The Mercury’s 2nd half against the Sparks this past Sunday showed just how amazing they can be offensively. “We had it going on,” Coach Gaines said after practice yesterday. “We need to put two haves together like that.”

After that incredible performance against the Sparks in Los Angeles, the Mercury return home to play the Chicago Sky tonight. This will be the first time Phoenix faces the Sky this season, and is only the 3rd Eastern Conference opponent they’ve seen so far.

The Sky are one of those teams that you just aren’t certain what you’re going to see out of them on a nightly basis. They are in the middle of the pack in almost every statistical category (both defensive and offensive), have players that can step up big on any given night, but still haven’t found their identity as a team. Sometimes they’ll look brilliant and other times they’ll look lost. However, they’ve certainly looked better more often than not this season with a 6-5 record. “They’re big. They have good players and go inside a lot,” Gaines said regarding the Sky. “Good players, straight up post basketball. A lot of inside-out basketball and Dupree is a double-edged sword since she has the ability to take you away from the basket.”

Essentially, the Sky live and die with 3 players: Jia Perkins, Candice Dupree, and Sylvia Fowles. Perkins is currently the Sky’s leading scorer at 16.3 ppg. Not far behind Perkins are Dupree (14.7) and Fowles (12.7) but the next closest players are Dominique Canty and Kristi Tolliver who both average just 6.7 ppg. Ultimately, this team really relies on Fowles more so than anyone, as evidenced by their late collapse against San Antonio when Fowles wasn’t available due to a sore right knee and the Sky ended up losing by double-digits. Fowles also didn’t play against the Monarchs last night in an 83-73 loss and it’s doubtful she’ll get many (if any) minutes against the Mercury tonight.

What Chicago does do well is shoot the ball. They are currently 2nd in the league in FG% and 1st in 3pt%. They also have multiple players that can create shots both for themselves and teammates and pass the ball extremely well (5th in the league in assists per game).

The Mercury will want to take advantage of Fowles being limited (or out) and try to run up the score as Chicago allows about 80 ppg. The Sky also allow a league-high 45.4% opponent FG% which certainly bodes well for the Mercury. With all things taken into account, this is the Mercury’s game to lose. Phoenix has too many weapons and I just don’t see Chicago being able to keep up defensively, or for that matter, have enough firepower offensively to counteract the Mercury’s onslaught.

With both the Storm and Lynx winning yesterday, this game becomes that much more important for the Mercury to win.

Key Players: Diana Taurasi and Cappie Pondexter

Not that this is (by any means) unusual but I really believe that both Diana and Cappie are going to have huge nights. Why? Because Chicago has no one that can stop them (or even slow them down) defensively! Honestly, who is going to defend them - Dupree? Canty? Price? None of those players are skilled enough on the defensive end to really affect Diana or Cappie.

What will also help Diana and Cappie is Temeka’s defense on Perkins and Tolliver. Perkins is their real threat, especially with Fowles being injured, and Meek is a terrific on the ball defender. This will allow Diana and Cappie to conserve energy on the defensive end and be more active offensively. If the Mercury stay sharp and execute, there should be multiple options to score on every play.

All that and I haven’t even mentioned the numerous match-up problems that DeWanna will create…

Keys to the game

• Limiting turnovers - turnovers slow the game down and keeps the opponent within reach
• Shutting down Perkins and Dupree - make others beat you
• Tempo - Phoenix has to continue pushing the ball and never let up, especially against this Sky team who will be playing their 2nd game of a back to back

July 8th, 2009 8:52 AM