Halfway Point Stats

I know that I am late...I have three games I still need to post...

I ran some numbers for the 1st half of the season and thought I should share them...

Over the first 17 games of the season the Storm are only averaging 75.46 possessions per game which is only 3 more possessions per game than they had in 2005. It is also one possession less than the league average. The rest of the league has passed Seattle in terms of speed. Fortunately Seattle is still doing well as far as points per possession. Some interesting data from the Minnesota Lynx (I know their numbers vary from mine...we use slightly different formulas and I don't think they are counting free throws by the same rules that I do for plus/minus.) shows Seattle is leading the league in defending against the break. Seattle only allows 6.7 fast break points per game, while the league averages 8.6. Seattle is also tied with Connecticut for second in the league in Defensive Rebounding %. This is pretty darn important, since when teams do get their offensive rebound they are scoring. The Storm allow 11.1 second chance points per game while the league averages 11.9. Detroit on the other hand is #1 in DR% and #1 in second chance points allowed, giving up only 9 per game.

Wendy Palmer has the best Per40 Roland Rating on the team. She is +18 per 40 minutes. Lauren Jackson is next at +12. Sue is +8, Betty +5, JB and Shaun are +4, and BT is +1. Izi is -1 followed by Tanisha with -4. Lawson is at -34 . We can't be hard on them, though, since all three of those negative RR players have positive on-court numbers. The team is just REALLY good without them in the lineup.

There is a fun video at ESPN.com which accompanies a great article that shares a little of what it is like to be a practice player for the Storm.