Well, the Mercury are a tired team and it definitely showed tonight.

• Rebounds: Mercury (37), Lynx (43)
• Assists: Mercury (11), Lynx (25)
• Steals: Mercury (4), Lynx (9)
• Turnovers: Mercury (19), Lynx (7)
• 3’s: Mercury (4), Lynx (9)

It was a game where it seemed like every bounce went Minnesota’s way. Though, it wasn’t by accident by any means; as we all know, the ball finds energy. And the Lynx just had more energy than the Mercury did tonight.

Hitting just 34% of their shots from the field, 25% from the three-point line, and turning the ball over 20 times the Mercury were out-played from the start in a 109-80 loss to the Minnesota Lynx.

The Mercury are now 3rd place in the Western Conference.

The Lynx were, by far, the more aggressive team both on the offensive and defensive end in the first quarter jumping out to a 27-22 lead.  Led for the most part by a fantastic quarter by Candace Wiggins (15 at the half), Minnesota swarmed the Mercury with intense defense and if the Mercury did happen to get a shot off, several Minnesota players were there for the rebound.

Not much changed in the 2nd quarter, save for the number of turnovers the Lynx forced which were already close to double-digits for the Mercury heading into half-time (9). Ultimately, the usual suspects (turnovers and points in the paint) led to Phoenix being down by 11 at the end of the 2nd quarter; turnovers led to 16 points and Minnesota had 26 of their 54 points in the paint. Luckily, Cappie Pondexter was hitting her shots and kept the game somewhat close with her 15 points and 7/8 free-throws.

The 2nd half was when things completely unraveled for the Mercury.  In the 3rd, the Lynx erupted for 31 points and held Phoenix to only 17 and were still clearly the aggressors.  It seemed like Minnesota went after every single rebound and I can remember a play very clearly where there were three Mercury players in the paint and Candace Wiggins went right in to grab the offensive rebound, 1 of 12 total in the game.  At one point, the Lynx were up by 32 points and it never got much closer than that in the end.

This Mercury team is just tired. Playing on the road every other day for over a week will certainly wear on you but there was never a clear feeling that the Mercury’s heads were ever in the game.  From the initial jump, the Lynx out-performed the Mercury in every area and never let up.

Never trailing in the game, the Lynx forced 19 Phoenix turnovers, stole the ball 9 times, and shot 44% from the field. Of course, when Diana hits just 2 shots out of 15 attempts makes the game much easier for any team.

The Mercury travel back to Phoenix tomorrow and will probably have the day off Monday, practice Tuesday, and get ready for revenge on the Storm come Wednesday at home.  A nice remedy for a 1-2 road trip is a day off followed by a game at home.

Not much else to say about this one, just one of those games where the Mercury could never find a rhythm or stop the Lynx on the defensive end. The only stat the Mercury bested the Lynx at were blocks, but that was only because they had many more opportunities to block a shot than the Lynx did.

One thing I do know, is that Phoenix will be ready and motivated when the Storm come to town on July 1st.

June 27th, 2009 7:14 PM