May 12, 2006 Preseason Game Storm @ Sky

As noted yesterday, neither of the scheduled preseason road games will receive radio coverage. From the box score for yesterday's game, we see that Wendy Palmer and Lindsay Taylor led the Storm in scoring with 10 points and 9 points respectively. Palmer also led the team in rebounding. Tanisha Wright and Sue Bird led the team for assists, with 5 and 4 respectively. The Storm won the rebounding battle 39 to 27 over the Sky, but hurt themselves on turnovers. It would be nice to blame the high turnovers on the inexperience caused by the missing starters Janell Burse and Lauren Jackson, but in fact it was simply a terrible night for Betty Lennox who committed 5 turnovers herself while shooting a wretched 15% on 2-13 shooting from the field. Wendy Palmer only did slightly better, shooting 33% on 4-12 shooting. Sue Bird was also a culprit on the sloppy play, though she shot 50% going 3-6 from the field, she turned the ball over 3 times as well. While I can only guess at Betty's struggles, I think it is safe to assume that defensive hawk, Chelsea Newton, who was acquired by the Sky in the expansion draft from the 2005 WNBA championship Monarchs, was not the problem, playing only 15 minutes in the game. I suspect that the interior threat of Burse and Jackson would have given Betty more options had they been available to play.

Donovan was forced to play 20 entirely new lineups in this game, unable to leverage any of the 13 she put on the floor against New York on Sunday.

By the Numbers

Final Score: Chicago 68, Seattle 67
Offensive Rating: 93.54
Defensive Rating: 94.94

Most Effective Offensive Players:
Tanisha Wright: 126.39
Iziane Castro Marques: 121.95
Lindsay Taylor: 114.69

Most Effective Defensive Players:
Wendy Palmer: 58% Stop Percentage
Barbara Turner: 48% Stop Percentage

Player +/-
Iziane Castro Marques: +9
Wendy Palmer: +5
Sue Bird: +4
Barbara Turner: +4
Simone Edwards: +4
Lindsay Taylor: +2
Tanisha Wright: -3
Betty Lennox: -7
Shaun Gortman: -7
Tiffani Johnson: -9

Best +/- Lineups
Bird-Wright-Gortman-Palmer-Edwards: +6
Bird-Lennox-Castro-Palmer-Edwards: +4
Wright-Castro-Turner-Palmer-Taylor: +4

Worst +/- Lineups
Gortman-Lennox-Wright-Johnson-Taylor: -4
Gortman-Wright-Turner-Palmer-Johnson: -3

The Storm will try to recoup tonight as they add Lauren Jackson back into the lineup against Minnesota, they will still be without JB, and Tanisha Wright will miss the game to attend her graduation ceremonies.