Final score: Storm 82 – Comets 69 (W) (1-0)

Submitted by | Norwester

Well, it wasn't a particularly pretty game, and the fans in attendance deserve to be a little bit wasted after the efforts put forth to rally our team. The only thing even keeping our stagnant, flat, disoriented team even in the game in the first half was Izi and her deadly threes, coupled with the occasional well-timed drive to the basket for a foul and free throws. Sue got benched, Betty got benched. Lauren was expending a lot of energy trying to direct traffic with no starting guard on the floor to either fill that role, or get her the ball, and didn't reserve her strong words for her on-floor teammates either, but barked in frustration at all on the bench as well. Everything Houston threw up was going in, and nothing we could do seemed to work. We had no team chemistry. I was having every bad flashback a Stormfan could have in this situation: our Opening Day 2005 shellacking by LA in front of a lower-bowl sell-out in which we fell on our faces so hard I'm surprised Sue didn't have to put her mask back on then and there; or - horror of horrors - the play-offs same year, when Houston came into our house...and made us their, uh, well...they owned us. It's only the first game of a new season, I consoled myself. We're bound to be rusty, particularly never having played as a team in an actual game before. It's a shame to suck in front of so many possibly new fans, but there's fantasy, then there's reality, and the reality is it will probably take us a while to gel. But happily, in the end, after stumbling out of the gate in the 2nd half and falling to a 20+ point deficit, we didn't hang our heads as a team and give up, but rather ratcheted up our intensity, particularly on defense. And shots finally started to fall. LJ was everywhere. Sue played some great defense. Betty started making good decisions. Izi didn't back down, but continued her aggressiveness. And Ashley was swatting Houston shots into the parking lot. In the end who "got struck?" The Houston Comets did. "You've just been struck. Go, Storm."

Despite it's warts, this game ended up being a lot of fun to watch. Few things are better than a big successful rally, particularly when you're backed up in your cheering by 10,000 other people. Much of the game I found myself a touch disappointed that more people weren't joining in enthusiastically to make some noise in an attempt to bolster our faltering team, who, granted, was missing shot after shot and committing one turnover after another. But then we'd make a shot, any shot, and the place would erupt. There were moments towards the end that you couldn't even hear the 24-second shot clock expiration horn. It was playoff loud in there. Last year it seemed like we were just mired in an awkward transition time, with no Pirate Guy leading cheers, a new PA announcer who was pretty well as unfamiliar with us as we were with him, the selling of the team, coming off a disappointing 2005, LJ's minutes strictly controlled. But last night I didn't feel any awkwardness between the PA guy and the crowd, and in fact he had some great moments (calling the ball out on the referee, exhorting everyone to stand up in such an All-Powerful-Oz voice that even Wendy Palmer on the bench sprung up ). We seem to be finding our own rhythm again, as fans and as a team.

Hand-outs as we entered consisted of a red bracelet/arm-band proclaiming "Get Struck", with the team name and the website also. In addition you could collect a magnetic schedule with a Sue Bird cut-out on it. I saw one of these Sue Bird magnets on the back of a car in the parking garage all ready. Nice. Oh, and of course you could pick up a program, which consisted of the rosters and upcoming events. There was a crowd waiting when the doors opened at 6 PM. Anticipating pre-game festivities on opening day, I know I wanted to be there as early as possible. Sadly, the concessions folks were not quite ready; perhaps they need more practice as a team. I was antsy, hoping I didn't miss anything significant while I stood in the one open station in my area and waited to by a bottle of water that I new from experience would be necessary. Happily, the team was still stretching out, etc. when I got to my seats. They seemed all smiles, and looked loose. Sue was really taking a vocal leadership role early, leading the warm-ups, doing all the talking in the huddle. Sue's hair seems longer than it's been in the past. And are LJ's shoes new? They looked pretty cool, and different than what she was wearing in practice, though perhaps she wears different shoes for practice and games. I don't pay that much attention. All the players stopped and signed autographs. Sue was out there until a staff member came and got her. Was that planned? Izi was there forever too.

Pre-game a drill team called Las Señoritas performed. Lots of marching, but some cool parts with swords. Different than the customary scantily-clad head-flippers. We were also treated to a "Storm Vision" segment with Sabrina about the Dance Troupe auditions (though this was shown again at a future game break). Adia and Alan performed some opening night talk up on the screen, with Adia mentioning specifically how nervous rookies are coming in. They also touched on the great shape LJ is in, how her health is always a key to Storm success, how both LJ & Sue are in mid-season form, and if Ashley, Izi and Betty pick up where they left off in preseason, things could be great. I took a moment to glance around and get my bearings. Gearlds was coughing a bunch during shoot-around, hopefully not from illness...it could just as well have been choking or something. I recognized Kurt the ref, but not the other two. There was a brief mid-court ceremony honoring local Dedicated Educators, in which three teachers received jerseys. Then there was another brief but nice ceremony honoring David Locke for his years of play-by-play, in which they played some of his game calls up on the Arenavision, then Karen Bryant and Anne Donovan presented him with a game ball. Much applause ensued.

The anthem was performed by the International School Jazz Choir, from Bellevue. They all looked very serious, but they sounded really good. I always like it when they hit that extra-high "free" note. There was much love at center court when LJ, Sue, Sheryl Swoopes and Tina Thompson met up for the Junior Captains ball signing and hand-out. Everyone was all smiles, and there were hugs all around. Cute. The introduced the refs up on the Arenavision, which was a really nice touch. The game production crew have added a few such touches to the experience this year, and I'm liking it, particularly that there are people putting thought into these things. The Fan Instruction Video has been retooled a bit, where JB is now the one telling us to "take a deep breath" and Ashley to give the Storm fan next to us a high-5.

The Comets were introduced. Byears got booed (which I think she liked ). Tari Phillips and Erin Grant got some cheers. The crowd gave Michelle Snow entirely too much attention, Tina Thompson got pretty enthusiastic applause, and the place went sort of crazy for Sheryl Swoopes. Well, what can you do? They're the enemy, and they're in our house, but they have years of being on the National Team, and excelling at their craft, etc.

Our introductory video was better. It was wise to take the game-calling out (though perhaps they had to due to not having any non-Locke calls to splice in) because it always made us lose our rhythm last year. All music, no talk= good. The song was peppy, and you could clap to it (though it had a speedy rhythm). What was it? Someone else will have to say. Rather than having the players walk down aisle stairs around the arena upon introductions they put up this tent apparatus at the tunnel, which was lit from within with glowing green light, and smoke was billowing out. The coaches and players emerged from this into a spot light, and while it wasn't perhaps the most spectacular of set-ups, I was much more comfortable with this, than the thought that at any moment the flashing lights, noise, and darkness could cause one of our players to take a tumble down the concrete arena steps to the floor, and subsequently to the hospital. This was a much better decision, so I liked it a lot. Ashley was introduced as a "Blocking Machine," and LJ got the loudest reception, which sometimes seems to go to Betty, but not last night. Sue took the mic and addressed us fans briefly, giving us her appreciation and exhorting us to help make the 2007 season a good one. I think it's probably a new thing this year, and we'll see each player as time goes on (like Wendy last week), but it's kind of fun.

The first quarter was pretty even, for the most part. LJ stole the ball early, then canned a 3 on an Izi assist. The only way our first regular season basket of the year may have been more appropriate would perhaps have been if Sue had the assist, but it was nice to have LJ put our first points up on the board. Izi was being aggressive, LJ was showing some good moves, but JB was getting schooled a bit by Snow. She also hit the deck hard at one point. She was subbed out for Ashley Robinson. Izi's outside shot was eventually the only thing keeping us in the game early on. We shot a decent 44% in the first half, but at times it seemed that everything Houston threw up there went in the basket. I was getting frustrated at our lack of rebounds, and how Swoopes and Snow could seemingly score at will from the paint, but I thought that Sue's defense looked good early. The refs were a touch whistle happy, which broke up the rhythm of the game at times, but early on Houston took the greatest brunt with Erin Grant picking up 3 quick fouls. Swoopes totally threw her shoulder into a defender and drew a foul instead of being called for one, which had to annoy Betty the most because that's the o-foul Ms. Money gets called on the most. But Betty got a bit of her own back when Swoopes didn't get the call when she basically bodied Betty out of bounds running down the sideline. She uses every dirty trick she can in there, and I hate to see the refs fall for them, or treat her with kid gloves. They got her several times during the night, though, and didn't always call us on all of our fouls (like when Sue hit Tina in the head).

With 3-1/2 minutes to go in the 1st quarter we called a timeout down 16-18 and the Dance Troupe came in. Lenny Wilkens was in attendance, and got a great crowd reception when shown up on the screen. I heard that Clay Bennett was there, but assume he was up in a suite or something. I only saw one ill-conceived sign that specifically called Clay out and told him to go away. To clarify, I say "ill-conceived" because if we want the Storm to stay in Seattle, we're going to need the good will of our new owners, and somehow insulting them and/or telling them to go away doesn't seem to me to be the way to engender warm and fuzzy feelings. I'm all for people expressing the sentiment that they want the Storm to stay in Seattle, but I think we should refrain from attacking the owners. I'm just saying.

Katie Gearlds got much applause when she checked in for the first time. She seemed a touch deer in the headlights initially, and hesitated on a shot or two that she should have taken. It was kind of brutal to throw her into the deep end out there, though, guarding Sheryl Swoopes. Besides her shot hesitation, she almost threw the ball away, but the ref interfered inadvertently, and it was still our ball. Izi continued to be unconscious from three-point territory, racking up 15 points before the 1st quarter was even over. Katie began to get her sea legs, fighting for two consecutive offensive boards and put-backs, the second earning her a trip to the free throw line (where she hit 1/2) in front of a very appreciative crowd. She was battling down there and deserved some love.

1Q: 26-27

During game break it was a KKNW shoot-out, Haley vs Vinnie. Vinnie won, but Haley from 106 deserves a shout-out. Byears checked in to boos (hmph). And Sheryl Swoopes schooled Katie, pulling a move then shooting right over the top of her. Ouch. But things didn't only go against us. LJ had a block, then ran the floor and caught an errant pass on the break that very few other players could have handled. The Wendy got a steal, and Izi earned an &1 to put us up 33-32 with about 7 minutes left in the half! But things started to unravel a bit here. In quick succession there was a dubious foul on LJ, that prompted to sit on the scorers table briefly in frustration, where she received a comforting pat on the back. That was followed by a bogus foul called by the out-of-position ref on Izi as she went after a defensive rebound. I'm not blaming the fact that the wheels were coming off our cart on the refs, but they were sure making their presence felt for much of the game, and the crowd was grumbling and booing at this point, particularly when the Arenavision upheld our absolute conviction that we never foul. Not even "Storm Movie Magic" with Katie Gearlds could lift our moods completely, though it was amusing to see her channeling Tom Hanks saying "Houston, we have a problem." Appropriate to the Houston game to, I'd say, though it wasn't necessarily Houston with the problem at this point even though we were up by three with 5 minutes to go. The crowd was big, but discontented and therefore not too loud at this juncture. The JB birthday message got applause, but our team got several consecutive turnovers and poor shots while Houston got a quick succession of easy-looking lay-ins, and drew a bunch of ticky-tack fouls. Betty was up on the Arenavision thanking us fans for coming out to the game, but strangely our starting guards Sue and Betty had been on the bench for some time. We were in the penalty, and Houston had like 2 fouls 2nd quarter.

HT: 37-46

After being up 33-32, suddenly Houston was up by 9. LJ had to expend a ton of energy trying to direct everyone on the floor as to where they should be. With about 4 minutes to go she started jawing at the refs, and was subbed out for a time. She was having to bark at teammates, gesturing and pointing, pretty much directing traffic through sheer will power. She had some choice words for the bench too, particularly for Sue not being in the game, to which Sue could only shrug in response, as it seemed to be due to her current residence being Anne Donovan's dog house, and what could she do about that? And it must have been cozy in there, because Betty had joined her. Team chemistry was fractured, and we seemed flat and listless as a team. Passes were sailing out of bounds. No one could get LJ the ball, and we were having to settle for a number of outside shots. Our shooting percentage was decent, but 10 turnovers? Dribble, dribble, dribble, turnover/clank ain't gonna win many games. An Izi three-pointer got "Play of the Half" and was replayed on the big screen. But mostly, we were faltering, and LJ was getting way too few touches in the paint.

It was amusing to see the Red Panda (bowl-flipper unicycle lady) at half time, because she'd come up in conversation earlier in the day when we were lamenting the lack of dog-races during half time last season. Also, it's always fun to me to take non-regular-fans to the games because they have some of the most amusing comments. Last night it was, "Lauren's legs could blind you" and in regards to the Red Panda (who is apparently a World-Record Holder): this is the "most bizarre thing I've ever seen in my life." Indeed.

We kept waiting and waiting, but the Storm didn't come out of the locker room after half time until late. There was only like a minute or so to go. LJ didn't even make it over to the hoop, stopping instead to perform an extra series of stretches on her ankle and leg. I wish I could say that we came out on fire, but it was actually painful, literally as we were still on our feet four minutes into the quarter! It was actually alarming. We were getting some good shots, but we would expend so much energy to get one Houston stop, follow it with a poor offensive possession, then allow an easy Comet bucket. Lather, rinse, repeat. I can't remember if JB started the half, but Ashley spend most of her time in with the starting unit. Anne was not going for the substitutions, it was almost like she was throwing the gauntlet down to her starters (and Ashley): get us out of this mess. But could we get in sync? Another bogus foul on Sue, and everything Houston throws up is going in, and at 6 minutes left it's 58-37 and we're still standing! Fortunately, Izi went to the line several seconds later, making 1/2. LJ got the rebound off the miss, which could have been a bright spot to start our rally, but the follow-shot missed. Sigh. Houston went to the line again up 38-58, followed by an officials timeout due to some blood on a Comet. I heckled the refs asking whether they didn't need to call more fouls during the timeout because I was sure they were missing the sound of their whistles. Also, one thing about being down and playing badly: it's kind of quiet so you can yell things they can hear.

Finally with 5 minutes to go we got our first field goal of the half, with LJ working it to keep it within 20: 40-60. With 4+ minutes in the quarter Sue hit a 3 and pretty much every shot that went in at this point got a huge reaction from a crowd just waiting for anything to latch onto. A subsequent Betty jump ball tossed ahead to a sprinting Izi followed by LJ connecting on a jump shot and suddenly we were on a 9-0 run and everyone was on their feet, egged on by the prompter, screaming, and it was LOUD. Out of the timeout Houston failed to manage their clock and turned over an 8-second backcourt violation which we celebrated with an LJ 3! Every fan was on their feet yelling De-Fense. It was great! A foul on Michelle Snow (I think it was only her second at that point...really? ) put Houston in the penalty and sent Betty to the line to get us within 8, and crowd noise was still high. LJ's airball after forcing a 24-second shot clock violation brought us down to earth a touch, but our defense was really buckling down, and things were really starting to click out on the court. We capped the quarter with a Betty lay-in at the buzzer leading to an enthusiastic crowd Fan Dancing along with the Dance Troupe.

3Q: 54-62

And things kept on flowing. Off an Ashley rebound LJ connected with Sue on a fast break, and despite some earlier shooting woes, Sue was hitting the big ones. Izi continued to be aggressive, as side of her I'm loving this year. We have LJ's MVP chant, and Betty's Bet-ty, that the crowd whips out at the drop of a hat. We'll have to think of something for Izi, because she was marvelous. Izi went 2/2 from the line to pull us within 6, then Ashley BLOCKED into the stands. It was a hang and swat and that shot was REJECTED. She got big hugs from LJ and team at that. Everything just started to click. Betty drew an &1 to pull us within 6 with 7 minutes remaining: 60-64, and prompting another Houston timeout, and we came to our feet, cheering our team to their bench. This is Storm basketball.

Next timeout with just under 6 minutes to go was filled with the Train (all the kids running out on the floor to snake around in a dancing train with Doppler, for those of you unfamiliar), and the announcer berated us all for sitting down, bringing everyone to their feet, and I don't think I sat much the rest of the way. Betty had a nice stop and pop move to pull us within 3. LJ got the rebound on the other end and Betty followed up with another jumper. Then with 4 minutes to go Sue got us the lead on a fearless lay-up, 67-66 and it was LOUD in there again. Evidence of chemistry developed after years of playing together: LJ had a sweet bounce pass back to Izi for a lay-in, then Sue drew an offensive foul prompting a Houston timeout, 3 minutes to go, and I'm running out of words to describe the celebration going on in the stands. Sue missed the subsequent shot, but put forth some extra effort on defense and got a steal. Betty went to the line. LJ went to the line. We were hitting our free throws. Ashley had another sweet shot from 20 feet and we were suddenly up 77-68 with less than a minute to go and pretty soon Houston was reduced to fouling us (and where was the ball but in Sue's hands? a player you don't want going to the foul line if you're an opponent). Betty subbed out, limping, to crowd appreciation for her efforts. With the final seconds ticking off the clock, LJ got the rebound and began dribbling up court, and Houston let her go, game over, so she let a garbage shot fly from beyond half court...and it went in! (Much to her embarrassment and the crowd's delight...whoops!). All she could do was cover her mouth and laugh. Perhaps during the post-game hand slaps she apologized to all the Houston players.

We outscored Houston like 28-7 in the 4th. That's crazy! And that's more the basketball we were itching to see in the first half. I don't like building big deficits, then having to perform heroically to climb our way out of them, but it made for some good drama. And I'm very impressed with the defensive intensity we were able to summon up. You always kind of sense that we can go on offensive runs, but our defense has at times been lacking. I'm liking our new full court pick-up.

Didn't see much from our bench in this one, except for helping us dig a hole. I was impressed with Katie, and eagerly anticipate more time with her on the court. T? Eh. Didn't really see anything to remark about from Fluker or Ely. Ely did botch the inbounds play after a time out. I've heard that prompted many a snarky comment from the crowd along the lines of "this is what we got for Barbara Turner?" Ouch. Not an ideal situation for Ely to show what the coaches clearly saw in Camp. It was only one game, and I want her to prove Coach right, because I want us to succeed; we're pulling for you, Shyra. Show us...the money? Well, whatever. Show us something, anyway.

Alan Horton interviewed LJ post-game, after all the "Hey!"ing to the music by the fans, and the players throwing shirts into the crowd. Betty was not limping while she ran around throwing shirts. I think she got re-taped. LJ said that the girls really stepped up, that Betty was great, and Sue stepped up, and Ashley "how much easier does she make my life?" She also gave Izi a shout out. She said they get so much energy from the fans, and thanked us again. And somehow? It never gets old to hear that they appreciate us, just as it never gets old giving them our appreciation. That's some sort of mutual appreciation we've got going. Alan asked her what AD said to them at half time, or in the huddle to get them going, and LJ was kind of at a loss, said that Anne just said that she still had faith in them that they could win the game. And she was more amused by her last shot going in than anything.

Run-off:

It was JB's birthday, and the team put a birthday message up on the Arenavision for her.

Apparently it was also new Assistant Coach Patterson's birthday recently, and she got a belated message on the Arenavision from her fellow coaches.

Lower-bowl sell-out.

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