Connecticut’s Renee Montgomery drives to the basket in Friday night’s loss to Phoenix.
UNCASVILLE, Conn., Sept. 7 – There was a sense of bewilderment Friday night at the Mohegan Sun Arena and it wasn’t coming from members of the visiting Phoenix Mercury.
The Mercury had won just six of their previous 26 games and had been thrashed two nights earlier in a 28-point loss to the New York Liberty. Yes, they had the leading scorer in the WNBA with forward DeWanna Bonner and the fabulous Diana Taurasi, the former University of Connecticut legend who helped the Americans win a gold medal at the London Olympics last month.
Phoenix was loose and why not? Their season ends in a little over two weeks.
Connecticut leads the WNBA’s Eastern Conference and has for most of the season. They won three of their last four games on the road, despite playing without All-Star forward Ashja Jones, who is recovering from a strained left Achilles tendon.
Olympian Tina Charles is making her case for MVP. Guard Kara Lawson has been outstanding with one of the best seasons of her professional career. In many games, it has been a different Sun player stepping up to help her team win.
The fact that Connecticut dropped a 91-82 decision to the Mercury before a crowd of 8,379 fans isn’t as surprising as the way it happened. Connecticut is 11-3 on the road, an impressive accomplishment considering they have won just 15 games on the road in the previous three seasons combined.
Connecticut’s Allison Hightower drives past Phoenix’s Krysal Thomas and looks to score against Phoenix Friday night.
This was Connecticut’s fifth loss at the Mohegan Sun in 16 games. But the Sun were pulverized on the backboards, pulling down a season-low rebounds while Phoenix ripped down 45 rebounds. The Sun had zero offensive rebounds in the first half. They finished with just five in the game while Phoenix pulled down 29 defensive rebounds.
Bonner, a thin 6-foot-4 forward from Auburn, scored 35 points, her second highest effort of the season. She drained six three-point shots and the Mercury hit 11 three-point shots, the most allowed by Connecticut in a single game all season.
Phoenix (7-20) scored the first seven points of the game and led 11-3 after four minutes. The Sun cut the lead to seven with 45 seconds left in the first half only to see Phoenix score five points in the final eight seconds of the half.
The lead swelled to as high as 21 points in the second half only to see Connecticut stubbornly trim the lead to five with 51 seconds left in the game. But Bonner immediately drained a three-pointer from the top of the key to ice the game with 40 seconds left.
Connecticut’s Renee Montgomery sank a career-high 25 points off the bench. “A wasted effort. It was a great effort but it was wasted,” Thibault said afterwards, shaking his head in disbelief. Charles scored 18 points while Danielle McCray added 14 off the bench.
This is a Connecticut team (20-8) that expects to contend for a WNBA championship this season. To get this type of performance at this point of the season (six games remaining) was stunning to the Sun.
“We didn’t have the focus we needed,” said Lawson, who scored eight points and had four assists. “We didn’t execute the game plan and we were outplayed. That is a tough thing to swallow because we’re a team that has a lot to play for. We’re a team with big goals and we definitely took a huge step backwards tonight.”
Thibault was shocked that his team was outworked the way they were. “At least 50 percent of rebound is effort and we got outworked on the boards tonight. We had zero offensive rebounds and finished the game with seven (offensive rebounds). Those are almost unheard of stats for us.”
As disappointed as he was about his team’s physical efforts, Thibault expressed concern about his team’s decision making process. “We rushed things we didn’t need to rush,” he said. “It’s not due to a lack of effort but from the head.”
For just the second time this year, Charles had fewer than 10 shots from the floor. She scored on five of eight shots. The last time that happened was a 1-for-7 performance in a 13-point loss to the Liberty in mid-August.
“I thought we should have tried to get Tina the ball in the block, she was open, and I think we just didn’t have the patience to get it into her. There were plenty of opportunities to throw it to her, I thought, and we passed it up too many times.”
What’s next now?
The Sun host Chicago on Sunday at the Mohegan Sun Arena before taking off for a five-day, three-game road trip on West at Phoenix (Sept. 12), Los Angeles (Sept. 14) and Seattle (Sept. 16) before closing out the regular season with home games against Eastern Conference rivals Indiana (Sept. 19) and Atlanta (Sept. 23), who have been playing well and who Connecticut will see in the WNBA playoffs.
“You have to be the type of team that is consistently improving and working on things to get better,” Lawson said. “At this point (of the season), it’s about how you are playing. We’re not out of time. What makes the great teams great is that they have a consistent focus and effort every night.
“That has to change for us in the last six games and I have great confidence that it will,” she said.
Phoenix 91, Connecticut 82
At Uncasville, Conn.
Phoenix (7-20): DeWanna Bonner 12-23 5-5 35, Nakia Sanford 4-5 0-1 8, Krystal Thomas 0-1 3-6 3, Diana Taurasi 5-10 4-4 16, Alexis Hornbuckle 4-11 0-0 8, Charde Houston 3-10 2-2 9, Avery Warley 0-0 0-0 0, Briana Gilbreath 2-5 0-0, 6, Lynetta Kizer 2-7, 2-2 6. Totals 32-73 16-20 91
Connecticut (20-8) Kalana Green 0-1 0-0 0, Kelsey Griffin 1-3 2-2 4, Tina Charles 5-8, 7-7 18, Allison Hightower 2-6 0-0 5, Kara Lawson 2-10 2-2 8, Danielle McRay 4-10 2-2 14, Mistie Mims 3-9, 2-4 8, Renee Montgomery 8-13, 6-7, 25, Tan White 0-2 0-0 0, Jessica Moore 0-1 0-0 0. Totals 25-63 21-24 82
Phoenix 26 26 23 16 — 91
Connecticut 16 24 19 23 — 82
Three-point goals: Phoenix 11-28 (Bonner 6-11, Sanford 0-1, Taurasi 2-5, Hornbuckle 0-1, Houston 1-5, Gilbreath 2-5); Connecticut 11-24 (Greene 0-1, Griffin 0-1, Charles 1-1, Hightower 1-2, Lawson 2-5, McCray 4-8, Montgomery 3-6)
Rebounds: Phoenix 45 (Thomas 16); Connecticut 21 (Mims 9); Assists: Phoenix 18 (Hornbuckle 5), Connecticut 16 (Lawson 4); Turnovers: Phoenix, 16-13; Blocked shots: Connecticut, 4-2; Attendance: 8379
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