Immediate reaction: Seattle Storm drop season opener to Minnesota Lynx, 83-70
By Christan Braswell
Seattle, WA - Storm head coach Noelle Quinn knows Rome wasn’t built in a day and that one game doesn’t define her team as they navigate a new normal with stars Nneka Ogwumike and Skylar Diggins-Smith.
“This is a work in progress,” she said. “This year is going to be really cool to see how teams play us because they were able to be disruptive with Jewell a lot.”
“But if they’re going to trap this year, we have some dynamic pieces on the back end of that.”
In the new group’s first regular season game, the Minnesota Lynx stood stout as they delivered Seattle a shocking 83-70 loss Tuesday night at Climate Pledge Arena.
Alanna Smith led Minnesota with 22 points and eight rebounds. Napheesa Collier had 20 points and 10 rebounds.
Ogwumike shined in her Storm debut, finishing with 20 points on 10-for-18 shooting, nine rebounds and two steals.
Her new frontcourt partner in All-Star Ezi Magbegor contributed 15 points, nine rebounds, three blocks, and two assists.
While the frontcourt thrived, the backcourt did not. Scoring 10 points apiece, Loyd and Diggins-Smith were cold for most of the game as they feel each other’s games out and acclimated to what’s best at the moment. Loyd was 3-for-19 and Diggins-Smith was 4-for-13.
In camp, Diggins-Smith said it would take 5-7 games for her to adjust to Seattle’s language on the court fully. Despite a terrific showing against her old team in the preseason, she also said it was just preseason.
After leading 44-38 with less than two minutes on the clock, the Lynx engineered a 7-0 run to take a narrow 45-44 lead into the locker room.
Coming out of the tunnel for the second half, Seattle started the third the same way they ended the second. Turnover after turnover gave the Lynx the advantage as they converted on nearly all of them, netting 22 points off 17 Storm miscues.
Trailing at 63-60 at the end of the third, the Lynx sent the Storm to the showers as they outscored them 20-10 in the quarter.
The Seattle Storm will now face an early three-game road trip starting with a rematch against the Lynx on Friday, May 17th at the Target Center in Minnesota. That rematch has a tipoff time of 6:30PM PDT, and it will be streamed on ION. From that game, the Storm continue the weekend on the road with a Sunday, May 19th battle against the Washington Mystics at the Entertainment and Sports Arena that has a tipoff time of 12PM PDT and will be broadcast on FOX 13+ / Amazon Prime Video - Seattle, MNMT. The three-game road trip wraps up on Monday, May 20th as the Storm will play a back-to-back of sorts when they battle the New York Liberty at the Barclays Center with a first pitch time of 4PM PDT that will be broadcast on ESPN3, FOX 13 / Amazon Prime Video - Seattle, WWOR-My9.
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