Final score: Storm 91 – Mercury 85 (W) (14-12)

Submitted by | NewSocks

I’m not going to write a normal game day report for this because you all saw the game on TV but here are some of the notes I did take while I was there.

All of the Phoenix fans were receptive to the signs. There were even some who seemed hesitant at first, but after explaining the situation, they were on board and took a sign.

Every Phoenix fan was nice that night. Even in the restroom. (SF9 *wink*)

The team came out and JB came out in street clothes… and heels. She looked taller than Coach Donovan. I looked over to her to get her attention a couple of times to wave but she was watching the team warm up. When I came back from handing another group of fans some signs I looked over and JB was looking over waving and said HEY!!

During warm-ups Sue and Lauren were looking over at KV and making faces at her and making her laugh. There was music and they were trying to do some dance moves while she was sitting in her chair. She just waived them off and laughed.

The ESPN camera man had two sweat bands on his camera’s eye piece. One was a WNBA one and the other one was a Storm one. I took a picture of this. Ill try and post it.

During the intros of players, LJ and BL did this leg kick thing. I didn’t see that last game, but of course LJ wasn’t at the last game I saw.

Crowd was loud during the intros. It was pretty cool. Phoenix fans have good energy.

They brought the players to the jump circle because they thought the Conn game on TV was just about over and it didn’t get over when they thought, but they left the players there for what seemed like forever.

It was 7:39 in the first quarter and LJ was already wincing and moving slow down the court. That had me worried. I wasn’t sure she was going to make it the whole game.

It was Scorch’s birthday. They had all of the Arizona mascots there. The big gorilla from the Suns came over and was sitting on the lady in front of me. The baby gorilla was messing with her kids. Then the big gorilla had this big, long, red tongue come out. It was hysterical because she had no where to go and this tongue was all over her face. I swore I heard her ask for a cigarette after the gorilla walked away.

BT was on Roy’s case about calling an illegal screen.

PT had a really nice step through move a-la DeMya Walker.

Kelly Miller kept dribbling at Mach 3 + into the key untouched.

Betty made a bad pass and someone on the floor yelled, Dammit Betty! And then Betty went right down the floor and commited a dumb foul. Not a good series of events for BL.
Speaking of bad passes, our team has developed a bad habit of trying to pass the ball to one another in the key when they are trapped in no mans land. The perimeter passes are nice and crisp, but the interior passes look like desperation passes and are not usually effective, mostly because they get stolen or a turnover occurs. T, TJ, BL and someone else are the biggest offenders.

Izi’s uniform is kind of weird in the sense that there is a very large gap between her names on the back.

TJ. Um. I wrote a whole lot about her but erased it. It wasn’t very nice. Let me just summarize it up by saying this. She isn’t doing much else besides sweating up a perfectly good uniform. Move. Get Pissed. Get out of the way. DO SOMETHING!

Jen Derevjanik popped Sue in the nose by accident.

BL threw Kelly Miller to the court pretty hard. DT came over and helped KM up and then walked away trying not to laugh.

A mismatch kept happening between ARob and Kelly Miller and no one took advantage of it.

Everytime a bad pass or a dumb mistake happened the bench looked unhappy. AD looked most especially unhappy. She threw her hands up plenty of times, pulled on the lapels of her jacket continuously, shook her head and gave the ice stare more than a few times.

Ann’s sure do know how to throw the dirtiest of looks.

I don’t think LJ likes Kristen Rassmussen. Or I think that Raz is no match for LJ and LJ knows it and has fun with it. Anyway, LJ nailed Raz on the defensive end, went down to the offensive end and nailed her again and then Raz nailed LJ and got called for the foul. LJ was busting up and grabbed her lips trying to keep the smile in check. When the players came to huddle she started laughing again telling them something and then went back to holding her smile in check with her hand. Pretty cute moment.

Betty got her third foul and told her team, sorry that was my fault.

Someone (phx) scored pretty easily down the floor and as the storm were setting back up on defense (avoiding the ice stare) LJ said, “sorry, I cant f-ing move. My foot is killing me.”

During half time someone with a dog came by to say hi to NL. NL stood up and the dog started sniffing her. Then the dog went in for the crotch sniff. The dogs face full on disappeared. NL tried to move but the dog wouldn’t stop. Finally the owner about snapped the dogs neck pulling on the chain.

Half time was a Neil Diamond impersonator.

When the team came out at half time I had my signs sitting on the chairs in front of me which were the ones right on the court. LJ looked at my sign that said,
Buying NBA Franchise 350 mil
Building New Arena 450 mil
Keeping the Storm in Seattle… Priceless.
She nodded and said, hell yeah!

Betty got a cheap shot in on Kelly Miller when they were running up the court. I’m starting to think that Kelly is getting on Betty’s nerves here.

Kelly Miller misses the FT and DT drops a very audible F bomb

Bad pass, offense not ran correctly, play screwed up because someone wasn’t in their place. Anne not happy with Tanisha

Standing around waiting for the guy with the frozen strawberries and cream to come back by while supposed to be playing basketball. Anne, not happy with Tiffani

Getting the ball and not looking to pass. Ok, now looking to pass and making a really bad one causing a turnover, or getting the ball and driving as hard as you can into all the phoenix posts standing there while other teammates are open. Anne not happy with Betty.

Ok, bad pedal and all…Sue Bird is fast.

Kelly Miller is ripped.

During a timeout our team manager Missy is working the refs for some reason. I don’t know what it was all about, but she was pretty adamant on the point she was trying to make.

Sue is holding her gut like she tore something.

I think it was on DT’s 4th or 5th foul, the guy who wasn’t Roy called the foul. As DT was walking in front of me and past Bonita Spence she said, that guy’s a f’n scumbag.

After the game I just sat there for a while. It’s easier for me to wait till I can walk straight out than to stop and start. I walked around to the other side of the court where David was still broadcasting. David saw me coming and stuck his hand up for a high-five and said, by the way I want to acknowledge the storm fans who made the trip and supplied the fans here with signs of support for the storm… or something like that. He hung on to my hand the whole time he was saying it, I guess so I could hear it. Dead cool.