Storm's Big Road Win 101-85 Part 2

Additional thoughts, interviews, and discussion on Seattle's win at Connecticut

The Seattle Storm (16-11) bounced back after a lackluster performance against the Washington Mystics on Saturday. They were very sharp, especially on the offensive end, where they shot a season-high over 60% from the field and scored over 100 points in the game. The starters looked excellent, and the bench got a lot of quality minutes during Seattle’s 101-85 road victory over the Connecticut Sun. Seattle led by 32 points early in the 4th quarter. Skylar Diggins had her first career triple-double after having one in the WNBA All-Star game just a couple of weeks ago. You can read the full game recap here.

In Part 2, I wrote more on the Storm’s productive offense, discussed a potential Marina Mabrey trade, and admired the WNBA for its parity. Plus, I’ve included some of the best quotes and the audio and video of the post-game press conference.

Productive Offense

Seattle’s offense was highly efficient. It’s amazing how good this team is when Nneka, Gabby, Skylar, and Ezi are all hitting their stride. They become such a dangerous team, especially with Ogwumike’s improved three-point shooting this season. Magbegor was super aggressive early on. The same can be said for Gabby Williams. Williams was intent on going hard to the rim and would not be denied. She even had a couple of AND1s as she’s starting to get rewarded more frequently with the whistle.

The Storm did a fantastic job, whether that was driving hard to the rim, going high-low, finding the backdoor cut, or reverse layups. Seattle’s “Core Four” (Ogwumike, Diggins, Williams, and Magbegor) combined to shoot 26-35 FG, good for 74% from the field. Seattle outscored Connecticut 56-26 inside the paint. You can view the shot chart below to see how incredibly effective they were overall, but especially inside the paint.

After the game, I had the opportunity to talk to Nneka Ogwumike about their offensive flow and what was working so well for them in this game.

Ogwumike answered, “That's how we want to play. That's the foundation that we stood upon in the beginning of the season, and we've been trying to get back to that. I think today was indicative of us just pushing the pace, getting to space, getting to our spots, and not over-complicating things. When you feel like the offense isn't working or shots are not falling, you feel like you need to change a lot. And I think that today we showed that we can lean on what makes us us, and we can just stay ready and aggressive individually, which ends up being a collective effort. And so I'm really happy that we were able to do that and also capitalize on our defensive possessions to turn into good offense.”

I also spoke with Coach Noelle Quinn about the offense.

“Offensively, I thought our pace was really good. I thought we were playing out of our defense. A lot of assists generated two feet in the paint and finding spray opportunities, efficient finishing around the room, especially with Gabby, Sky. And it is an amazing performance by Nneka all over the floor. knocking down threes, but also being very physical in her attack. So I think the ball was moving. I thought that we were cleaner with our reads. And then, you know, it's different when we're knocking down shots.” Quinn told me.

Mabrey Trade?

My friend and colleague, Kevin Pelton, put out a fun article to discuss some potential WNBA Trade Deadline deals. You can read the full article here. He suggested the Storm could trade for Marina Mabrey of the Connecticut Sun. They would have to part with at least one of their first-round picks; likely their own, which is currently less valuable than their other two picks from Los Angeles and Las Vegas. However, as Kevin points out in his article, Seattle would also need to trade players in order to match Marina Mabrey’s salary.

Unfortunately, in the WNBA, if a team trades for another player during the season, they are responsible for the entire year’s salary. Unlike what happens if a player is signed as a Free Agent in the middle of the season. For instance, when the Storm added Tiffany Mitchell, she came in as an Unrestricted Free Agent in the middle of the season, so they had to only pay her prorated veteran minimum salary, which was around $42,000 per HerHoopsStats. But a deal for Mabrey would require the Storm or any acquiring team to have $210,000 in salary cap space before they could add her.

In Pelton’s article, he suggested that Seattle could trade Alysha Clark ($185,000) and Katie Lou Samuelson ($90,000). That would free up $275,000 in total salary cap space for the Storm. That would allow them to acquire Mabrey and add one more player on another prorated deal. In theory, Seattle could also offer a different player other than Katie Lou Samuelson. They could offer either Lexie Brown ($96,000) or Zia Cooke ($66,000); however, they would have to include Clark because they would need her higher salary to try to match Mabrey’s max deal.

Marina is averaging 14.7 PPG, 4.5 RPG, and 4.0 APG this season. She is shooting 36% from the field overall and 29% from beyond the three-point line. Mabrey has never been a WNBA All-Star, but she is a talented shooting guard. She’ll be an Unrestricted Free Agent at the end of this season.

Looking over the proposed deal, a few thoughts come to mind. Would adding Marina Mabrey to the Storm’s roster improve the team? I think that is unequivocally a “Yes”. Mabrey would add another shooter who can score, penetrate, and knock down three-pointers. She would help Seattle space the floor with the threat of her outside shot. She could also help the Storm find more offense during some of these games where the team is scoring less than 70 points. The addition of Mabrey would improve the bench quite a bit because either she could provide firepower off the bench. Mabrey would be a more reliable scorer than Lexie Brown or Zia Cooke. Alternatively, Marina could start at the Shooting Guard position, and that would return Erica Wheeler to the bench. A spot she excelled at to begin this season, before playing so well, they had to move her to the starting lineup.

The next question would be, “Would the addition of Mabrey turn the Storm into title contenders?” That is a larger question and less certain. Right now, we don’t know the exact extent of Breanna Stewart’s non-contact lower leg injury. Stewie came up lame running back on defense on Saturday against the LA Sparks. It was early in the first quarter, and she was immediately ruled out for the rest of the game. Reports suggest that an MRI revealed no significant injury, meaning not a full-blown torn Achilles or torn ligaments. However, her timeline to return is unknown.

When Stewart partially tore her other Achilles tendon at the end of the 2021 WNBA season. There was some thought that had Seattle advanced far enough in the playoffs (late in the Semi-Finals or reaching the Finals), that Stewart might have tried to return and play. Instead, the Storm were eliminated in a single-elimination game in Everett against the Phoenix Mercury. Shortly after the Storm’s season was over, Breanna Stewart went into surgery to repair her Achilles tendon.

We’ve also seen most recently what happened to the Indiana Pacers and Tyrese Haliburton. Haliburton had a calf strain in the NBA Finals against the OKC Thunder. And he tried to play through it. Then, in Game 7, his body gave out, and his Achilles tendon ruptured. We will have to see how long Stewart is out for and if there is any risk for further injury when she does play.

That was a bit long-winded, but it’s important. If Breanna Stewart is unable to return this season. That would make things significantly more difficult for the New York Liberty to advance back to the WNBA Finals. They still have enough talent on their roster to reach the Finals, especially if they add Emma Meesseman soon, as the reports have stated is the plan. But losing Stewie for some time will give lots of other WNBA teams the chance to make a Finals run.

If you look over the landscape of the WNBA. The Las Vegas Aces have struggled a lot this season compared to the past few years. The Indiana Fever haven’t played up to expectations as DeWanna Bonner left the team shortly after joining them, and Caitlin Clark has been marred by multiple injuries. Both the Phoenix Mercury and the Atlanta Dream could make a run. But every team is vulnerable.

A Seattle Storm team with the addition of Marina Mabrey and a constantly improving Dominique Malonga, likely would have enough talent to make a serious run at the WNBA Finals.

However, there are also plenty of reasons why Seattle wouldn’t make this move. As a franchise, the Storm are in a very healthy position right now. They have a potential WNBA Finals contender currently, but they also have a lot of assets for the future. It should also be noted that draft picks are 100% protected against expansion drafts, but players aren’t. Even Unrestricted Free Agents have to be protected. That means that if the Storm traded for Mabrey, even though she would become an Unrestricted Free Agent, they would still have to protect her in the expansion draft unless they were 100% fine losing her and not even having the chance to try to re-sign her. If they protect Mabrey, they would be leaving another player exposed. Depending on how many players they’re allowed to protect in a two-team expansion draft (Portland and Toronto), that might mean losing Nika Mühl, Erica Wheeler, or an awful scenario like losing Jordan Horston.

If they’re giving up a first-round draft pick, I assume they would hold onto the Sparks pick because if LA does miss the playoffs, that’s likely a Top 3 draft pick in 2026. But even still, giving up one of the other two picks could cost the Storm a talented player. Players like Kiki Rice, Cotie McMahon, Serah Williams, or a top International Prospect like Awa Fam could be available with the Storm’s other first-round picks. And I’m not sure if that’s worth giving up for two months of Marina Mabrey.

It’s also possible Connecticut would be asking for either multiple first-round picks or one first-round pick, and the Dallas early second-round pick, which ironically will likely end up being Connecticut’s pick due to owning swap rights between Dallas and Connecticut.

Another interesting factor is whether Mabrey would even want to be traded. She’s built a very close relationship with rookie Saniya Rivers. Despite Marina requesting a trade before this season started, she may no longer want that to happen.

Lastly, I’m not sure about the optics of trading an injured Katie Lou Samuelson or veteran Alysha Clark. If we’re being realistic, this could be Clark’s final season in the WNBA. She’s the oldest player in the WNBA now that Diana Taurasi retired. I’m not saying it definitely is, but it would be fitting if she ended her career where it started, in Seattle.

Let me know if you want to see the Storm trade for Marina Mabrey, knowing what it would cost. And if you think adding Mabrey would give the Storm a legitimate shot at the title.

Parity League

This is more of a quick aside, but after watching the Storm crush the Connecticut Sun, who had just beaten the Golden State Valkyries team by 31 points, I flipped the channel over to the New York Liberty/Dallas Wings game. To my shock, the score was 63 to 36, with Dallas in the lead at halftime.

Despite being one of the league’s worst teams this season. Dallas recently beat the Storm in Seattle by 24 points. Now they were leading the defending champions, the Liberty, by nearly 30 points! Of course, New York was without Breanna Stewart. And they did rally to cut their 30-point deficit down to six points late in the game. But it was still surprising to see. And it’s really just a reminder that the WNBA is full of parity. 10 of the 13 teams have 11 wins or more already, with most teams still having close to 20 games to play.

As we expand from 12 teams in 2024 to 15 teams in 2026, it’ll be interesting to see if the parity of the WNBA starts to fall off a bit. Even more so, after 2030, once the league expands to Cleveland, Detroit, and Philadelphia as well. But for now, the WNBA is one of the most competitive leagues, night in and night out.

Post-Game Press Conference

If you prefer the audio versions, I’ve posted them below.

*Note the audio version of the player interviews was interrupted due to an Amber Alert, so we lost maybe 1-2 minutes near the beginning.

Player Interviews

Diggins talked about her triple-double and rebounding.

Skylar said, “Rebounding like that, it helps our pace, get to get in and go, get out. But yeah, I played a lot of talented players. I didn't really see what it was, I guess, until the end. And then I missed two free shots in a row. But yeah, it was great to happen tonight. Coming off a loss, we wanted to bounce back. And regardless of what the numbers were, just trying to do my part. I did not like how I played in Washington. But just trying to use the overall floor game. Some of their schemes are really aggressive. And so just trying to make the right reads when I'm able to draw two or three in the paint.”

Ogwumike on the noticeable improvement of Dom Malonga.

Nneka replied, “Dom is someone who you witness her growth and progression in the game. It's not even just game by game. It's literally with every minute that she plays, you are seeing her develop. In these last few games, we've noticed her coming in with that strength, her understanding her body in space and taking contact and utilizing the wisdom that she has in the game to be effective on both ends it's I mean it is truly just the beginning for her, but we want her to know that she's an incredible asset as young as she is and as early as it's been in her career and we we just want to continue to have her play with that type of confidence.”

Coach’s Quotes

On the training wheels being removed for Dominique Malonga.

Quinn told me, “You know, Dom is growing in an amazing way. And I think these past couple of weeks, we've grown up in ways that you guys don't really see. And I'm not going to really talk about those intangibles, but it's really showing up in her play. And she's going to continue to be a vital part of what we need to be doing on defense and offense. She plays extremely hard, but because, you know, she's surrounded with greatness and has an example in front of her, great examples in Nneka and Ezi and post players, she's able to really compliment them, but see what it takes to play at this high level. So she's going to continue to, you know, grow in this fashion because she's putting the work in.”

On Skylar’s triple-double and the importance of rebounding.

Quinn said, “It was just kind of the reward, being coachable and understanding the rebounding isn't just to get a triple double or stats, but it's to help us as a team. We're plus 11, I think. Is that right? On the boards today. And we can't just rely on our post players. And I think early on in the season, she always talks about how she's she lets them go get it. But now, if you watch her play, you could point back to that All-Star Game when she had a triple-double as well. She's going to pursue rebounds. And I think that's important as we start the break, start our transition break, and things like that to engage her on that end of the floor. Yeah, I thought that she was assisting. She had eight, I think, at halftime. She was assisting well, and she was, you know, pretty efficient in other areas. And so I thought it was important, you know, second in franchise history. That's awesome. First in her career, which I didn't know that, but continuing to show how great she is in a Storm uniform.”

On the lessons learned from this three-game road trip.

Coach replied, “We got to continue to build on the things that have brought us success. I want to continue to speak life and positivity in my group. The reality of it is, we're not trying to miss shots. We're not trying to mess up on defense. We're trying to do the right thing. And that's kind of what discipline is, to continue to do the right thing all the time and not getting bored with the details of those things. So I'm going to continue to implore and encourage the group to be us, to rely on each other, to pick each other up. And in times where we feel like we're not giving our best or doing our best, to keep the perspective and in perspective, being where our feet are and attacking whatever the goal is of the mission is for that particular day. So the thing is not getting too high or too low. and making sure I stay pretty positive and encouraging in that way. And then hopefully that continues to breed some success.”

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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