Coach Corey Gaines has said several times that the Mercury’s offense is still a little bit behind where their defense is. If that’s the case, with the Mercury averaging 90.5 points a game thus far, it’s scary to think what their offense will be like when they really start to click…

Trailing only the Minnesota Lynx for the most total average points per game (95.0), it’s ironic that both of the Mercury’s wins have come from their improved team defense.  Tonight, just like opening night against San Antonio, the Mercury rallied late to start 2-0 for the first time since the 2000 season, beating the Liberty at home, 91-84.

Though they are certainly elated with the quick start, there is still a lot of room for growth.  “We’re still not playing well,” Coach Gaines said after the game, ” we’re [just] wearing teams down.  We are keeping the same pace and the same pressure on them. Teams aren’t used to playing that fast and we practice fast and do everything fast so we’re used to it.”

The first three quarters were eerily similar to their opening game against San Antonio - the game was close, Phoenix struggled to find their groove offensively, and it wasn’t until the 4th quarter where they really started to pull away.  In fact, the Mercury have outscored their opponents 50-31 in the 4th quarter this year.  Tonight, the Mercury’s defense stifled the Liberty from the start of the 4th with New York missing 9 of their first 10 shots allowing the Mercury to find their groove offensively.

Cappie Pondexter was the steady force for the Mercury tonight scoring 26, grabbing 5 rebounds, and dishing out 4 assists.  Most importantly, she took the ball to the hole consistently and drew fouls; this led to 29 total free-throws the Mercury shot as a team, hitting 23 of them. “I was pretty active and mixing it up,” Cappie told me after the game, “offensively, I want to be aggressive.  When I’m able to get to the line there are no limits to my game.  When I draw 2-3 people, there are people open.”  Just so everyone knows, Cappie is a much better passer than she gets credit for.  Tonight, she had 4 assists, and many came from the amount of defenders she draws on offense.

The theme that’s different for the Mercury in the 2009 season is the amount of focus they have on defense.  “We forced 20 turnovers,” Cappie said after the game, “and that’s a positive thing for sure.”

It’s certainly a focus that Gaines has all players taking into account.  Diana Taurasi (another solid night with 21 points, 5 assists, and 5 rebounds) is a big proponent of lock-down (sorry for the pun) team defense; “we’ve definitely focused on it more as a unit,” Taurasi said, “we know offensively it will take care of itself.  We have enough weapons we know the points will be there.”

The Mercury’s rock, Tangela Smith, had a fantastic night and was on fire from the field scoring 18 points to go with her 5 rebounds.  Tangela also reached the 10,000 minute career mark tonight which makes her just the 6th player in WNBA history to accomplish the feat.

DeWanna Bonner continued the hot start to her professional career tonight with 13 points and 5 rebounds.  “She does a lot for us,” Taurasi said, “to bring someone like her off the bench is a huge advantage and something we haven’t had in a while.”

Admittedly, she didn’t have that comfort level you could see in the first game which led to 3 turnovers.  “I’ll take some of the blame for that,” Gaines said, “tonight she played three positions, so she got confused; the 3, 4, and 5 so it’s kind of tough. But she’s young, and she’s playing them at a fast pace so it’s hard.”

Key Stats:

• Mercury forced 20 turnovers which led to 23 points
• Mercury had 11 2nd chance points while the Liberty had only 6
• Mercury had 16 fastbreak points, Liberty 11
• Mercury had 19 assists on 32 made shots
• Mercury got to the foul line 29 times, making 23

June 10th, 2009 10:23 PM