Dream Tendered Offer to Lacy Earlier This Year

One of the most perplexing events of the 2009-10 offseason was the fact that Jennifer Lacy remained an unsigned free agent almost until the beginning of Training Camp. She was released by the Dream on April 26 and four days later the Washington Mystics signed her for training camp.

Given that one of Holdsclaw's motivations in signing for the Dream was to play alongside Lacy, the question was why the Dream failed to re-sign Lacy. Today, I communicated with someone...well, let's just say that it was very high up in the DFO, someone who would know exactly what was going on.

According to my DFO contact, the Dream tendered an offer to Lacy...and they heard...nothing. No answer from Lacy. So if Lacy wanted to stay with the Dream, she would have simply signed the offer and nothing would have changed.

Frankly, if I was in the WNBA and had a PER of 7.87 lifetime...if some front office tendered me a contract I'd sign it and risk a wrist injury by giving myself a high-five.

Major Sponsor Announcement Scheduled for Media Day

According to the Atlanta Dream, owner Kathy Betty will make a "major sponsor announcement" tomorrow. In attendance:

Atlanta Dream Owner Kathy Betty
Atlanta Dream President & COO Toby Wyman
Atlanta Dream Head Coach & General Manager Marynell Meadors
Representatives from major sponsor

Who knows what this means? Do we dare hope for a jersey sponsorship? "Major" can mean anything in the WNBA, but if the Dream wanted me to start salivating, it worked.

The End of the Holdsclaw Era

The following message was sent by Dream COO Toby Wyman to the season-ticket holders of the Atlanta Dream on May 11, 2010:

As we continue to build this franchise on and off the floor, we are at times faced with making tough decisions. We are currently challenged with one of the most difficult decisions this organization has encountered. Unfortunately, Chamique Holdsclaw recently expressed a desire to be traded. Chamique was an integral part of our success last year and we had every intention of keeping her and having her continue to play a key role with the Dream. We are actively pursuing a resolution to grant her request and we appreciate all that Chamique has done to help our young franchise.

So now, it's out in the open. The question isn't if there will be trade, the question is "when". After tons of smoke, we finally have fire.

Chamique Holdsclaw's tenure with the Atlanta Dream began on December 17, 2008 when they swapped the #13 pick to the Los Angeles Sparks in the 2009 WNBA Draft - the Dream already had the #1 pick - for the rights to Holdsclaw. (The Sparks would pick up Lindsay Wisdom-Hylton out of Purdue with the pick they acquired.) There were high hopes because Chamique Holdsclaw was probably one of the greatest women's basketball players of all time. (*) Even though Holdsclaw had her detractors - Holdsclaw's battles with depression were well documented and her walking away from the Sparks during the 2007 season let many fans down - The Claw was certainly a big-name acquisition for Atlanta.

At the time, the two biggest names on the Dream were Betty Lennox and Ivory Latta. Lennox had battled with coach Marynell Meadors and the only question among Dream observers was how Lennox would leave, not if. With Latta cut at the end of the 2009 training camp in favor of Shalee Lehning, this made Holdsclaw the biggest name on the team. Sancho Lyttle and Erika de Souza had yet to surprise the Dream with their great 2009 seasons. McCoughtry was the #1 pick in the WNBA Draft but she was still a rookie and some suggested that there would be other players in the draft at least as good as McCoughtry.

Holdsclaw could return to a leadership role in more ways than one in Atlanta . But it seemed that injuries plagued Holdsclaw before she even put on the Powder Blue uniform of the Dream. Playing for the Wisla Can-Pack Krakow team in Poland , a knee injury sent Holdsclaw home in mid-season. Holdsclaw was only able to play 11 games for the Poles in 2008-09. Even so, the goal was for Holdsclaw to have her knee rehabbed in the interim and to return to the Dream for the start of the 2009 WNBA season.

When Holdsclaw returned to the Dream, there was still some gasoline left in the tank. Holdsclaw exploded for 28 points in a Dream game against the Shock, and three weeks later scored another 28 against the Lynx in Minnesota . The Dream were 18-16 in 2008 and 14 of those 18 wins came with Holdsclaw. Holdsclaw's ability to move the ball for the Dream offense was outstanding - she could either burst by a defender or stop-and-start, throwing off the defender's timing and leaving her helpless.

As the season progressed Holdsclaw's knees caught up with her. She would only play in 25 games of the 2009 season. Her Player Efficiency Rating was 14.85 - the equivalent of an average player and not a superstar. In terms of PER, it was Holdsclaw's worst season. (For a player at Holdsclaw's level, "average" is bad.) Like a car's overheated engine, Holdsclaw's knees finally conked out and she missed the final nine games of the regular season. She returned for one game of the playoffs against the Detroit Shock but was a non-factor, scoring 3 points in 13 minutes of play. Holdsclaw did not return for the second game, watching from the bench, and the Dream were eliminated.

Even so, Holdsclaw was one of the parts of a successful 2009 season and many hoped that a (healthy) Holdsclaw would be back in 2010. Holdclaw's health problems persisted. She signed with the Good Angels Kosice team for the 2009-10 European season and after a couple of games, the Slovaks sent Holdsclaw right back home. The impression given by the Slovaks was that she had failed her physical, and Holdsclaw confirmed it in a Twitter post:

When I didn’t pass my physical in October with the team in Slovakia , I was disappointed. I felt this way because as an athlete, all you want to do is compete, and for a short time I was unable to do so. This whole experience has been really humbling.

To replace Holdsclaw the Slovaks got...Angel McCoughtry, who did extremely well under the same circumstances - even dunking in a game against a weaker Slovak club. McCoughtry and Candice Dupree took the Good Angels Kosice team deep into Euroleague. Holdsclaw ended up with K. V. Imperial in Cyprus - a good team and perennial Eurocup contender, but not exactly a top rank European team - the kind of team where average WNBA players might play. (**)

Holdsclaw returned to Atlanta at the end of the Cypriot season. One clue that things might have changed for Holdsclaw in Atlanta was that Jennifer Lacy was still unsigned by the Dream. Holdsclaw is a close friend of Lacy's and part of the draw in playing in Atlanta was that they'd be on the same team. Lacy would be entering the fourth year of her WNBA career and would be due a significant salary raise. If Atlanta signed Lacy, the Dream would be stuck with Lacy's dismal production under Meadors; if the Dream didn't they took the risk of losing Holdsclaw who might bolt. (***)

Before camp, the Dream declined to sign Lacy and Lacy became a free agent. Lacy ended up at the Washington Mystics camp, Chamique Holdsclaw's former stamping grounds. Holdsclaw was definitely in Atlanta - she was sighted at a shoe promotion - but there were no pictures of her in camp. There was no promotional material highlighting Holdsclaw in camp, but Holdsclaw and Lacy had made appearances for the Dream (for example, at Georgia Tech in an attempt to promote the club) in the early part of 2010.

With Thursday, May 13th - Media Day - looming ahead, with Friday being the day where all WNBA rosters are finalized and with Saturday being the first game of the 2010 WNBA regular season with the Dream traveling to San Antonio , something had to give. It gave yesterday evening. Someone posted on the Dream Facebook page that Holdsclaw might be leaving and the season-ticket holders revealed the contents of their e-mails.

(* * *)

The question now is what the Dream will do with Holdsclaw. They can trade Holdsclaw, but the question is "does any other team want Holdsclaw?" Holdsclaw's on-court production depends on her shaky health and Holdsclaw's salary requirements would be high - The Claw has been in the league since 1999. Meadors would probably take any trade she could get if there were no other options...past trades by Meadors of Dream players indicate that for particular unnamed players that have left Atlanta , Meadors would have taken two used basketballs (one patched) in trade.

Another option is that the Dream could flat-out release Holdsclaw. This leaves any other team free to pick her up. The downside is that the Dream gave up a first-round draft pick for one year of an underperforming Holdsclaw. A final option would be to suspend Holdsclaw for not showing up to camp, and I don't know how suspension affects a player.

The two big questions are:

1) Is the Dream good enough to make the playoffs this year even without Holdsclaw? My answer is "yes". Lyttle, de Souza and McCoughtry make the Dream a contender.

2) Who will take over Holdsclaw's role on the Dream? Holdsclaw brought two advantages to the Dream. She was personable, and she was a team leader.

What little I've seen of Angel McCoughtry suggests that McCoughtry could step into a team leader position even as a second year player. McCoughtry has the drive and the will to win; she simply has to avoid trying to do everything for the Dream. Can McCoughtry make her teammates better, the test of a true leader? If she can, then McCoughtry becomes the Field General. Everything from last year and Euroleague suggests that McCoughtry is The One.

Whether McCoughtry has the charisma of Holdsclaw is hard to say. McCoughtry has made appearances for the Dream on television, but does she want to get out there and mingle with the fans at minor functions and turn on the charm even when she doesn't want to? If McCoughtry wanted to be the Dream's ambassador, I believe she could do it - McCoughtry is the kind of person who could do almost anything she set her mind to through sheer determination.

Even though the Holdsclaw Era is over, the Dream lives on. It's just a rule of being a fan - your players don't stay with you forever. Definitely true for the Dream - the only players left from the 2008 squad are Erika de Souza and Iziane Castro Marques. With the Atlanta Dream, change is a fact of life, not a choice.

_____



(*) - My Hall of Fame Metric has Holdsclaw as the xxth greatest of the modern era, with a 94 percent chance of going into a hypothetical WNBA Hall of Fame.

(**) - Although I hear that it's beautiful in Cyprus .

(***) - If you buy the "Meadors is master manipulator" theory, one could conclude that Meadors let Lacy go in the hopes that Holdsclaw would soon depart afterwards. If so, the master plan failed because Holdsclaw's late trade request leaves the Dream scrambling.

Facebook Rumors

A random comment by Monique Hall on Facebook:

Monique Hall OMG!!!!!!!!! What is really going on???????? Just got an email that Chamique wants to be traded. I am speechless.

You know, there's nothing to this other than a random post on Facebook. But since nothing has been seen of Holdsclaw in training camp, the Dream front office needs to address this before speculation runs wild. Speculation expands to fill the vacuum left by absent knowledge.

Current Atlanta Dream Preseason Roster

Here is my current understanding of the Atlanta Dream's training camp roster:

C Alison Bales
C Yelena Leuchanka (O)
F-C Erika de Souza (NG)
C Shawn Goff
C Britany Miller

F Demetress Adams (NG)
F Tatum Brown (P, NR)
F Chamique Holdsclaw (NG)
F Sancho Lyttle (NG)
F Angel McCoughtry
F Chanel Mokango

F-G Iziane Castro Marques
G-F Armintie Price
G Dalma Ivanyi (NG)
G Shalee Lehning
G Coco Miller
G Kelly Miler
G Brittainey Raven

Anyone whose name is not followed by something in parenthesis has actually appeared in one of the two preseason games

O - indicates that the player is most likely overseas
NG - the game has never been seen in a preseason game, and there is no evidence that they're in training camp
P - there is photographic evidence that the player is with the Dream
NR - the player is not listed on the Dream's roster on the Atlanta Dream web page

Ardossi, White Released from Training Camp

Training camp has claimed two more victims - this time Brigitte Ardossi and Erica White.

Ardossi was an alumna of Georgia Tech, where she was selected by the Atlanta Dream in the second round of the 2010 Atlanta Dream last month. It was going to be a difficult job for her to get a spot in camp, and two unimpressive exhibition games didn't help her case.

Erica White was signed to the Atlanta Dream's training camp in March 2010. White, a LSU graduate, was drafted in the second round by the Houston Comets in the 2008 WNBA Draft. She played the entire year for the Comets, but only played briefly the following year for the Indiana Fever after the Comets were disbanded at the end of the 2008 season.

What Meadors is Holding

See the picture in the post below, and visit this link:


10 LC 94 2410
House Resolution 1594
By: Representatives Drenner of the 86th, Abrams of the 84th, Benfield of the 85th, and Henson of the 87th

A RESOLUTION


Recognizing and commending Coach Marynell Meadors on being named the 2009 WNBA Coach of the Year and inviting her to be recognized by the House of Representatives; and for other purposes.

WHEREAS, Coach Marynell Meadors has long been recognized for her amazing ability to bring out the best performances from her players and her commitment to promoting the work of female athletes; and

WHEREAS, she has diligently and conscientiously devoted her time, talents, and energy for the past 35 years to challenging athletes as a coach and currently serves as general manager and head coach of the WNBA's Atlanta Dream; and

WHEREAS, Coach Meadors earned bachelor's and master's degrees from Middle Tennessee State University and began her prestigious coaching career at Tennessee Tech University as the first head coach of the women's basketball program; and

WHEREAS, she dedicated 20 years to the Golden Eagles, posting a school record winning percentage of .723, earning two Ohio Valley Conference Coach of the Year awards and a Metro Conference Coach of the Year award, and steering her team to four conference championships and two Metro Conference titles; and

WHEREAS, Coach Meadors also served as head coach at Florida State University, where she transformed the Seminoles into a winning program and led them to a Metro Conference Championship and the second round of the NCAA Tournament; and

WHEREAS, this year, Coach Meadors enters her second season with the WNBA's Atlanta Dream, her fourth with the WNBA family, and was recently honored as the 2009 WNBA Coach of the Year; and

WHEREAS, during her tenure in the WNBA, Coach Meadors has inspired fans and players of the Atlanta Dream, the Charlotte Sting, the Miami Sol, and the Washington Mystics, helping lead the Stings and Mystics to playoff appearances; and

WHEREAS, in recognition of her contributions to the field of sports and her excellent basketball coaching abilities, it is abundantly fitting and proper for this body to honor the extraordinary commitment and accomplishments of this outstanding individual.

NOW, THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED BY THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES that the members of this body commend Coach Marynell Meadors on her impressive coaching career, congratulate her on being honored as the 2009 WNBA Coach of the Year, and invite her to be recognized by the House of Representatives at a date and time to be designated by the Speaker of the House of Representatives.

BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that the Clerk of the House of Representatives is authorized and directed to transmit an appropriate copy of this resolution to Coach Marynell Meadors.

New Writeup on Dream-Mystics Preseason Game

Marynell Meadors receives a proclamation from the Tennessee House of Representatives. Pic by Thomas Corhern.

Thomas Corhern of the Cookeville Herald-Citizen wrote about the Dream-Mystics pre-season game held in Cookeville. Some choice quotes:

"Most of that took place because we didn't take care of the basketball," said Meadors, who coached at Tennessee Tech from 1970-86. "That really hurt us. We got set back on our heels and never really recovered from it. We fought back within eight or nine points. I didn't think our chemistry was good on the court. We just didn't seem to play with an edge and we've got to get that back."

Dream star Iziane Castro Marques, who led the team with 13 points, added, "It may not have been the result we wanted, but it was a good teaching point for us."

...

"Those aren't good games for them," Meadors said. "They're usually much better scorers than they were. Izzy just got here on Thursday. She practiced with us once then we came down here. When you have players coming into camp at various times, it's really hard to get good chemistry. We'll get them in next week and work on those things."

McCoughtry added, "Fortunately it's still the preseason, but we're still trying to find our chemistry. We'll be fine, but we've still got some work to do."

For the rest, read the article. (I'm posting the pictures on the blog as to not eat the bandwidth of the Herald-Citizen.) The paper called the game a "success". We also got this cryptic sentence:

With a depleted roster thanks to the European championships overseas, and former Tennessee standout Chamique Holdsclaw unavailable for the contest, the Dream (0-2) was lacking a bit of its oomph.

Why unavailable?

Other pictures:

Lehning vs. Kobryn
Lehning vs. Currie

Post Exhibition Game Pic (Damned Small)

Another picture of the Dream, this time taken after practice. Someone got on the bus!

(Note: in order to see the picture full size, you have to quote the link. Yes, I hate these teeny-tiny pictures probably as much as you hate them, but that's how Twitter wants to work the system. Twitter wants the hits, so you have to click on the picture.)

E2/2010 - Mystics 77, Dream 58

Okay. The Dream have lost a lot of games in their history by 19 points or more. Hey, last year we lost games by 19 points or more. The last game that we lost that badly was...no, wait, we didn't lose by 19 points last year. The biggest losses we had were by 18 points. You have to go back to August of 2008 to find a loss of that magnitude, where the Dream lost to Connecticut 98-72 at Philips Arena.

But even that game had high points. Betty "Big Buckets" Lennox scored 19 points. Katie Mattera had 13 points and six rebounds. And we don't even have those players on the Dream anymore. Looking at the box score, high points are few and far between.

* The Dream shot 27.1 percent from the floor. First half shooting was 22.2 percent. Thank goodness this was the preseason. We still didn't have Sancho Lyttle, or Erika de Souza or Chamique Holdsclaw...and where on earth is The Claw? She's becoming harder to find around the Dream training camp than Waldo.
* Atlanta had 12 first quarter turnovers. Alison Bales turned the ball over four times in the first quarter.
* This was a Michael Price officiated game, and he must have purchased a brand new whistle. The Mystics were whistled for 36 personal fouls. The Dream were whistled for 28 personal fouls. The Dream had 37 foul line visits and the Mystics had 27. Price must have needed an oxygen tank after the game.

I've not seen a report on the game. Maybe everyone's trying to pretend that it never happened. I know I am. If there was a high point to this game, it can't be found anywhere in the box score. The "high point" is that it didn't happen during the regular season.

We'll take a look at the game flow a la Dean Oliver.

Pace:

Estimated possessions = [(69-15+23+0.4*27)+(59-10+21+0.4*37)]/2 = ...approximately 86.

The Dream's offensive rating was 58/60 = 67.4 and the Washington's offensive rating was 89.5. The Dream's offensive rating comes from the fact that the Dream couldn't hit the side of a barn offensively.

Game flow: The Dream's cold start put them behind early on in the game and they pretty much stayed behind by double-digits for most of the game. The Dream were never in it. In the second half of the third quarter the Dream closed Washington's lead to single-digits but the closest the Dream were able to come were eight points.

Shooting percentage: Mystics 37.7 percent, Dream 27.1 percent.
Effective shooting percentage: Mystics 39.9 percent, Dream 28.8 percent. Neither team had much of a range. The Mystics went 3-for-16 from 3-point range, the Dream went 2-for-18.

Turnovers: Dream 21, Mystics 23. Not the best game when it came to moving the ball around.
Offensive rebound percentage: Mystics 45.4 percent, Dream 24.3 percent. Having neither Lyttle nor de Souza hurts in these games.
Free throw visits: Dream 37, Mystics 27. However, the Dream's big advantage at the free throw line was negated when they shot 65 percent from the line. Atlanta only hit two more free throws than Washington.

All in all, it was easy for Washington to dominate. The Dream simply didn't show up.

And now, let's look at the Dream's individual performances.

Chanel Mokango: We'll get something straight right off. There were no great individual performances - the best performances were mediocre. Therefore, there was no "Dreamer of the Game"...there were merely survivors.

Mokango was one of the players who actually reached the level of mediocrity. Four points, one rebound. 1-for-4 shooting, and three personal fouls - but she did have a couple of steals and a blocked shot, so there you go.

Iziane Castro Marques: Castro Marques is back! And sure enough, she went 5-for-13 and missed every 3-point shot she made. (She tried six of them.) She went 3-for-6 from the free throw line. 13 points scored, but 19 scoring opportunities. She led in points, but gave the Mystics a lot of opportunities with what she missed. Bleah.

Armintie Price: Price got the start...and scored one point. She returned to her old free-throw shooting ways, going 1-for-4 at the free throw line. However, Price had three assists and a steal so it wasn't all bad.

Brittainey Raven: Raven scored 7 points - five of them at the free throw line. She went 1-for-5, including 0-for-3 at the 3-point line. Four rebounds helped, a -14 raw plus/minus did not.

Alison Bales: She managed to recover from the previous awful game into a mediocre one. She played 25 minutes and had the most time on the floor than any player. She scored 7 points, but had five turnovers to lead the team. Five turnovers to lead the team, with four in the first quarter. Three personal fouls. Not the kind of game you want to add on your resume.

Angel McCoughtry: 11 points and six rebounds. McCoughtry shot 3-for-12 to match the team's fortunes. She had four personal fouls, falling into the same kind of pattern that we saw in 2009. On the other hand, her +1 raw plus/minus led the team.

Shalee Lehning: 18 minutes played. Two points. Three assists. 1-for-3 shooting. Two personal fouls.

Erica White: She had the smallest amount of time on the court - 8 minutes, 52 seconds. She went 4-for-4 from the free throw line for four total points. She was 0-for-2 shooting from the court with one turnover.

Coco Miller: Coco Miller isn't going to help herself in camp with this kind of game. Miller went 0-for-3 and scored both of her 2 points at the free throw line. She had three rebounds and two assists, but scored three personal fouls - an average of one every four minutes.

Kelly Miller: She played 13 minutes and scored only three points. One rebounds, one assist, one personal foul. Her -17 in raw plus/minus was the worst on the team.

Brigitte Ardossi: Less than ten minutes played. Two points on 0-for-2 shooting. One rebounds, two fouls, two turnovers. "There's no emoticon for what I'm feeling."

Shawn Goff: 2 points. Believe it or not, it wasn't the worst offensive output of any of the starters - Price only scored one point. Two rebounds, two personal fouls...but four turnovers. Only Alison Bales had more turnovers than Goff did. Goff would have gotten the Bad Dream of the Game award, but it wouldn't be fair to give that award to her since she was helped by so many people.

(* * *)

Okay, between now and Friday evening, the Dream have to begin cutting players. It looks to me like Marynell Meadors will have some tough decisions to make.

The next game for the Dream will be on Saturday, in San Antonio as they open the 2010 regular season against the Silver Stars on the road. Afterward, they fly right back to Atlanta for the home opener against the defending Eastern Conference champions, the Indiana Fever. The new Dream is about to go on-line - we can only hope that we've finally worked some of the bugs out.

Digest 04-2010

* Mean Brigitte
* Erika de Souza (and others) Not Returning to Ros Casares
* Joe Maloof's Bizarre Plea
* The Future of NCAA Women's Basketball: Austin Murphy and Conference Realignment
* This Week's Games (That Weren't in the USA)






One of the arrivals in Atlanta training camp for 2010 is Georgia Tech graduate Brigitte Ardossi. Ardossi was the second round draft pick for the Atlanta Dream this year out of Georgia Tech university. For those who have never heard of Ardossi, Ardossi is a power forward who was forced to step up in a big way for Georgia Tech basketball this year when scorer Alex Montgomery - a junior in 2009-10 - was sidelined for much of the season recovering from an ACL injury. There were many games for the Yellow Jackets where Ardossi more or less carried the team on her back, scoring many of her points off of her own offensive rebounds.

Ardossi is a native Australian as well. She was written up in the Australian newspaper The Age.

From the link above:

''Six-foot-one, probably the quickest player out on the court and had a mean, very competitive streak in her,'' [Coach Adrian Giblin] said. ''It made her a bit of a handful to coach, but also made her a delight to coach because you knew she wanted the ball and wanted to win. That's a head start from anyone.''

Another interesting kernel of information was her background in netball:

Ardossi, at that stage, was also committed to netball. Although she eventually opted to give up on pursuing the sport in favour of basketball, Giblin said the skills she learnt from that code made her a much more damaging player.

'Her netball background gave her a bit of a leg-up because she was so agile and she moved brilliantly laterally, so she could go side-to-side as well as going forwards and backwards,'' [Giblin] said.

Interestingly enough, Ardossi is not the only potential Dreamer with a netball background. According to Mechelle Voepel, Sancho Lyttle also had a netball background and was on a national netball team with Sophia Young at one time.

The article implied that Australian basketball is keeping its eye on Ardossi. It's hard to say if Ardossi can make the dream, but the WNBL - the Women's National Basketball League, the premiere league in Australia - might be interested in having Ardossi on a team. There's also an outside chance that Ardossi could make the "Opals" - the Australian women's national basketball team.

Followers of women's basketball might be seeing Brigitte Ardossi for a long time...if not in the WNBA, then elsewhere.

(* * *)

For at least the last couple of years, Dream player Erika de Souza has been playing with the Ros Casares club in Spain. No longer. Erika de Souza will not be appearing in blue-and-orange next season. Neither will Amaya Valdemoro, Elisa Aguliar, Anna Montañana or Delisha Milton-Jones. After a Liga Femenina championshp and after making it to the finals of Euroleague, it looks like Ros Casares will be virtually disbanded. In addition, coach Isma Canto will be departing.

Currently, no definite information as to where de Souza will end up next year. The most likely destination is that of Perfumerias, the second-place finisher in the Liga Femenina and Ros Casares's opponent in the Liga Femenina Finals. This would put Erika de Souza on the same team with her Atlanta Dream teammate Sancho Lyttle.

(* * *)

An article by Ailene Voisin for the Sacramento Bee reports that Joe Maloof, the owner of the former Sacramento Monarchs, would like to bring the Monarchs back to Sacramento.

Maloof plans to beg WNBA President Donna Orender and plead with NBA Commissioner David Stern to reinstate the original WNBA franchise that captured the 2005 championship and routinely ranked near the middle in attendance.

"Just give us a few years," the Kings co-owner insisted. "Timing is everything."

For those of you new to women's basketball fandom, the Monarchs were one of the eight original WNBA franchises. On November 20, 2009, the Maloof brothers - owners of the Monarchs - folded the team. According to Mechelle Voepel at ESPN, even the employees of the team weren't informed - employees, season-ticket holders and the press all found out the same way, by press release. The idea was that with the Monarchs folded, the Maloofs would devote all of their energy to the Sacramento Kings - the NBA franchise in Sacramento.

How much advance notice the WNBA was given is still a state secret. In practical terms, it left the WNBA to scramble to find new ownership mere weeks before teams needed to know the upcoming season schedule and before the positions for the 2010 WNBA Draft were determined. Add the facts that the American economy was in recession and that it's very hard to wheel and deal during Thanksgiving and prospects for the Monarchs relocation or resale looked bleak. On December 8, 2009, the WNBA gave up the effort and on December 14, 2009 the former Monarchs were dispersed across the league.

Some WNBA writers, like Mike DiMauro, were glad that the Maloofs were gone:

It's great news, just not for the people of Sacramento, who will miss their team.

But for the future of the league? This is beautiful. Because the WNBA just rid itself of a fraudulent ownership group.

The WNBA did not - and does not - need owners who feign interest in their franchises. It's still a problem. Some owners supported shrinking roster sizes from 13 to 11 last season, a move that crippled teams beset with injuries.

...

Let's be clear on this: Owners who spend more time cutting jobs than finding new and creative revenue streams (as some franchises did last summer) should get rid of their franchises forthwith. No, really. Get out. It's OK. Clearly, you tolerate your teams at best. So dump them. And then don't let the doorknob leave a lasting impression.

So given the difficulties that the Maloofs caused the league, why would this ever come up as an issue again. As the song says, "How can we miss you if you won't go away?"

My first question is: was this an unprompted comment? Was Voisin's discussion with Maloof specifically about the Monarchs? Or was it about several topics, with the Monarchs being one topic of many? The article failed to make that clear, and context would help us a lot. Furthermore, did Joe Maloof contact Voisin or vice-versa? All of the context for this conversation...is missing.

Context is important. If the conversation was about the Monarchs specifically, or if Joe Maloof initiated the conversation, it might indicate that Maloof really is interested in bringing the Monarchs back. But if Voisin posed the question, it could be that Maloof - to put it nicely - is feeding Voisin a massive line of horsepuckey. Maloof's thoughts might have been, "Hey, if I say something nice about the Monarchs I might be able to get a couple of ex-Monarchs fans to see Kings games."

The latter will probably never happen. WNBA fans and NBA fans tend not to overlap. The old Monarchs season-ticket holders would not want to be offered the Kings as a consolation prize, particularly if the unspoken message is "Ex-Monarchs fans, come and see the important Sacramento basketball team!" The impression left by the Maloofs when the Monarchs were dumped was that Monarchs fans were an afterthought to the Maloofs; it would take great effort by the Maloofs or Kings management to turn back the memories of that snub.

Let's assume that we're taking Joe Maloof's comments at face value - a dangerous proposition. Does the WNBA really want Joe Maloof back? It's not about the Monarchs being back; the W would be just as happy with some other owner with big pockets putting a team in Sacramento. Rather, it's about the Monarchs being back with Joe Maloof as the head.

Rick Horrow wrote in 2005 for CBS about the difficulties in starting a league. (Oddly enough, the Monarchs won their WNBA championship in 2005). One of the four factors that Horrow listed for a successful league was "The start-up league must attract a stable of emotionally and economically secure owners and investors committed for the long term."

Note the emphasis on emotional maturity. The WNBA doesn't need owners that will bail out at the first sign of trouble. No league does. At Pleasant Dreams I wrote the following in 2009:

For the WNBA, I think the more important question is that of the "emotionally secure" investors. How long have the owners of WNBA teams had their fortunes? How experienced are they as business managers? How likely are they to bail out at the first sign of trouble? I have my doubts about some of the WNBA owners - without naming names, I wonder if some of them really have the nerve - there's no nicer way to say it - to navigate the rough patches.

I wrote this in September 2009. Two months later, the Maloofs blinked in the face of the recession and the troubles with the Kings. They bailed. They didn't show emotional maturity, at least not on the WNBA side of the ledger. If Joe Maloof is being serious, the proper answer to the Maloofs by the WNBA , by the NBA and by Donna Orender or David Stern should be a collective "Joe...you can't be serious."


(* * *)

The May 3rd edition of Sports Illustrated had an interesting article from Austin Murphy regarding the realignment of the major conferences. The article focused on the changes in the college football landscape, as the money making (*) sport in college sports is college football and it is the sport that gets the most attention.

Over the past twenty years, conferences changing their membership lists should be no surprise. Penn State joined the Big Ten in 1990, expanding the conference to 11 teams (and giving the conference a rather inaccurate name). In 1991, Arkansas and South Carolina joined the Southeastern Conference. Two years later, Texas, Texas A&M, Texas Tech and Baylor abandoned the Southwest conference to join the (former) Big Eight, spelling the beginning of the end of the Southwest Conference. The Atlantic Coast Conference picked up Florida State in 1991 and then raided the Big East in 1994, spiriting away Miami, Virginia Tech and Boston College out of the Big East.

Currently, college sports is ruled by the six BCS (Bowl Championship Series) conferences: the ACC, the Big East, the Big Ten, the Big Twelve, the Southeastern Conference and the Pacific (Pac 10). However, if one read the above paragraph, you'd recognize that conference alignments are never fixed. The SI article gets underway with a mention of Jim Delany, the Big Ten commissioner, who mentioned that the "timing is right" for an expansion in twelve to eighteen months.

One rule in collegiate sports is that if football drives conference realignment, the other sports will have to follow. This includes our favorite sport, women's basketball. The article mentions three possible expansion scenarios, each with increasing impact on the sport scene.

Big Ten Plus One: The first scenario has Missouri becoming the twelfth team of the Big Ten. Sensing weakness in the Big Twelve - and wanting to increase the allure of their own national sports network - the Pacific Ten grabs Colorado from the Big Twelve and Utah from the Mountain West conference. The Big Twelve replenishes itself with the addition of Brigham Young and Texas Christian from the Mountain West. (This leaves the Mountain West as a six-team conference.)

Using the ratings from RealTimeRPI.com, how does each conference change in strength?

The addition of Missori to Big Ten women's basketball won't have Ohio State or Michigan State trembling in terror. Missouri would come into the Big Ten as the weakest team, probably replacing Northwestern (at least for a little while). The addition of Colorado and Utah will not affect the balance of power in the (hypothetical) Pac-12.

The teams added don't significantly affect this new version of the Big 12. Furthermore, the Big 12 actually gets stronger by swapping out some of its weaker members. The relative strength of each conference to each other doesn't change. But who is the real loser in this rearrangement of colleges? Texas Christian. The Horned Frogs women's basketball team finished as the Mountain West's regular season champion - they were eliminated in the quarter finals of the Mountain West tournament but went on to the NCAA Tournament where they were eliminated by Dayton.

But in a reconstituted Big 12, TCU wouldn't even be in the top half of participating teams. TCU would probably be buried under a mountain of Texas A&Ms and Oklahomas and Baylors and Texases and Iowa States. They'd have to play an extra game in the Big 12 tournament and would probably slip out of national notice - the NCAA would have to send seven or eight teams to the tournament from the Big East to get TCU in with the way things stand now. TCU might love the football money they get, but women's basketball would be a tradeoff - it might be easier for TCU to recruit but performance might suffer.

Big Ten Plus Three: The Big Ten decides to become a fourteen-team conference. The three teams that get added...Missouri...and Rutgers and Nebraska. Mama, hold the phone! The Big 14 want Rutgers for the New York connection, and New York has always been a hotbed of women's basketball talent. The Pac-10 add Colorado and Utah as indicated above. The Big Twelve drops to the Big Nine. The Big Nine could pick up TCU and Brigham Young as in the other scenario, but that would leave the last team to be either San Diego State, New Mexico, Wyoming, UNLV, Colorado State or Air Force - which would probably kill the Mountain West conference dead and leave the Colonial Athletic as the most powerful of the mid-majors.

So how does the Big 14 shape up? Rutgers gets itself out of the tough Big East conference and if Nebraska's amazing 2009-10 is The Shape of Things to Come, then the Big Ten's landscape is changed and Jim Foster and Suzy Merchant have some competition. (And C. Vivian Stringer might get Iowa as a regular conference opponent.) The Big East loses a tiny bit of its luster, but could probably find a replacement somewhere for Rutgers. The Big Nine would be a very strong basketball conference - the Big Twelve Minus Nebraska, Colorado and Missouri would still be very, very strong. There's no real loser here, except for maybe San Diego State, a strong Mountain West team now playing in a weaker conference.

Big Ten Plus Five: According to Murphy's hypothesis, in order for the Big Ten to pick up Notre Dame as a football member, they have to wreck the Fighting Irish's Big East membership. So they do. Missouri, Nebraska, and Rutgers all come to the future Big Sixteen. The Big Sixteen grabs Pittsburgh, and Notre Dame, sensing the momentum shift, leaves the Big East to join the Big Sixteen.

The Atlantic Coast Conference, having a history of successful Big East raiding, senses blood in the water. They extend the Atlantic Coast to the Mideast by picking up Cincinnati, Louisville, Syracuse and West Virginia out of the Big East - and the ACC becomes the next sixteen team conference. The Big East is reduced to a nine-team conference of schools from the Northeast...and South Florida.

The Southeastern Conference wakes up and determines not to be left out of the land-grab. The Pac-10 probably still takes Colorado and Utah, although it isn't mentioned in the article. The Pacific Ten wants Texas, but the Southeastern Conference wins the bidding war. Since Texas is technically southern, the SEC picks up Texas, Texas A&M, Oklahoma, and Oklahoma State. The Big Twelve is reduced to the Big Six and has to pick up spare parts from the Mountain West and the WAC.

This leaves five "superconferences" - The "Big Ten", the Pac-Twelve, the SEC, the ACC and the still-big-but-not-as-big Big East. (What becomes of the former Big Twelve no one knows.) These five superconferences then abandon the NCAA and form their own intercollegiate sports organization.

The Big Sixteen becomes more interesting. Notre Dame is more than a match for the Ohio States and Michigan States, and Notre Dame will be playing Michigan, Purdue and Indiana on a regular basis. As for the ACC, the addition of its four former Big East clubs don't really change the balance of power in the ACC, which will leave Duke and North Carolina breathing a sigh of relief. The Big East teams give the ACC the best of both worlds - they bolster the level of competition but aren't powerful enough on their own to change the ACC landscape.

The biggest winner is the Southeastern Conference. It could be a beast of a conference, with seven or eight of its 16-prospective teams regularly ranked in the Top 25. (Tennessee vs. Oklahoma! Texas vs. Vanderbilt!) The Big East takes a major hit, but in terms of women's basketball remains relatively strong.

The loser in this scenario? Baylor. Baylor would be one of the left-over teams in the (former) Big Twelve and would be left scrambling. Even though Baylor has a strong women's basketball team, they don't have a strong football history and football drives each of these realignments. So who would Baylor be playing? Iowa State and Kansas State? Or do they become the bigwig in some mid-major conference? And would Britney Griner transfer if Baylor stops becoming a "big-time" school?

Okay. Enough of the wishful thinking game. "Pet," you say, "nice try, but this could never happen." True, maybe it won't happen the way that Austin Murphy proposes it will. But I'll bet that something will happen. Conferences will realign to get bigger pieces of the football money stack, and women's basketball and all of the other sports will be dragged along with wherever football decides to go. So if you're a fan of a Big Six team, enjoy those matchups next year with your hated foes...because in a year or two, it might be an entirely different set of teams you'll have to learn to hate.

____
(*) College football makes a lot of money, but spends it just as quickly - according to many studies, college football does not add to the net profit of a university.

(* * *)

The Turkish League championships are still continuing, and that keeps Yelena Leuchanka off our shores...for now.... This is the section devoted to those Dream players that are still overseas....

Spain

LFB2: in the Liga Femenina 2, Burgos is playing a round robin with three other teams to determine which teams have a shot at being advanced to the upper division. The round-robin took place from May 6th through May 8th.

Burgos 70, Eivissa 48. Eivissa was held to 30 points over the final 30 minutes of the game.

EIV: Beachem 13, Lara Ramirez 10, Lopez Marques 9
BUR: Lozana Adan 20, Nascimento 10 (Jorge Portela 7)
Demetress Adams: 9 points, 3-for-6 shooting, 4 rebounds, 2 steals, 33 minutes played

Navarra 69, Burgos 57. Burgos collapsed in the fourth quarter, scoring only nine points. Navarra was sent to the free throw line 21 times where they hit 20 shots.

BUR: Nascimento 12, Ortega Esarte 8
NAV: Cinite 17, C. Smith 16, Plumier 10
Demetress Adams: 11 points, 5-for-7 shooting, 6 rebounds, 20 minutes played

Ensino 79, Burgos 75. It comes down to the fourth quarter, with Ensino knocking regular-season leader Burgos to a 1-2 standing in the round robin and out of the chances for advancing to the Liga Femenino. Burgos coach Guillermo Fernandez blamed the fact that his team "qualified for the final too early."

ENS: Gomez Iglesias 25, Herrera Arevalo 15, Roddy 13
BUR: Nascimento 18, Lozana Adan 12, Pablos Villarroel 9
Demetress Adams: 10 points, 3-for-3 shooting, 6 rebounds, 2 assists, 24 minutes played

Turkey

Galatasaray 67, Mersin 62. Galatsaray moves on to the finals with a 3-0 sweep of Mersin - the first win came from the winning the regular season, and this was the second win of the playoffs. Galatasaray came back from a 38-34 halftime deficit. Ivory Latta helped get Mersin to 59-58, but it wasn't enough. Katie Douglas did not play in the game for Mersin due to a sprained foot.

GAL: Catchings 21, Young 17, Yigit 15
MER: Latta 14, Turner 14, Scott 12, Larkins 10
Yelena Leuchanka: 7 points, 3-for-6 shooting, 7 rebounds, 2 assists, 24 minutes

Fenerbahce 57, Galatasaray 51. In the best-of-five finals seres, Galatasaray loses the first game on the road to regular season champion Fenerbahce despite being up by 11 early on. Leading 31-25 at halftime, Galatasaray remained ahead until a pair of Nevriye Yilmaz free throws put Fenerbahce up 41-39 at the end of the third quarter.

FEN: Vardarli 13, Hoffman 11, Tuncluer 11 (Taylor 9, Yilmaz 8, Sutton-Brown 5, Powell 0)
GAL: Young 18, Catchings 15, Palazoglu 11 (Douglas 0)
Yelena Leuchanka: 5 points, 2-for-6 shooting, 3 rebounds, 2 steals, 15 minutes played

Fenerbahce 61, Galatasaray 56. Fenerbahce wins Game Two of the best-of-five Turkish championship series and could win the Turkish title on Tuesday with another win. Galatasaray was shut out during the overtime period and Penny Taylor scored all five points of the overtime for Fenerbahce.

FEN: Taylor 19, Tuncluer 10, Yilmaz 9 (Hoffman 8, Sutton-Brown 7, Powell 1)
GAL: Catchings 14, Young 12 (Douglas 6)
Yelena Leuchanka: 8 points, 4-for-5 shooting, 9 rebounds, 3 offensive rebounds, 25 minutes played

More Training Camp Pics

A couple of pictures from the Atlanta Dream training camp (posted by @AtlantaDream on Twitpic).



First, see the Dream recover from practice at Cookville High School. See all of the Dream players recovering, and see if you can find out who they are...because the org won't release a training camp roster (grumble).



Second, see Shalee Lehning take on a future WNBA fan in a practice drill. A lot of blowhards like to talk about how they'd score 50 points against a WNBA'er, but I think Lehning can take this guy.

Atlanta vs. Washington, Sunday May 9th

Who: The Atlanta Dream (0-1, preseason) take on the Washington Mystics (1-0, preseason).

Here were the training camp rosters for each team in the previous preseason game:

Dream: Angel McCoughtry, Shawn Goff, Alison Bales, Armintie Price, Shalee Lehning, Coco Miller, Chanel Mokango, Brittainey Raves, Erica White, Brigitte Ardossi, Britany Miller.

Mystics: Monique Currie, Jennifer Lacy, Nakia Sanford, Katie Smith, Lindsey Harding, Marissa Coleman, Kristin Mann, LaTangela Atkinson, Nikki Blue, Ewelina Kobryn, Shanavia Dowdell. Lauren Ervin and Alexis Gray-Lawson, participants in the game in the link above, have already been cut.

What: The second of two preseason games, both outside of Atlanta. The last time the Dream played the Mystics in the 2009 regular season they lost 82-64 on the road in the Dream's final regular season game. Atlanta had already clinched, but the Mystics needed the win. Unfortunately, Shalee Lehning was hurt in that game and she could have been of help in the postseason against Detroit.

Where: The Hooper Eblen Center on the campus of Middle Tennessee State University in Cookeville, Tennessee.

When: Tipoff is 4 pm on Sunday, May 9th. The game will most likely not be available on TV, or on WNBA Live Access. Maybe there will be a live update of the box scores, maybe not. I'm sure we'll at least know who won. It is also the final competitive game before the Dream travel to San Antonio on Saturday, May 15th to kick off the 2010 regular season.

Why: In the first place, if you wanted an excuse for a road trip, this is it. For Marynell Meadors, it's a return to the place where she started her coaching career - she was a women's basketball player at MTSU between the years of (approximately) 1961 through 1965. Back then, says Meadors, their coach Sue Gunter left after their sophomore year and Meadors offered to take over duties as a player-coach as Middle Tennessee State didn't want to pay money to have someone coach women's basketball. (My, how much things haven't changed in fifty years). So your going to this game supports women's basketball, which is a good thing.

For players on the edge - Brittainey Raven, Alison Bales, Brigitte Ardossi, Britany Miller, Shawn Goff, Erika White - even Coco Miller, maybe - this is the final chance to show their stuff to Marynell Meadors, because she has to have this roster cut down by Friday, May 14th to just eleven players. Media Day for the Dream is the morning of Thursday, May 13th and the Dream might wish to showcase who they think will be the final roster. Meadors hasn't made too many cuts - there are theoretically twenty people who could call themselves members of the Atlanta Dream, including Demetress Adams and Dalma Ivanyi - so the axe will have to come out.

The Mystics have it tougher. Alana Beard, injured for the 2010 season, is still technically on the roster because Washington doesn't want to cut her and...oh Spencer Pratt, even I don't understand the WNBA roster rules. That means that Washington will have an active roster of only 10 players, one of which might be Jennifer Lacy, the former Atlanta Dream player that the Dream did not re-sign out of free agency.

Atlanta Dream-Connecticut Sun Gallery

The gallery is here at SportsPageMagazine.com.

Oh, and who is #53 up there in the photo? It's Brigitte Ardossi! There are also photos of Shawn Goff, Chanel Mokango, Brittainey Raven and others, so check out the link.

E1/2010 - Sun 86, Dream 79

The Dream have played their first game of the 2010 season. They headed back to Connecticut, but fell short. The good news is that they took eleven players with them; the bad news is that among those eleven players, only 2 1/2 could be called "starters" if you were generous. So you have to take the loss with a grain of salt. No Lyttle, no de Souza, no Castro Marques, no Holdsclaw.

Here's the report from John Altavilla of the Hartford Courant.

Here's the report from Jim Fuller of the New Haven Register.

And here's the Guru himself, Mel Greenberg.

All right. Even SportsPageMagazine.com doesn't have any pictures yet. There were only 3,779 in attendance - no, wait a minute. For a Tuesday game at 11 am in the morning in the woods of Connecticut, that's great attendance! Still, there weren't many people present. There was no WNBA Live Access, and frankly, the boxscore didn't update automatically. If you were able to follow this game minute by minute, you were either in Uncasville or you have a very long neck.

So let's take a look at the post-mortem. The Dream got off to a very good start - an 11-0 start in the first quarter, but any Dream fan from 2008 knows that you can never depend on an 11-0 lead, and not particularly in a "game of runs" as this one was called on RebKell. The Dream held on to a 48-46 lead at halftime, and Fuller's article tells what happened next:

Connecticut Sun coach Mike Thibault resisted the temptation to insert some of his more established players to get his squad back on course. Third-year forward Kerri Gardin, with 67 regular-season games to her credit, was joined by second-year guard Renee Montgomery and rookies Tina Charles, Kelsey Griffin and Allison Hightower.

What happened next was a surge propelling the Sun to an 86-79 win over Atlanta before 3,779 at Mohegan Sun Arena.

Charles, the former UConn star who was the top pick in last month’s WNBA draft, began and ended a 19-2 game-altering run with baskets. But she had plenty of help from her fellow rookies.

So 19-2 beats 11-0 hands down when it comes to runs. Furthermore, Angel McCoughtry scored 17 points in the first half, but only two in the second half.
Only three players played for the Dream for more than 25 minutes - Montgomery, Shalee Lehning and Armintie Price. Whereas the Sun had three players who played for at least 29 minutes. Tina Charles and Renee Montgomery each played 31 minutes.

Let's examine the box score in detail. We'll go into an article by Dean Oliver and how he examines a box score:

Pace:

Estimated possessions = {(72-11)+20+0.4*20)]+[(70-9)+19+0.4*22]/2 = ..approximately 89 for both teams.

The Dream's offensive rating was 79/89 = 88.8 and the Sun's offensive rating was 86/88 = 97.7. This sort of implies that neither team dominated offensively, and defensive skill made the difference.

Game flow: Quarter by Quarter, the game was decided in the middle, particulary in the third quarter when the Sun outscored the Dream 25-14. The Sun led 71-62 after three quarters. The Sun didn't blow out the Dream - if you look at the play-by-play results the Dream crawled to within seven points, 71-64 in the fourth quarter with 9:12 left - but after that, the Sun went on an 11-2 run to take a 16 point lead with about four minutes left. That run killed the Dream's chances of winning.

All of the big names: McCoughtry, Lehning, Charles, Montgomery - were on the bench in the fourth quarter, to return only briefly if ever. The only starter on the floor for significant time appears to have been Kerri Gardin. The 11-2 run was basically a testimony to the Sun's bench. No one particular Sun player dominated the fourth quarter.

Shooting percentage: Sun 47.1 percent (33-70), Dream 38.9 percent (28-72).
Effective shooting percentage: Sun 52.1 percent, Dream 43.1 percent. That pretty much did it. The Sun won because they could hit their shots, and the Dream (collectively) couldn't.

Turnovers: Sun 19, Dream 20. It was at best an average game for protecting the rock.
Offensive rebound percentage: Sun 25.7 percent, Dream 23.4 percent. No edge here, but the Dream definitely missed Lyttle and de Souza.
Free throw visits: Sun 22, Dream 20. However, the Dream hit 17 of their attempts, and the Sun shot a sad 59.1 percent from the stripe (13-for-22). I'd give the advantage to the Dream, but that wouldn't be enough to cool down the Sun's hot shooting hand.

And now, let's look at the Dream's individual perfomances:

Angel McCoughtry: Can you think of McCoughtry not coming to play? She led the team with 19 points. She had to take a lot of shots, but she hit 3 out of 4 3-point attempts. She kept personal fouls down, but unfortunately, it looks like Tina Charles's team beat Angel McCoughtry's team again. (See: 2009 NCAA Finals.) Even with the lost, McCoughtry brought her game to Connecticut and she was the Dreamer of the Game.

Armintie Price: A big question was whether or not Price or Shalee Lehning would be able to shake off the rust. Not only did Price have a 10-point game, but she hit four out of five free throws. Maybe she's been working on that in the off season. Price, furthermore, led the team in rebounds with seven total, and she picked up five assists as well. This whole Armintie Price thing might be working out, except for getting three of her shots blocked.

Shalee Lehning: Lehning must have heard me muttering "you have to shoot more" because she hit four out of five shots. However, she had two assists and four turnovers. I guess you can't do everything to please all people, but since Lehning's arm didn't fall off during the game, we can only count the result as a plus.

Britany Miller: For just 17 minutes played, the third Miller in Dream training camp - Britany Miller, a center who once played for the Detroit Shock - did an okay job. She had five rebounds and two blocked shots. However, her 1-for-5 shooting won't impress many people, but Britany Miller probably earned another day in training camp.

Chanel Mokango: The best you can say about Mokango's game was that it was average. Eight points on 3-for-7 shooting. However, in 15 minutes of play she picked up three personal fouls. Her -7 in raw plus/minus was the third worst on the Dream - the dream slid behind when Mokango was on the floor. But hey - it ain't easy playing in the W, not even in the preseason.

Erika White: Now, we're entering the realm of "meh". White played 20 minutes and had a grand total of four points. Negative plus/minus. Three assists, three turnovers. One rebound.

Brittainey Raven: Raven was the fourth member of the Dream that schored in double digits, but in 23 minutes she had four personal fouls. That led the team, and kept the Dream from making more effective use of her. No assists, one turnover. Raven will need to get herself in better control if she wants to make the Dream.

Shawn Goff: Goff only scored two points in 19 minutes of play. She did have four rebounds, which were counterbalanced with the four personal fouls she committed. She turned the ball over twice. This is the part of the list where the players will have to fight to stay alive in training camp. You might only get one shot at making an impression. However, Goff got to start and had a +7 in raw plus/minus, partially due to that 11-0 Dream run to start the game.

Coco Miller: EGAD. Coco Miller had a raw plus/minus of -15. Maybe she was playing with nothing but rookies on the court, but Coco only generated four points to go with her three assists. At least she only turned the ball over once, but that raw plus/minus is just horrible.

Alison Bales: She started, and in the Battle of the Centers, Bales scored four points - and Tina Charles scored 21. Bales went 1-for-5 in shooting but she did have six rebounds. I don't know; I'd hate to have to guard Tina Charles too.

Brigitte Ardossi: 20 minutes played. Only two points scored. 1-for-4 shooting. -11 plus/minutes. 3 personal fouls. I'm not going to call Brigitte Ardossi the Bad Dream of the game, as this is just an exhibition. But right now, given the limited statistical lines, Raven just moved ahead of Ardossi in terms of training camp security.

Current Atlanta Dream Preseason Roster

Here is my current understanding of the Atlanta Dream's training camp roster:

C Alison Bales
C Yelena Leuchanka (*)
F-C Erika de Souza
C Shawn Goff
C Britany Miller

F Demetress Adams
F Brigitte Ardossi
F Tatum Brown
F Chamique Holdsclaw
F Sancho Lyttle
F Angel McCoughtry
F Chanel Mokango

F-G Iziane Castro Marques
G-F Armintie Price
G Dalma Ivanyi
G Shalee Lehning
G Coco Miller
G Kelly Miler
G Brittainey Raven
G Erica White

bold type - not listed on Atlanta Dream website
(*) - currently overseas

We have photographic evidence that Brown is there. Goff comes from the University of Mississippi sports website. Miller only comes from the CBS Sports WNBA Transactions page, and we don't know how accurate the news is yet.

Atlanta vs. Connecticut, Tuesday May 4

Who: The Atlanta Dream (0-0, preseason) take on the Connecticut Sun (0-0, preseason) in the very first preseason game of the year for both teams.

Both teams have a cast of new training camp invitees. The Dream can take a few people, but we have no idea who is going to Connecticut. We also have no idea who they'll meet.

What: The first of two preseason games, both outside of Atlanta. The last time the Dream played the Sun in the 2009 regular season they won 88-64 in Atlanta. The win secured a spot in the post-season as they clinched second place. It was also the final game that the Dream won in 2009, as they lost to Washington and then lost both playoff games to Detroit.

Where: The Mohegan Sun Arena in Uncasville, Connecticut.

When: Tipoff is 11 am on Tuesday, May 4th. The game will most likely not be available on TV, or on WNBA Live Access. Our fervent hope is that somehow, someway the fans will be provided with a box score.

Why: You have to ask? We've been starvin' for women's basketball around here, and the Dream will be back on the court. After several months of waiting, the season is back in full swing for Atlanta.

There are a lot of good plotlines here. The first is that this could be a matchup between the #1 WNBA Draft pick of 2009 - Angel McCoughtry - and the #1 WNBA Draft pick of 2010, Tina Charles. Furthermore, the win last year knocked the Sun out of the post-season, so you'd think that there would be the "revenge factor".

Unfortunately, this is a preseason game. It doesn't count. Nominally, the point of these games is to evaluate talent, and I have a list of 20 people who might or might not be on the Atlanta Dream's roster. So it could be Angel McCoughtry or Demetress Adams. Odds are de Souza and Lyttle won't be ready. Leuchanka is in Turkey. And you've got to give Chanel Mokango, Brigitte Ardossi and Brittainey Raven some time to play. It could be a real collection of spare parts on both sides of the roster.

Of course, WNBA fans will be poring over the box score intently, trying to divine the future from the results. If the Dream lose, don't take it too seriously. But if Angel McCoughtry is there, she's going to want to win.

Chandi Jones Waived

It looks like a pedigree from the University of Houston - Sancho Lyttle's [i]alma mater[/i] - isn't enough. According to the cbssports.com web page, Jones has been given her release from the Atlanta Dream.

Chandi Jones, we hardly knew you. Since information about training camp is released with the same frequency of the Manhattan Project Newsletter in 1945, she might be back on the team two hours from now. So keep checking the websites.

Alison Bales Back With the Dream

On the Atlanta Dream Facebook Page, one can see members of the Atlanta Dream - or at least those members invited to training camp - at work at the Brookhaven Boys and Girls Cub and at the NFL/Youth Education Town center. Among those who have pictures in the albumb are Erica White, Tatum Brown, Brittainey Raven....

...and Alison Bales??

Yep, the photographic evidence is clear - Bales is back with the team, or at least, during the training camp. The other Dream player in the picture is third-round draft choice Brittainey Raven.

So where has Alison Bales been all this time? This newspaper article from the Dayton Daily News tells the story. During last season, Bales ended up in the Phoenix Mercury training camp but was waived on June 3, 2009. In the off-season - when most players travel to Europe - Bales heard nothing.

“Overseas, a lot of times, is just kind of inconsistent,” she said. “You never know where you’re gonna end up: ‘Oh, you’re gonna go to Latvia.’ Then two days later it’s: ‘No, Latvia is a no-go, but there’s a team in Israel. ... And another team in Turkey is interested, but your old team there is being difficult.’ ... Then it’s: ‘Oh, there’s a team in Siberia that wants you.’ ... I’ve heard all that this year.”

In the mean time, Bales figured that she had better begin planning for a career outside of basketball:

“I’m not ready to be done yet with basketball, but I also figured I better have a backup plan for all this or I’d just end up so frustrated,” she admitted. She had graduated from Duke with a double major — biology and cultural anthropology — so now she began taking pre-med classes at [Wright State University].

In the meantime, she has decided to cast an eye towards medical school, but still hoped that a team would pick her up:

This spring, it seems likely she’ll end up back in a WNBA camp, though jobs are more scarce than ever with 12 teams and now just 11 players per roster. To prepare herself, she’s spent several months going through intensive, thrice-weekly workouts with trainer Andrew Winkler of Fast-Twitch Performance Enhancement in Centerville.

And now, it looks as if Bales has been given a chance to catch on with the Dream. If you're interested in Alison Bales, I'd read the article - it's a clear, consice update as to what Bales has been doing, complete with a peek at some of the anxieties of a professional athlete with her feet in two different worlds.

“Seeing my friends starting to get married and having babies,” she said with a smile and shrug, “and me still holding onto the basketball dream, it kind of made me feel like I haven’t quite grown up yet.”

Digest 03-2010

* The Democratic WNBA
* Lyttle, de Souza Earn Honors in Spain
* The Power Law of Sports Fandom
* Shawn Goff, Chandi Jones and Tatum Brown Get Training Camp Invites
* Women's Basketball Expands (Again)
* Dream Takes Practice on the Road
* The 2010 NCAA Women's Basketball Championship - How Houston Saw It
* This Week's Games

When I write "Democratic" I'm not writing that the WNBA advocates an egalitarian political system characterized by equal participation and representation. Rather, I'm writing about the political party that WNBA fans belong to.



The accompanying graph - full size at this link - should be self-explanatory. The horizontal axis represents the political spectrum - the left side votes for the Democrats, and the right votes for the Republicans. The vertical axis represents how likely the fans of a certain sport are likely to vote - the upper part indicates high voter turnout and the lower quadrant represents low turnout.

The study, which was commissioned by National Media Inc. (a Republican firm) and whose polling was conducted by Scarborough USA, has implications primarily when it comes to deciding where one wishes to spend money on political advertising. The actual proportions shouldn't be surprising - as some commenters in the link noted, sports viewership is dominated by white males, and while males strongly tends toward supporting Republicans.

What sport do you want to associate with if you're a Republican running for office? Probably college football - it's a large audience, it has decent turnout at the polls and it's predictably Republican. PGA Tour followers have a higher turnout and are more Republican, but there aren't as many of them. What if you're a Democrat? Probably the NBA, which has average voter turnout and whose fans tend to vote for Democrats. The WNBA's fans are most likely to vote for Democrats, but they aren't numerous enough to spend a lot of cash on. (Although if it's a close election, and you need to pick up a few thousand votes....)

I don't know if this study does anything than confirm our own biases, but the graph is definitely interesting to look at. If you're a WNBA fan looking for ideological fellow-travelers and are looking to change sports, call David Stern in New York - I think he has a sport to suggest.

(* * *)

In Spain, players Sancho Lyttle and Erika de Souza picked up some of the honorariums doled out by the Liga Feminina - the Spanish League of women's basketball.

Lyttle was named the "Player of the Year" of the Liga Femenina, the equivalent of the MVP award. Lyttle played for Perfumieras, taking them to a 23-3 regular season record, good for second place in the LFB. As of this writing, the team made it to the LFB Finals. Perfumerias also made it to the quarterfinals of Euroleague, where their march to the European Championship was stopped by Ros Casares. Lyttle averaged 17.6 points and 8.3 rebounds against the best women in Europe, and in Spain, she is averaging 15.8 points and 10.5 rebounds a game.

This isn't Lyttle's only hardware. She was named Center of the Year and made it to the LFB's First Team, along with familiar names such as Shay Murphy and DeLisha Milton-Jones. (The complete list is here.) She was also named to the LFB's All-Defensive Team.

Erika de Souza made it to the LFB second team along with Jazz Covington (out of Louisville), Crystal Langhorne and Shannon Johnson. De Souza averaged 13.3 points per game and 8.6 rebounds per game in Euroleague, where her Ros Casares team made it to the finals before losing to Spartak Moscow. In the LFB regular season, Ros Casares finished the season 25-1 and is currently playing against Perfumerias in the LFB Finals. In LFB play, de Souza has averaged 14.4 points and 9.5 rebounds per game.

Congratulations to Lyttle and de Souza! Now finish up the season in Spain and head back to Atlanta!

(* * *)

I'm going to ask you ten trivia questions about the WNBA. The answers to these questions won't be provided - for help, see your local internet.

1. Name the first team to win four WNBA championships.

2. Name the only two players to win the Most Valuable Player award in the WNBA three times.

3. Name the only player to win the MVP award as a rookie.

4. What were the two major changes made to WNBA rules in the start of the 2006 season?

5. Which team won the first WNBA game ever played?

6. Who was the first player to ever score a basket in the WNBA?

7. What player scored the most points ever in a WNBA game? (Bonus: How many points did she score?)

8. Which WNBA player born in the United States played for the Russian Olympic team in the 2008 Olympics?

9. Who is the tallest player in WNBA history?

10. After which player is the WNBA's Sportsmanship Award named?


If you feel bad that you don't know the answers to many of these questions, well...don't. My suspicion is that a lot of the attendees at WNBA basketball games couldn't answer these questions if their lives depended on it. It's not that those season ticket holders and game followers aren't interested in women's basketball - far from it - it's just that they aren't intense fans and don't see the need to immerse themselves completely in a "culture of fandom". By an "intense" fan I mean someone who is what I call an "insider" or "ensnared"....

...at least according to a book called "The Elusive Fan" by Irving J. Rein, Philip Kotler, and Ben Shields. The three writers argue that there is a fan involvement ladder in sports fandom. (And possibly, in any fandom.) These levels of fandom are:

1. Indifferent: In the case of the women's basketball, these people have either found the women's game unsatifying, threatening (gasp!) or for whatever reason, they really don't care enough about women's basketball (or basketball) to have an opinion.
2. Eyeballers: These are probably the largest group of women's basketball fans out there, those that make up that 2.7 rating in the Connecticut-Stanford final game. They'll watch special events - the WNBA Finals, the NCAA finals, maybe an All-Star Game - but they're not going to be involved at any level beyond the "most important" events.
3. Wallets: These are the fans that will actually attend a WNBA game, and indeed, they'll socialize around the game. They'll pull up WNBA Live Access or catch regular season games - and that's when they can't economically attend the games themselves.
4. Collectors: These are fans interested in sports memorabilia.
5. Attachers: These are fans interested in receiving communication from the team/their heroes and wanting the opportunity to exchange messages.
6. Insiders: These are fans whose goal is to enter into or participate in the inner circles of women's basketball.
7. Ensnared: These are the most involved fans, because they identify personally with a team. These are involved fans, and sometimes, too involved and a little bit creepy. (Think of the Monica Seles stabbing. Seles was the #1 women's tennis player who was stabbed by a Steffi Graf stalker.) They can either be a boon or a problem to a sport.

My theory is that if one were to draw a graph of women's basketball fandom, it would be a power law graph. It would look something like a hockey stick. It would not look like a bell curve, or what is called a "normal distribution". The normal distribution assumes that most women's basketball fans/potential fans would be somewhere in the middle - perhaps "wallets" or "collectors" and involvement would trail off on both sides. The power law distribution assumes that the overwhelming majority of women's basketball fans are in that "eyeballer stage" - they'll watch the game when there's an important women's basketball event or they might be a men's basketball fan but nothing else is on TV. There are a few wallets - the attendance figures at WNBA games bear that out - and as we go up to the collectors/attachers/insiders/ensnared, the numbers decrease even further. The "ensnared" are simply the capstone on a pyramid with the "eyeballers" at the base - and the base is always wider than the apex.

So what are the implications of the power law theory? The first is that despite the fact that the wallets spend the money on the games and despite the fact that the attachers and insiders are really, really involved - the potential cash is in getting the eyeballers to attend a game. They are the potential source of future revenue. A preacher should spent his efforts on the people who are receptive to his message, and as they saying goes, one doesn't waste time preaching to the already converted.

The second implication is that we tend to look at the world through the lenses of our own particular group.

* For the indifferent, the biggest problem with the WNBA is that it exists.
* For the eyeballers, the biggest problem with the WNBA is that if you're not careful you might forget when the WNBA Finals come on TV.
* For the wallets, the biggest problem with the WNBA is in buying concessions, tickets, and paying for parking, as well as balancing going to the games versus your job.
* For the collectors, the biggest problem with the WNBA is that it isn't confident enough to sell more jerseys, banners, and WNBA collectible cards.
* For the attachers, the biggest problem with the WNBA is that you don't get enough information from the teams.
* For the insiders, the biggest problem with the WNBA is that you don't have the ears of important people in women's basketball - or if you do, that they don't listen.
* For the ensnared, the biggest problem with the WNBA is that they won't give you Becky Hammon's phone number.

The third implication is that the segment of the fandom that writes blogs and posts on messageboards is heavy with the top three groups. Those groups begin to assume that they are WNBA fandom and that their voice is the only important one. The bulk of people going to WNBA games don't want to buy jerseys, nor do they need an hour-by-hour update on team transactions. They just want to have a good time at a sporting event. The eyeballers just want something good to watch on TV. Neither of those groups care about Carol Blazejowski and how she manages the Liberty.

The power law says "pay more attention to the casual fan, and less attention to the hardcore fan". My anecdotal argument comes from the early days of Monday Night Football. The "big three" announcers in the early history of the show were Howard Cosell, Frank Gifford and Don Meredith. Gifford and Meredith's approach to football announcing was the same dog-and-pony show that we're still familiar with in 2010: breathless play-by-play and the intricacies of the dime defense.

Cosell, however, knew that most football fans were casual fans, and that was his unstated aim. He wasn't going to bore you with football esoterica. He was more interested in the stories of the players than the strategy and tactics of the sport. He figured that his viewers weren't football experts, so why turn the show into a digression on coaching strategy? The hardcore fans hated Cosell, they absolutely despised him. He didn't know the game as well as Dandy Don Meredith, who was going to give you the real football knowledge.

But when Cosell was in the booth, Monday Night Football was one of the highest rated programs on TV. People related to him. They might have loved him, or they might have hated him, but they were never neutral - and they tuned in, religiously. Maybe the WNBA should follow the Cosell philosophy, and not the Madden one.

(* * *)

According to the Clarion-Ledger.com and the University of Mississippi sports website, Ole Miss graduate Shawn Goff has received an invitation to the 2010 Atlanta Dream training camp.

Goff graduated from Ole Miss in 2009, and headed overseas to play in Sweden. I am unable to find out how well she did, but I believe she played for Swedish team Margo or Kinna Mark.

From the Ole Miss website:

A four-year letterwinner at Ole Miss, Goff finished her career as one of the all-time greats to ever wear an Ole Miss uniform. The Tallahassee, Fla., native ranks 18th all-time at Ole Miss in scoring after pouring in 1,179 career points. She finished her senior season eighth in the SEC with 13.8 points per game and tallied 23 games in which she scored in double figures.

Goff also ended her career with 702 rebounds and is one of only 10 players in school history with over 1,000 points and 700 boards. She paced the Rebels and ranked ninth in the SEC with 6.6 rebounds per game as a senior.

Another player, Chandi Jones out of the University of Houston, was invited to the Dream's training camp, according to the Houston Roundball Review:

Chandi Jones, the greatest player in the history of the University of Houston's women's basketball program, has signed a training camp contract with the WNBA's Atlanta Dream.Jones, 5-10, is not yet listed on the Dream's roster but has turned in her paperwork to the Dream.

Jones finished her collegiate career as the all-time leading scorer in UH and C-USA history with 2,692 points; and her number 13 jersey was retired by UH on February 5, 2005.

Jones was drafted 8th overall in the 2004 WNBA Draft by the Phoenix Mercury.

Jones played with the Detroit Shock in 2004 and part of 2005 before she ended up with Minnesota, finishing her career there in 2006. She was a teammate of Sancho Lyttle when they both played for the University of Houston.

Tatum Brown also makes an appearance in the Dream's training camp. Brown, a 6-4, 178 pound forward, graduated from Arizona in 2000. She has never played for the WNBA, but has remained active in international basketball

Brown has played in Israel (where she was once detained by the tough Israeli airport security), the Rwandan women's national team, France and Turkey. I know that she's been at least in camp for the Cleveland Rockers in 2002 and played at one time for the Houston Stealth in the old National Women's Basketball League, as well as the traveling Houston Jaguars team.

Good luck to all of the above. With a tough Atlanta Dream team, it's going to be hard to earn a spot on the roster.



(* * *)

If you've heard of the Women's Blue Chip Basketball League (WBCBL) - a semi-pro league that plays a season concurrent with the WNBAs - they (theoretically) have some competition.

An organization called the Women's United States Basketball League (WUSBL) which will be headquartered in Atlanta, GA and which will have twelve franchises in the southeast United States, a geographical region that has historically been a poor climate for women's basketball. According to the press release, the goal is that the league would play a 28-game schedule. The teams will hopefully be placed in Atlanta, Augusta, Birmingham, Louisville, West Virginia, Chattanooga, Charleston, Charlotte, Columbia, Richmond, Savannah, and Jacksonville.

So is this league going to happen? I don't know. No one knows. According to the same press release, the initial goal was to start a men's basketball league - the USBL - but "...some American men's lower level basketball leagues have given a black eye to the sport by the failure to operate good companies, the flax we received from vendors and arenas, we wanted to rent was ridiculous." Furthermore, it doesn't cost any money to send a press release - but starting a league is another matter entirely. Supposedly, on May 8th and May 15th there will be WUSBA women's tryouts held in Louisville, KY - interested readers can chase down their own information.

I do believe that that if the WUSBL is ever realized, such a structure would be better than the one the WBCBL is currently is using - one with approximately fifty teams and seemingly little information about any of them. There are very basic things that a league has to do in order to be stable. There has to be financially secure leadership. There must be corporate support. Travel schedules have to be finalized. Players have to be paid, and they have to be able to depend that they will get paid, even if it's just $300 per week. And finally, there must be a threshhold where some teams will be accepted and others will be turned away.

Is the WUSBL good news? Yes. The WUSBL is good news even if it never plays a game, because it promotes the idea that there is money to be made - at some level - in women's professional basketball. In many cases in sports history, expansion is not voluntary - it is forced. The traditional pattern goes as follows:

1. New league springs up because the old league doesn't meet the demand for the sport.

2. New league becomes popular and begins attempting to compete with the old league by offering players higher salaries.

3. Salaries go up in both leagues. Players benefit.

4. Both sides conclude they're paying too much in salaries - the owners in the leagues conclude they have more in common with each other than not.

5. The leagues merge.


Of course, WUSBL salaries would have to get a lot higher than $300 per week and a meal voucher at Golden Corral. But then again, stranger things have happened. Major leagues get started by a bunch of crazy people with money - sometimes, more money than sense - and before you know, it snowballs into something big. The goal of the WUSBL is to be the "triple-A" of the WNBA - a big ambition - but great oaks grow from small acorns.

(* * *)

According to OurSportsCentral.com, the Atlanta Dream is going to be hosting open practices at high schools in the Central Georgia Area. The program is called "Take the Show on the Road" and it will be presented by Nfinity, which produces basketball and cheerleading shoes.

"Take the Show on the Road is a great opportunity for our team to interact with communities up close while providing them a unique and fun platform to raise significant funds for their school programs," said Dream President and COO Toby Wyman.

Fans who attend Take the Show on the Road get an inside look at the team's practice from start to finish and enjoy interactive elements including autographs, Q&A with players, giveaways, prizes and more! Nfinity will be on site during the Take the Show on the Road events with shoes on display and a booth for sales.

For those of you who can't get to a game - but who can get to a local high school - then who knows? You might be seeing the Dream up close and personal.

(* * *)

Recently, I obtained some Nielsen data regarding the 2010 NCAA Women's Basketball Championship. I thought the championship rematch between Connecticut and Stanford was a disappointing game, and my conclusion was this would be reflected in the Nielsen ratings for the game. I knew that hour-per-hour Nielsens were available, and that those ratings or shares would reflect those of a disappointing game - high numbers at first, and then falling thereafter.

What I forgot was that I had an insider who could look up television ratings. Unfortunately, the only ratings the insider could get me were from Dallas and Houston. I received a set of Houston ratings and hopefully, I'll get the ratings from Dallas soon.

The data I have is Live+SD, Live+3 and Live+7. All of these numbers represent a time range from the original air date of the program, since Nielsen understand that many people these days will record a program on their DVR and watch it later. "Live+SD" reflects televisions where either the game was watched as it aired, or was recorded plus watched on the same day. The +3 and +7 designations extend this viewing window up to +3/+7 days after the game was recorded. Since the numbers are roughly the same, I'll be using the Live+SD (seen live or on the same day) numbers.

Here is the quarter-hour data for Houston, Texas for the Connecticut-Stanford game. The game started at 7:30 pm central time, and 7 pm begins the lead-in to the show.

Two numbers follow, separated by slashes. The first number is the rating, which is the percentage of all televisions (in use or not) tuned to the game. The second number is the share, which is the percentage of all televisions in use tuned to the game.

All times are Central Time:

7:00 pm: 0.6/1.1

7:15 pm: 0.6/1.1

7:30 pm: 1.3/2.2

7.45 pm: 1.9/3.0

8:00 pm: 2.2/3.4

8:15 pm: 2.3/3.4

8:30 pm: 3.1/4.5

8:45 pm: 4.4/6.2

9:00 pm: 3.7/5.7

9:15 pm: 4.8/7.3


I was astonished to say the least. My expectations were reversed in the results. Viewership was low during the pre-game hoopla from 7 pm to 7:30 pm, and as the game progressed, the ratings slowly increased. By the end of the game, 7 percent of all active television sets in Houston were either watching the finale or taping it.

Of course, there are a lot of explanations for the data pattern. Maybe most viewers watched "American Idol" first before joining the game in progress. Maybe the numbers reflect Houston's traditional love of women's basketball. In any case, it looks like in Houston...they liked what they were seeing.



(* * *)

Basketball is still taking place in Europe in a lot of countries, so a rundown on where some of our Atlanta Dream players are:

Russia

Some photos from the first Ekaterinburg-Spartak Moscow game - where Ekaterinburg won 70-62 - can be found here. There are at least a couple of photos of Kelly Miller here.

Ekaterinburg 87, Spartak 79. In Game Two of the best-of-five series, Ekaterinburg wins again, with accusations of dubious home-team refereeing helping out Ekaterinburg.

The game film is here. Photos of the game are here. (Kelly Miller gets about three pictures.)

EKA: Parker 43, Abrosimova 13, Stepanova 10, Pondexter 10, Gruda 4, Nolan 2
SPA: Bird 20, Taurasi 14, Jekabsone 12, Fowles 4, McCarville 2
Kelly Miler: 5 points, 2-for-4 shooting, 3 assists, 22 minutes played

Ekaterinburg 73, Spartak Moscow 67. In front of a home crowd of 6000 fans, Ekaterinburg completes the amazing sweep of Spartak Moscow and wins the Russia Superleague A Championship.

Photos of the game are here.

EKA: Parker 25, Pondexter 12, Gruda 11, Nolan 11, Abrosimova 2
SPA: Taurasi 17, Fowles 15, Bird 12, McCarville 10, Jekabsone 0
Kelly Miller: 3 points, 1-for-3 shooting, 1 assist, 3 rebounds, 16 minutes played

Spain

Ros Casares 78, Perfumerias 69. In the sixth match between these two teams this year (regular season, Euroleague, Copa de la Reina), a good second quarter gives Ros Casares the first game in the best-of-three LFB Finals series.

ROS: Snell 24, Milton-Jones 23, Palau Altes 12
PER: De Mondt 13, Domingues Fernandez 11, Torrens 11
Erika de Souza: 13 points for Ros Casares, 10 rebounds, 6-for-11 shooting, 29 minutes played
Sancho Lyttle: 19 points for Perfumerias, 12 rebounds, 4 assists, 3 steals, 35 minutes played

Ros Casares 82, Perfumerias 78 (OT). Ros Casares gets the Game Two win in overtime and the Spanish League season comes to an end as the best-of-three finals season is swept by El Ros. Amaya Valdemoro of Ros Casares put it away with a 3-pointer with 16 seconds remaining in the overtime as Perfumerias simply ran out of oomph.

PER: Sánchez 15, Torrens 14 (Willingham 2)
ROS: Snell 21, Milton-Jones 17 (Valdemoro 6, Aguilar 3, Montañana 2)
Sancho Lyttle: 29 points, 10-for-17 shooting, 14 rebounds, 5 offensive rebounds, 39 minutes played
Erika de Souza: 16 points, 8-for-15 shooting, 13 rebounds, 6 offensive rebounds, 43 minutes played, fouled out

LFB2: Encino 68, Burgos 54. Top team Burgos has been struggling with its second straight loss and falls into a tie with 23-5 Extrugasa at the end of the regular season. Burgos moves into the second of two four-player groups that will play a round-robin to determine which teams get promoted to the LFB.

ENC: Gomez Iglesias 18, Herrera Arevalo 17, Roddy 14 (Pollini 0)
BUG: Lozana Adan 16, Cabrera Arguello 9, Jorge Portela 8
Demetress Adams: 4 points, 2-for-4 shooting, 8 rebounds, 3 turnovers, 25 minutes played

Turkey

Galatasaray 73, Tarsus 64. Galatasaray wins their quarterfinals series with Tarsus 3-0 (one win automatically assigned to the higher seed). Tarsus had the lead at halftime, but the second half was all Galatasaray. Galataasaray advances to play Mersin and Ivory Latta in the semifinals.

TAR: Black 14, Erdogan 14, January 11 (Lennox 9)
GAL: Catchings 27, Douglas 11, Young 11
Yelena Leuchanka: 9 points, 3-for-5 shooting, 7 rebounds, 24 minutes played


Galatasaray 74, Mersin 63. Sophia Young scored 25 points to give Galatasaray Game One of the best-of-five semifinals series.

MER: Turner 15, Larkins 14, Ivegin 9, Latta 9 (Scott 3)
GAL: Young 25, Catchings 13 (Douglas 4)
Yelena Leuchanka: 11 points, 5-for-6 shooting, 8 rebounds, 4 steals, 22 minutes played