Storm Stun Lynx 93-79 Part 2

Additional thoughts, discussion, and interviews from Seattle's win over Minnesota.

The Seattle Storm (21-19) picked up their best win of the season on the road at Minnesota by a final score of 93-79. The victory was as impressive as it was unlikely. Seattle turned up the defensive intensity and outscored Minnesota by 27 points in the 2nd half. It was one of the greatest comebacks in franchise history. If you missed it, you can read the full game recap at the link here.

In Part 2, I wrote about how Napheesa Collier struggles against Dominique Malonga and why Minnesota should try to avoid Seattle in the playoffs. I also discussed how winning a game they were expected to lose has changed some things for the team as they gear up for the playoffs. I’ve also included some interview quotes and the full post-game press conference.

Collier Struggles with Malonga

Napheesa Collier is having an MVP season this year. She leads the WNBA in scoring at 23.6 PPG. Collier is an incredible scorer at all three levels (paint, midrange, three-point). She was the 2024 WNBA Defensive Player of the Year. There is no denying she is one of the most talented players in the league, whether she actually wins the Most Valuable Player award or not.

With that said, I’ve noticed that Collier has a lot of trouble scoring against Dominique Malonga. I’m not quite ready to call Malonga the “Collier Stopper” or say that Dom is Phee’s kryptonite, but there has been a lot of evidence to show that she gives Phee fits.

If you recall, back on June 11th, it was Malonga who helped turn the tide of that game against Minnesota. You can read more details on that at this link here. She forced Collier into multiple airball shots.

Some of it is very obvious. Napheesa Collier, like Nneka Ogwumike, is undersized for a low-post player. She is only 6’1”. Honestly, this is probably why she fell to 6th overall in the 2019 WNBA Draft. WNBA scouts must not have had the belief that she would be able to score and battle down low against taller bigs. It is a massive credit to Collier’s work ethic and her drive that she’s turned into as talented a player as she has.

At 6’6” with a 7’1” wingspan, Dominique Malonga is a much larger player than Napheesa Collier. But it’s Malonga’s speed, lateral quickness, and defensive discipline that provide such a problem for Phee.

In this game, Dom forced Collier into multiple missed shots to the point where Napheesa was whistled for an offensive foul as she tried to push Malonga off of her. Phee has been able to overcome a lot against bigger players, but the height and length advantage of Malonga seems like it might just be too much of a size difference. Dom’s physical tools are a perfect counter to what Napheesa Collier likes to do.

After the game, I spoke with both Skylar Diggins and Coach Noelle Quinn about this topic.

Skylar told me, “I think Dom gives everybody problems, both sides of the basketball. Obviously, her length and you know, as the season's gone on, finding her footing and understanding how physical this league is, not just taking hits anymore, but giving a few back in return, and timing. You learn people's cadence after you've been in the league for a little bit longer. And so it's no surprise there. You know, Napheesa is hard for everybody, and nobody's really figured her out. So, just trying to make it tough on her. And I thought Dom, Ezi, Nneka, that post group did a great job of containing a really good player.”

I asked Coach Quinn not only about the Malonga/Collier matchup, but also the impact both Dom and Ezi had on this game.

Quinn replied, “Yeah, I thought that Ezi and Dom's minutes together gave us a good balance of defense and offense. Ezi's activity level; she had some monster blocks. just really communicative on the defensive end. I think one rebound at the half, but finished with seven. So her activity increased even more. She hit a three, just a lot of momentum plays for us. And, some, even some high/low looks, you know, Dom spacing the floor, the gravity that she provides for us at the rim opens up like others, not just herself. And, the, yeah, just the energy level they play at the pace that each of them plays with that impacted our possessions and really gave us a boost on both sides of the basketball.”

“Dom, she does give Collier a little bit of trouble because of her length. And, you know, Napheesa is a difficult matchup, and she can hurt you from inside and outside. But Dom's agility to defend her around the court, plus take away her three and contest and provide some altering of shots, plus rebounding. I think she did that at home and then doubled down tonight on the road and really impacted the defensive end tonight.” Quinn added.

Minnesota Should Avoid Seattle

The Minnesota Lynx (30-8) are the best team in the WNBA. The Minnesota Lynx will finish the season as the #1 overall seed and have homecourt advantage throughout the playoffs. I still believe the Lynx are likely to win their 5th WNBA Championship this season. But I also believe that it would be in their best interest to avoid Seattle in the postseason.

I also think that it might be in the Storm’s best interest if they were to face Minnesota, to do it in the first round. The first round is a best-of-three playoff series. New this year is that all playoff teams get at least one home playoff game. They’ve changed the format from two games at home to the top seed and then a decisive Game 3 on the road to a 1-1-1 format. The semi-finals remain a best-of-five series 2-2-1. Also new for 2025 is that the WNBA Finals will be a seven-game series. The higher seed will host Games 1, 2, 5, and 7 (2-2-1-1-1), and the lower seed will host Games 3, 4, and 6.

If Seattle and Minnesota were to face off in the playoffs, the Lynx would be favored no matter what, whether it’s a three-game, five-game, or seven-game series. Because the WNBA doesn’t reseed after the initial bracket, if the Storm aren’t the 8th seed, they could only face the Lynx in the WNBA Finals. It would probably be “easier” for the Storm to beat the Lynx twice in a three-game set than beat them four times in one series.

With that said, this win will give the Storm a lot of confidence. Seattle has overcome large leads by Minnesota multiple times and two of the four times, they came back and won the game. They nearly did it in the first matchup in Minnesota as well where they lost 82-77. Seattle is also the only WNBA team this year to defeat the Lynx on multiple occasions when Napheesa Collier is in the lineup. The Atlanta Dream is the only other team to beat Minnesota twice, but one of those games was without Collier and the Dream won 75-73 in Atlanta.

Minnesota’s losses this year.

94-84 at Seattle (first loss)
68-64 at Washington (without Napheesa Collier)
79-71 at Phoenix
87-81 at Chicago
90-86 versus Atlanta (first home loss)
85-75 at New York (without Phee)
75-73 at Atlanta (without Phee)
93-79 versus Seattle (second home loss)

Their 74-59 loss against Indiana in the Commissioner’s Cup Championship technically doesn’t count.

Sometimes, certain teams are just bad matchups for other teams. As we saw on Tuesday, the Indiana Fever are a bad matchup for the Seattle Storm. Seattle has two wins against all of the Top 5 teams in the standings. They have beaten Minnesota, Las Vegas, Atlanta, Phoenix, and New York two times each. They are 0-3 against Indiana. The only other teams they have a losing record against are the Washington Mystics (1-2), the Golden State Valkyries (1-2), and the LA Sparks (1-2). The Storm still have the opportunity to even things up with both Los Angeles and Golden State in September.

Defensively, Malonga and Magbegor can make the game more difficult for Collier. No one is going to shut down Phee completely. If she’s scoring 18 points, but has to take 23 field goal attempts on 30% (7-23 FG) shooting to get there, that is a win for Seattle. If the Storm’s guards are able to match or outplay Courtney Williams and Kayla McBride, Seattle has a very high chance of winning.

In this game, Williams and McBride combined for 38 points, and both played well, but Skylar and Gabby combined for 39 points. Nneka and Dom combined had better numbers than Napheesa. And the two Aussies, Ezi and Alanna Smith, canceled each other out. Erica Wheeler was also critical in the win as she was able to outplay Natisha Hiedeman and DiJonai Carrington off Minnesota’s bench.

Minnesota’s path to the title will be much easier if they can avoid Seattle.

This Win Changes Some Things

I had marked this down as a “scheduled loss” before this game took place. The Seattle Storm have literally played every other day on the road for an entire week. They played on Friday (8/22) in Dallas, Sunday (8/24) in Washington, D.C., Tuesday (8/26) in Indiana, and Thursday (8/28) in Minnesota. Meanwhile, the Lynx had three days off after a home game against Indiana on Sunday. This was the 5th game of a five-game road trip for Seattle. All signs pointed to a Minnesota Lynx victory.

That almost felt like an absolute certainty when Seattle got behind 21-6 in the first quarter. Even more so after they trailed 39-18 midway through the second period. It would be hard to blame them if they packed it in like they did against the Indiana Fever. But that is the beauty of sports. They fought back and they fought hard. They did everything a good competitive basketball team should do, and they outscored the Lynx by 35 points from the 5:50 mark of the second quarter to the end of the game.

With the unexpected victory, the Storm move ahead of the Golden State Valkyries (19-18). They now have two more wins than Golden State and four more wins than Los Angeles (17-19). While extremely unlikely, Seattle still can technically get as high as the 3rd overall seed if they were to win out. That would also require teams like Atlanta, Phoenix, and New York to lose just about all of their remaining games.

As I said, very unlikely. But this win does put them in a position where it’s possible they could still earn the 6th overall seed. Because the Indiana Fever swept Seattle and own the tiebreaker, the Storm will have to finish a full game ahead of Indiana to earn the 6th seed. By beating Minnesota, they do give themselves a legit shot at it. Right now, they are in a virtual tie with Indiana (20-18) as the Fever have a .526 winning percentage and the Storm have a .525 winning percentage.

Of course, this is also dependent on the Storm taking care of business against Chicago. And then picking up at least one and ideally two wins in September against the LA Sparks, New York Liberty, and Golden State Valkyries.

I believe there is a good chance the Storm will clinch a playoff spot with just 22 wins, and I feel it might be a near 100% guarantee if they get to 23 wins. If they get to 24 wins, they will be in, and both 24 and 25 (the most they can have) would probably earn them the 6th seed.

The players and the Coaching staff deserve a lot of credit for a 4-1 road trip. Even if there were a couple of lesser teams on the schedule. Going 3-2 would have been great, honestly. After losing six games in a row, the Storm have won four out of their last five and five out of their last seven. They can keep that up with a good win against Chicago on Saturday. It’s been a good bounce back by the team.

Despite a lot of disappointments throughout this 44-game season, the Seattle Storm are a very talented team when they are firing on all cylinders and playing at their best. It’s within their power to tell their story and how this season will end. If they can win 23 or 24 games, clinch a playoff spot, and win a playoff series, the team can prove they are headed in the right direction.

Post-Game Press Conference

If you prefer the audio versions, you can listen to them below. Please note, I missed a minute or two of the player interviews as I hit the record button only to notice it never started recording as Skylar started speaking and answering her first question. The video above has the full interviews.

Player Interviews

Coach’s Quotes

Notes:
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Thanks to Her Hoop Stats and Across the Timeline for being great resources.
Photo Credits: Seattle Storm/WNBA Photography

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