Final score: Storm 76 – Mystics 72 (W) (9-6)

Attendance | 7042

Anthem Watch | Best ever - gave me goosebumps.

Fan Psyche | Holdsclaw looks reeeeal hurt.

Game Highlight | Adia's fastbreak layup for our first lead and Sue hitting some clutch free throws to ice the win.

Halftime | Kids bball.

Game Photos | Game Photos (Scott Larson)

Angie had the quote of the night, "Well, we pulled that one out of the crapper."

If hadn't known better, I would have sworn that Seattle was the team that had played and gotten pummeled the night before and that Washington was coming off of a win and a short break. The Mystics were faster up and down the court, shooting with great confidence and flow, executing their offense and seemingly getting whatever shot they wanted, and did not look like a 2-10 team at all. The Storm, on the other hand, were tentative, seemingly stymied by the Mystics' zone defenses (one person near us remarked that it was like the Storm hadn't seen a zone before), sluggish and working for every point.

The first half was one of the uglier Storm halves this season. All the Sandy Brondello runners, the Adia 3s, the Kamila mid-range jumpers - all of them were clanging off the rim. LJ and the lack of Storm turnovers were the only things keeping the score within 9 or so. There was a stretch were the only things the crowd was able to cheer for were when Washington threw the ball away on fastbreaks. And they were fastbreaking a lot. It didn't matter if it was a Storm miss, make or TO, the Mystics were screaming down the court for easy layup opportunities. Coco Miller, Stacey Dales-Schuman and the supposedly injured Chamique Holdsclaw were burning the slow Storm time and time again. Chamique was nothing short of amazing. Her shots were smooth and she looked comfortable shooting from everywhere on the floor. She was limping a little on a couple of occasions and who knows how much pain she was really feeling, but she gave us an All-Star performance. In their offensive sets, the Mystics were shredding the Storm defense. They were back-cutting, driving, hitting 3s and scoring at will.

Coach Donovan was visibly pissed the whole game.

Towards the end of the first half, she had KV in with four bench players and it was looking grim. Before sending in the other four starters to join Kamila - this was about 4 or 5 minutes before the half - I saw her kneel down in front of them and, finger jabbing for effect, gave them some "direction." Now, I'm not a lip reader by any stretch, but I'm pretty sure she began by saying, "This is how it's going to be." The Storm starters came in and ended the half down by only 5 instead of 12+.

I think we all know what was probably happening in the Storm locker room during the half.

Whatever Coach Donovan said had an effect because the Storm came out in the second half with more determination and better shooting. The Mystics were still faster and had more energy, but the Storm looked more like the better and more confident team. It still wasn't pretty, but the Storm caught up, kept up and finally pulled away. Sue picked up her defense and got some key steals which lead, finally, to some Storm fastbreaks. LJ and Kamila started exerting themselves on the boards and the Storm evened up the rebounding deficit from the first half. With Sandy, Sue, LJ and Kamila in double figures (Sue had a double double and Kamila was one rebound away from a double double herself), the Storm took a measure of control in the second half. It still wasn't in the bag though until the clock was down to 7 seconds and the Storm were up by 4 on Sue Bird free throws.

One glaring stat that I'm sure is going to be discussed during practice before the LA game - 2 for 11 shooting, 5 pts, 7 rebounds and 6 turnovers for the Storm bench. If this had been one of those games in which Sue or LJ had been off and not performed like the All-Stars they are, this would have been a loss, and probably a big one. If the Storm's championship talk is going to be a reality, the bench is going to have to produce in more than one or two games.

A win is a win is a win and we'll take it for sure. The Mystics' performance underlines that no teams in this league can be considered easy wins at this point. It certainly makes for some exciting basketball.

Other notes:

Being 4th of July Eve, tonight's game was replete with red, white and blue. Doppler was covered in small flags and was wearing a big on as a cape. There was a reenlistment ceremony before the game in which a group of about 15 service people took the oath at center court. Also, the flag was presented during the anthem by representatives of all the armed services. After the anthem, they took the flag out stripes first which meant they had to spin it around - is this some sort of protocol? And, if that is an official protocol, how many rules was Doppler breaking by wearing all those flags?

Luke Ridden, the new draft pick for the Sonics, was at the game along with Ray Allen.

LJ gave the game ball to a little girl sitting courtside across from the Storm bench. There was no PA explanation of why, but the little girl looked like she was in awe and tears as LJ handed her the ball.

Sue talked to Kevin Locke after the game and made the comment that her punishment for scoring a double double is to have to talk to him postgame. It sounded like a joke and everyone laughed, but her expression was so stony when she left the court that I think the last thing she wanted to do after a game like that one was chit chat and give cliche answers. I don't think she was really dogging Locke, I just don't think she wanted to be out there.

Once the Storm got the lead and were feeling better about themselves, Simone started shimmying during the timeouts and got Sun to join her. A girl in the next section over from us has a "Simone bust a move" sign that she brings to each game. Someone on the bench saw it and pointed it out to Simone who then waved and obliged.

There were several girls' basketball clubs in attendance, having played in a competition earlier in the day (HoopGurlz.com sponsored I think). Like they do at every game, the Storm list the groups on the big screen during a timeout. It is always funny to hear the bursts of squeals come from different points in the stands as the various names roll by.

Submitted by | StormFanNo1

I always knew we would win this one. Even when we were down 12-13 points in the first half, I knew we would win. OK, it wasn't a blow out as I expected, but a win is still a win. It's nice to be able to trust in your team so much.
 
In the first half it was all Chamique, Coco, and LJ. Thanks to LJ, we managed to stay in the game. The rest of the team were putting one brick after another. About 10 minutes into the game, when we were down about 11 points, Coach D took out all the starters except LJ, and put 4 bench players in. I guess they needed a good talk about  their lack of effort. It must have worked, since when the starters went back into the game, (3 minutes before the end of first half) they started a come back effort. We ended the half down 5 points, which was our best showing so far.
 
Our comeback effort continued in the second half, and three minutes into the game we were down 1. Adia didn't score much, but she scored the special basket that gave us our first one point lead. The arena was rocking at that point.  
 
Adia, even though not scoring much, put a terrific effort putting the brakes on Stacy Dales, and she also had key rebounds and hustles for the ball when it mattered. She is one player, whose stats don't tell the whole story about her contributions.  
 
Kamila was like an impenetrable wall in the paint for us. She is an AWESOME defensive player, and her offense is really picking up this year.
 
Sue, while content with letting her teammates doing most of the scoring, sure know when to step up and become a scoring machine when needed. Three times during the game she stole the ball and dashed to the other side of the court, scoring all alone.
 
LJ left the game for a few minutes in the second half, when we were up by 4. (She was playing non-stop, so she needed a little rest.) Alisa came in, but she didn't do well at all. The ball kept slipping right out of her hands in the paint, and more than a few times Mystics stole her inbound pass before she had time to get full grasp of it. The box score says Sue has 5 turnovers, and there is no f$$king way she had 5 turnovers in this game. I guess every time the ball was stolen right out of Alisa's hands after an inbound pass from Sue, it was counted as a turnover from Sue. To me it looked like Alisa had 5 t/os while Sue had one or two.

Needless to say, LJ had to come right back into the game because we were once again down by 4 after a couple of minutes without her. With LJ's help we clawed our way back to tie first, and then up by two, and finally less than two minutes before the end of the game we were up by 4 once again. The teams traded baskets for a while, and then 30 seconds before the end of the game Mystics started fouling us to stop the game. Sue was all ice from the free throw line, and Kamila picked up key defensive rebounds at the end. So we kept our lead and ended up with a win.
 
This was a very exciting game for us fans. It's great to see the team able to climb out of the hole they dug themselves into and win the game. Once again, I lost my voice cheering, but it was worth it.
 
These are great times to be a Storm fan.

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