in Indiana’s 3-1 upset victory in the series. So the Lynx were hoping for a much better start this time around, to set the groundwork for regaining the championship trophy. The Atlanta Dream were in town hoping to spoil the party – or at the very least do better than the sweeps they’ve suffered in their two previous visits to the Finals.

 

The first questions were answered by the opening lineups. Minnesota center Janel McCarville had reportedly been suffering from some back pain since Friday’s practice, but she was in the starting lineup as usual along with the regular Lynx group. Atlanta had decided to stick with the small lineup that had served them so well against Indiana in the Eastern Finals, with Angel McCoughtry as a pseudo-power forward alongside Jasmine Thomas, Tiffany Hayes and Armintie Herrington on the perimeter. The opening possessions quickly illustrated that Fred Williams had decided to go with the unusual defensive assignment I mentioned in my preview, with McCoughtry guarding McCarville while Erika de Souza took Rebekkah Brunson. Herrington started on Seimone Augustus, with Hayes on Maya Moore, but Atlanta had a general willingness to switch on the perimeter whenever necessary. As anticipated, Minnesota were happy to match up with Atlanta’s small lineup without changing anything about themselves – Brunson started on McCoughtry, McCarville took Erika, and they got down to work.

 

It was a pretty frantic opening period, with both teams feeding from the crowd’s energy and the action flowing from end to end. McCarville posted up on McCoughtry once, and managed to force the ball home, but the Lynx weren’t going to take themselves out of their offense in an effort to attack that potential mismatch. They were moving well off the ball, Moore was hitting jumpers, and Augustus was successful with a couple of those dive-in plays from the corner, both times finishing off nice feeds from McCarville. Their offense was rolling nicely.

 

But the Dream had a little early success too, doing some of the things we knew they’d need to do in this series. Herrington crashed for an offensive rebound, stealing the ball right from Brunson’s hands and dropping in a putback. Erika got a couple of touches in the low post, and found a way to finish over or around McCarville. McCoughtry opened her account with a ridiculous leaning jumper that she jacked far too early in the offense, but it somehow went in. The problem was that they weren’t having much success stopping the Lynx and when they finally did create a turnover, McCoughtry blew a wide open layup. The high pace suited the Dream, but the transition chances still weren’t really there. Minnesota were doing a solid job of taking care of the ball while running their offense, preventing those break opportunities for Atlanta.

 

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2013 WNBA Finals Preview: Minnesota Lynx vs. Atlanta Dream – Part 2, Key Themes and Factors, and the Final Verdict

 

Now for the topics, trends, decisions and debates that are likely to decide the WNBA Finals, or are at least worth paying attention to as the series goes along. Many of them were touched upon in Part 1, where we took a closer look at the personnel involved, but now we’ll get more in depth. Then, just for fun, I’ll offer up a prediction. Although with the way it’s been going for me with picks this year in the postseason, you might want to go the other way.

 

Big or small?

 

Dream head coach Fred Williams made a move for the Eastern Finals that surprised me with its sheer boldness and willingness to be proactive. He often seems to spend games watching them drift by, including in the first-round where his most meaningful move was forced upon him by Le’coe Willingham’s injury. But he opened the series against Indiana with his small lineup, essentially featuring four perimeter players – Angel McCoughtry is generally considered the power forward because she’s the tallest of the four, but they’re basically all guards and wings. It proved to be an astute move, as their offense sliced through the Fever at will, and consistently looked far more effective than at any stage in the previous series against Washington. Now he has to decide what to do against the Lynx, because Minnesota are not the Indiana Fever. They don’t have a virtual perimeter player at power forward – they have Rebekkah Brunson, who might not be a traditional post-up threat, but she’s big enough and nasty enough to take advantage of a smaller player in the paint and on the glass.

 

So does Williams concede that his small lineup can’t defend the Lynx well enough, and go back to a more traditional lineup, with either Willingham or Aneika Henry at power forward? Probably not. Maybe, at times, we’ll see two Dream bigs together in this series. He threw that option away entirely against the Fever, but if Brunson starts dominating the glass, or Williams just wants to shake the Lynx up a little, it might be a more useful option against Minnesota. But we saw in the regular season game between these teams on August 20th that the Dream’s small lineup can both survive defensively, and succeed offensively against the Lynx. Atlanta will want to keep their pace high, and maintain the attacking mentality from the Indiana series, so I’d expect McCoughtry either to start at power forward, or slide there pretty early on.

 

Then it becomes a case of what either team does to handle the matchups. Minnesota can make everything nice and simple by going small themselves, shifting Maya Moore to power forward in a similar move to Atlanta with McCoughtry. Then the defensive assignments are simple. But Lynx head coach Cheryl Reeve won’t allow Williams to dictate the action like that. Instead we’ll see Brunson defending McCoughtry – Brunson did an effective job in that role in the regular season game I mentioned – while forcing Atlanta to handle the opposing mismatches on the other end. Either McCoughtry has to defend Brunson, which is plausible for a while but probably not something you want to see for an entire series, or Williams has to get creative.

 

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2013 WNBA Finals Preview: Minnesota Lynx vs. Atlanta Dream – Part 1, Match-ups and Challenges

 

By the numbers (over entire regular season):

 

Minnesota Lynx (26-8) vs Atlanta Dream (17-17)

 

Points scored per 100 possessions: 106.46 (1st in WNBA) – 95.19 (9th)

Points Conceded per 100 possessions: 94.55 (3rd) – 93.2 (1st)

Rebound percentage; .522 (2nd) – .503 (4th)

 

Season series between the teams: Tied 1-1

07/09 @Min, Lynx win 94-72 (no Augustus or Hayes, Lyttle’s last game this season)

08/20 @Atl, Dream win 88-75 (available players were as expected for this series)

 

—–

 

Here we go again, everybody. The Minnesota Lynx are in the WNBA Finals for the third consecutive season, looking to regain the title that they lost a year ago. The Atlanta Dream are back in the championship series for the third time in four years. The franchises clashed in the 2011 Finals, with relatively similar rosters – and the Lynx won in a sweep. But that feels like a long time ago, and a lot of water has passed under the bridge since then. The 2013 regular season, which saw the Dream finish .500 while the Lynx were their typical dominant selves, is largely irrelevant now. So a series from a couple of years ago definitely can’t be considered particularly important. Everyone starts the Finals 0-0, and the Dream’s confidence should be high after a sweep of Indiana to win the East, where they went some way towards reestablishing their identity. The track record of the Lynx makes them worthy favourites for this series, but they won’t have things all their own way.

 

Let’s start out on the perimeter, where you’ll arguably find the strength of both these teams. The Lynx have one of the strongest perimeter trios the women’s game has ever seen. Lindsay Whalen is a consummate point guard, the classic ‘coach on the floor’ who’ll run everything for head coach Cheryl Reeve and get the ball where it needs to go. But Whalen’s also more than capable of attacking the defense for her own points, as we saw in the recent Game 1 against Phoenix, where her scoring helped take the game over. The strength of Minnesota’s wings only makes things easier for Whalen, because typically opponents have to use their stronger perimeter defenders to contain Seimone Augustus and Maya Moore, leaving Whalen with whoever’s left. In this series, that’ll likely be Jasmine Thomas and some Alex Bentley. Both Thomas and Bentley have had their moments this season, playing their parts in Atlanta’s backcourt attack and occasionally getting hot, but they’ll need to at least compete with Whalen and try to stay in front of her as much as possible. Everyone gambles in Atlanta’s defense in search of steals, but they still need to hold their ground and prevent Whalen from getting into a flow that dominates the rhythm of the game.

 

Then there’s Moore and Augustus. After a couple of years settling into the league – where she was already impressive – Moore took another step this season and definitively moved past Augustus as the most valuable of the Lynx wings. She can do a little bit of everything, stuffing the stat-sheet in a way Augustus never really has, while continuing to be a remarkable scoring threat from all over the floor. She’ll rise up and shoot over the defense when you think she’s covered, and just score anyway, or create points by running the floor hard and working on the glass. Augustus is still just as dangerous as a scorer, will break out for points on the run just like Moore, or pull up for jumpers over anyone. She’s also developed a little more of an inside game this year, which we’ll undoubtedly see her break out at times in this series, especially if Atlanta try to guard her with a significantly smaller player. Armintie Herrington is a strong and long enough defender to trouble Augustus on post-ups or drives, but if they try to get away with Thomas, Bentley or even Tiffany Hayes for extended stretches, Augustus has more ways to attack them these days.

 

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WNBA Today, 09/30/2013: Dream and Lynx complete sweeps to set up 2011 Finals rematch

 

Unlike the first-round, where we had three upsets out of four opening games to start the 2013 WNBA playoffs, both higher seeds held serve to begin the conference finals. So Sunday afternoon saw the lower seeds trying to keep their seasons alive back on their home floors. While there had been differing levels of defeat in their respective Game 1s, both Indiana and Phoenix had obvious things they had to fix if they wanted to avoid packing their bags and waving goodbye to their title chances.

 

As usual, we opened in the East, where the issue for the Fever was pretty obvious. Atlanta were ridiculously efficient offensively in Game 1 of the series, repeatedly slicing through Indiana’s defense after breaking defenders down off the dribble. Turnovers were a problem for the Fever as well, but they didn’t ignite that many Atlanta fastbreaks – it was largely a basic case of failing to contain penetration in the halfcourt, and everything spiralling from there. Indiana’s offense had been good enough if their defense had been anywhere near its typical level.

 

Game 2 began in a very similar vein. Indiana’s offense was productive enough, with Tamika Catchings hitting a couple of shots, and the team getting inside and drawing some fouls. The whistles even seemed to be going their way. but Atlanta were still piercing their defense with far too much ease. All afternoon we saw the Dream run a simple weave action out on the perimeter, which virtually all defenses – including Indiana’s – cover by simply switching assignments. You almost become the top half of a 3-2 zone and just cover the space, watching the handoffs happen in front of you. But then the Dream would toss in a screen at one of the elbows, and suddenly there was enough space to drive a bus down one side of the lane. Atlanta were again doing a good job of spacing the floor, but not in the typical way teams ‘space’. You normally do that with shooters, who can take a kick-out pass and knock down a shot if the defense drops away from them. The Dream’s small lineup – they’d obviously stuck with the four-perimeter-player format that worked so well in Game 1 – just spread out and created as much room as possible for each other to drive. Indiana were still sticking too close to them, failing to clog the lane, and allowing Atlanta to beat them off the dribble.

 

However, the Dream were missing a little more when they made it to the rim. Indiana were doing a slightly better job of at least challenging the finishes inside, putting the Dream drivers under pressure, and forcing misses. Atlanta had grown in confidence, and were attacking with speed in transition, but the misses allowed Indiana to keep pace and the score was tied at 19-19 at the end of the first quarter.

 

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WNBA Today, 09/27/2013: Dream hold off Fever as defense disappears out East; Mercury kiss cheeks while Lynx kick ass in West

 

In some ways, the prospects for our Eastern and Western Conference Finals in the WNBA this season suggested they would go to type. In the East, we had two teams known for their ability to pressurise and force turnovers. One was the best defense in the league this season, the other has been known as a shut-down defensive squad for years. A classic Eastern defensive battle was on the cards. In the West, we had the team with far and away the best offense in the WNBA this season, against a team known as all-offense, all-the-time for over six years (albeit with some recent hints of defensive interest). So a run-and-gun Western shootout, right? As it turned out, we got the contrast – just not in quite the way that history might’ve suggested.

 

The evening began in Atlanta, with the Indiana Fever starting another series on the road. That’s what happens when you slide into the playoffs with a sub-.500 record after a constant struggle throughout the regular season. But the Dream had survived problems of their own, collapsing from a 10-1 start to the season and then having to come from 1-0 down in the first-round of the playoffs to fight past Washington. Whoever ultimately makes it out of the East is going to have worked through some significant difficulties to get there.

 

Dream head coach Fred Williams made a surprisingly active and ballsy move to open the series. After junking his small lineup entirely against the Mystics in the first-round, and making it through that series in part because of his team’s size and offensive rebounding, he immediately went small against Indiana. Both Le’coe Willingham (who started the Washington series at power forward, then missed Games 2 and 3 due to a knee problem) and Aneika Henry (who replaced Willingham) were in uniform and available, but both began the series on the bench. Instead, Angel McCoughtry slid over to the theoretical power forward position, while Armintie Herrington regained her starting spot alongside Tiffany Hayes and Jasmine Thomas on the perimeter. Essentially, it puts four perimeter players on the court with center Erika de Souza. It’s a lineup they used effectively as a change-up during the regular season, especially after Sancho Lyttle got hurt and made their ‘natural’ lineups less effective. We were always likely to see it in this series because Indiana are so small these days with Tamika Catchings at power forward. But it’s the first time Williams has ever used it to start a game. In some ways, it’s the exact opposite of how the Washington series began, where Mike Thibault and the Mystics dictated the action throughout Game 1 and Williams never seemed to have an answer. For once, he had the guts to throw the first punch.

 

All of that said, the game didn’t begin particularly well for Atlanta. They looked confused on which way they were going on the opening tip, handing Catchings an uncontested layup to start the game. Then Hayes jacked an ugly three on Atlanta’s first possession, and Catchings continued to light them up for the next few minutes of the game. The plan appeared to be to guard her with Hayes – McCoughtry was hiding on Karima Christmas, as expected – and Catchings apparently wasn’t impressed by this idea. She hit jumpers, or attacked Hayes off the dribble and finished inside. It didn’t look like Hayes could handle her. When the game restarted after the first timeout five minutes into the opening quarter, Herrington had switched over onto Catchings, and Plan A appeared to have been thrown out the window.

 

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2013 WNBA Playoff Previews: Western Conference Finals – Minnesota Lynx vs. Phoenix Mercury

 

By the numbers (over entire regular season):

 

Minnesota Lynx (26-8) vs Phoenix Mercury (19-15)

 

Points scored per 100 possessions: 106.46 (1st in WNBA) – 99.46 (4th)

Points conceded per 100 possessions: 94.55 (3rd) – 100.4 (10th)

Rebound percentage: .522 (2nd) – .486 (10th)

 

Season series between the teams: Minnesota won 5-0

06/06 @Min, Lynx win 99-79

06/19 @Pho, Lynx win 80-69

07/07 @Min, Lynx win 91-59

07/21 @Pho, Lynx win 82-77

07/24 @Min, Lynx win 81-69

 

—–

 

For all the talents of the Los Angeles Sparks, in many ways this was the matchup that everyone wanted to see. In one corner we have the dominant Minnesota Lynx. They were a powerhouse for the third year in a row, once again finishing with the best record in the WNBA. They’ve got three years of chemistry, the smoothest offense and one of the most cohesive defenses in the league. They’ve even got a little bit of extra incentive this season, trying to regain their crown after slipping up against Indiana in the Finals last year when heavily favoured. They’re the ones who were always meant to be here. In the opposite corner, the team who were practically crowned before they set foot on a basketball floor, then had to re-shape themselves after things didn’t go to plan. This isn’t the old Phoenix Mercury, the team that lost the last 12 games they’ve played against the Lynx. Russ Pennell made some changes after he took over in midseason, and now ESPN gets the leader of their ‘Three to See’ in the conference finals after all. We’ve got the reigning champs who were almost forgotten, against the team everyone rushed to anoint as their successors. The Sparks might be out, but Hollywood easily could’ve written this script.

 

Let’s start with what we know. The Lynx are very, very good. They had some occasional struggles getting past Seattle in the first-round, but that was a veteran team with exceptional discipline who know how to make a game messy. And Minnesota still held on to beat them for the sixth straight time this year. With Lindsay Whalen at the point, and Seimone Augustus and Maya Moore on the wings, the Lynx have arguably the most dangerous perimeter trio that the WNBA has ever seen. They can fill it up from outside, they can drive past you, Augustus and Moore have both worked on their post game, and in transition they’re even scarier than the LA team Phoenix just snuck past. This has been one of the central problems for the Mercury in the past in dealing with Minnesota – even if they managed to get their own offense rolling, they couldn’t stop the Lynx to save their lives. It was a team that could play at both ends of the floor against a team that only showed up at one.

 

But while Minnesota have those 12 consecutive wins over Phoenix stretching back to 2011, they’re yet to face the Russ Pennell Mercury. Since taking over he’s gotten the team to engage on the defensive end, and at least expend the energy required to put up a fight when they don’t have the ball. It’s not always been perfect – it takes a while to remember how to follow defensive concepts, and some players on the roster are just basic bad defenders – but they’ve been competitive ever since he took over. Lynx head coach Cheryl Reeve will have her team prepared for the changes in the Mercury, but you can never entirely understand what you’re going to face until you see them on the floor. In the end, maybe it was a positive for Phoenix that they played all five regular season games against Minnesota before the All-Star break. It helped get Corey Gaines fired, and the Lynx never got a taste of the new Mercury.

 

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2013 WNBA Playoff Previews: Eastern Conference Finals – Atlanta Dream vs. Indiana Fever

 

By the numbers (over entire regular season):

 

Atlanta Dream (17-17) vs Indiana Fever (16-18)

 

Points scored per 100 possessions: 95.19 (9th in WNBA) – 95.37 (8th)

Points conceded per 100 possessions: 93.2 (1st) – 95.27 (5th)

Rebounding percentage: .503 (4th) – .503 (5th)

 

Season series between the teams: Atlanta won 3-1

05/31 @Ind, Dream won 86-77

06/25 @Atl, Dream won 76-60

08/10 @Ind, Fever won 80-66

09/04 @Atl, Dream won 89-80

 

—–

 

So here we are again. Two years ago, Atlanta recovered from losing the opening game in the Eastern Conference Finals to fight past Indiana and make their second consecutive trip to the WNBA Finals. Last year, Indiana lost the opening game in the first-round, before coming back to knock out the Dream – beginning the run that ultimately led to a championship. So there’s plenty of history here. Between them, they’ve provided the East’s representative in the WNBA Finals for each of the last four seasons. We’re looking at two teams who know exactly what this is all about, and know each other incredibly well. So with all this familiarity, and both teams clawing their way to mediocre records this season, what’s going to make the difference in who earns another shot at winning it all?

 

The regular season encounters this year tell us very little. Partly because at least one important player was either absent back then or will be absent for the playoffs, and partly because this is the playoffs. Indiana didn’t look like the team that had struggled through much of the regular season in the first-round, because they stepped up their game when it mattered and took the Chicago Sky apart. Atlanta had many problems against Washington in the first-round, but eventually stepped up in key areas and came through. It’s simplistic to say, but these teams are close enough that the winner of this series is likely to be decided in large part by who raises their game best for postseason play. Indiana always seem to enjoy playing Chicago, so maybe that helped them in the last round, but they also looked demonstrably ready for playoff basketball. If Atlanta play like they did for most of the series against the Mystics, and the Fever show up like that again, the Dream are in trouble.

 

A lot of that comes back to Angel McCoughtry. She’s the leader and driving force for Atlanta, but she shot appallingly against Washington when the defense managed to keep her out of the lane and limit Atlanta’s transition chances. Indiana will be trying to do exactly the same thing. Karima Christmas will probably be defending her for most of the series, and is capable of doing a lot of the same things that Monique Currie did for Washington, but the Fever don’t have quite the same size to clog the lane as the Mystics. And as we saw in the Game 3 decider, Washington were eventually hurt by foul trouble. While Indiana’s domination of Chicago masked the issue in the first-round, the Fever are still desperately thin in the post. Foul trouble for Tamika Catchings or Erlana Larkins could cause real problems, because there’s nowhere much else to go.

 

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WNBA Today, 09/24/2013 (Part Two): Sparks dreams dashed by Mercury in dramatic decider

 

So Atlanta were in – now it was on to the decider in a series that had provided rather more offense. The Mercury and Sparks had thrown haymakers at each other, both stolen a game on the road, and ended up here. After the season began with everyone talking about the power of the top three teams in the West, it seemed only appropriate that the first-round should be completed by this. One game to decide who’d face the Lynx in the Western Finals, and who’d be left considering their season a significant disappointment.

 

There was a change in the starting lineup for Phoenix, with the visible pain Penny Taylor was in at the end of Game 2 keeping her out of Game 3 entirely. Returning from her knee surgeries has been a problem all season, and if she was missing a deciding playoff game you know she really wasn’t able to move on it at all. Briana Gilbreath came back into the lineup, which changed up some of the defensive assignments. Kristi Toliver now had Gilbreath to hide on, so she didn’t have to spend as much time worrying about covering DeWanna Bonner (not that Bonner had done much to attack that matchup during this series). Lindsey Harding isn’t much bigger than Toliver, but she’s generally a better defender, and she slid over onto Bonner. But it also gave Phoenix an extra perimeter defender that they could rely on, and Gilbreath started the game on Harding. That allowed Diana Taurasi to move over onto Alana Beard, who she could help away from more consistently than Harding. Losing Taylor could never be a positive, but it had the potential to make Phoenix a more effective defensive team.

 

But the most noticeable difference in the opening stages from the previous games was Kristi Toliver’s offense. She came in a dismal 4-22 from the field in the series, bricking endless jumpers in Game 1 before disappearing entirely as Game 2 wore on. But she was firing away again, hit a step-back over Candice Dupree to open her account, then a transition three shortly afterwards. This was a scary prospect for Phoenix, because Toliver being icy cold had been a big help to them so far in this series. With Taurasi and Brittney Griner missing several decent looks in the opening period, it was some surprising success from Bonner and the usual smoothness of Dupree that kept the Mercury even at 19-19 at the end of the opening period.

 

The second-quarter was kind of insane. If you follow me on Twitter, you’ll have seen that it even provoked me into a little ditty, which went along the lines of “I can’t guard you, You can’t guard me, Let’s all score, together!” LA looked like they were taking control early on, led by Candace Parker. Phoenix have struggled to guard her through much of this series, with Dupree their best option but rarely a particularly successful one. Parker abused her on a series of drives, and helped push the Sparks into an eight-point lead.

 

But then there was the other end of the floor. As it has been for much of the season – and probably should’ve been for even more of the season – the Taurasi-Dupree pick-and-roll became Phoenix’s go-to play. While Dupree couldn’t really guard her, Parker was being even more embarrassingly roasted in the reverse matchup. Her pick-and-roll defense was neither one thing nor the other – she wasn’t staying with the roller to cover the finish, or jumping out on the ballhandler to cut off the pass. She was just sort of watching while Dupree went sailing past (and the rotation to help behind her was pretty awful as well). Dupree also beat her on a couple of straight-up isolation drives and a jumper or two, and just kept piling up points. By halftime she was 10-13 for 20, and the Mercury were shooting 58% for a 42-40 lead.

 

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