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Roman Augustoviz spends Minnesota's winters covering college hockey, specifically the Gophers, and other University of Minnesota sports. During the summer, he writes about the WNBA's Minnesota Lynx, with a dose of U sports sprinkled in. Follow him on Twitter @RomanStrib.
Whalen picks up her play after Augustus' injury
Posted by: Roman Augustoviz under Lynx Updated: May 20, 2012 - 11:57 PM
Seimone Augustus, who had 19 points at the time, was injured with 3 minutes, 30 seconds left in the third quarter Sunday.
She left the game and didn't come back. So somebody had to step up.
Turns out it was point guard Lindsay Whalen.
Whalen made two baskets in the last 43 seconds of the third quarter and then was three for four from the field in the fourth quarter for six more points. She finished with 13 points, 10 after Augustus left the game.
"I thought Lindsay struggled prior to that," Lynx coach Cheryl Reeve said. "So the timing was good for her to find her footing in the game. I thought Monnie (Monica Wright) played great. It never feels good to have someone like Seimone out of the game when the game is still in the balance, but ... Whalen understood it was her time to pick things up a little bit."
Besides her points, Whalen had five assists, four rebounds and three steals. In the fourth quarter, her numbers were three for four from the field, two steals, one rebound and one assist.
Rebekkah Brunson and Candice Wiggins had five points apiece in the final quarter.
Wright was the Lynx's second leading scorer. She was six for nine from the field, three of five on free throws for 15 points as a reserve. She also had five rebounds, five assists and two steals in 22:27.
SHOULD FANS BE WARNED?
It looks like everything will turn out all right for Augustus, that no ribs were broken. But it could have been disastrous. A broken rib could have put her out for who knows how long.
Which got me to thinking. Does anyone tell the people who buy courtside seats that a player could crash into them? And what they should do if that happens?
It happened so quickly,but I believe somebody was sitting in the chair Augustus crashed into and moved. If that person catches her, she probably isn't as shaken up as she was.
Will check into this more later this week. Don't think there is anyone I call at 11:30, although Whalen might still be up. Just watched her around 11 a.m. with Joe Schmidt on Ch. 5, the same station on which the Lynx-Mercury was televised.
Whalen and other Lynx have to be at Target Center at 5 a.m. Monday for bus ride to airport to New York City. Oh my.
THEY SAY
Reeve on her her players: "They handled a lot of distractions. We didn't play poorly, but we still have a long way to go."
Whalen on pregame rings and banner unveiling ceremony: "It's great. From watching Timberwolves growing up, to now have something that we all contributed to up at the Target Center, it's a great feeling. We have the Western Conference banner and the championship banner [hanging from the rafters]."
Augustus on her feeling during ceremony: "A lot of excitement. You can tell that our fans have been waiting, probably counting the months until our return. It was fun to experience that with them. At the same time, once the banner went down and the lights went back on and we started to warm up for the game, it's about 2012 and what we're trying to do now."
Maya Moore on work and fun: "When it's time to go to work, I'm fully focused. I go hard at whatever it is. If it's having fun and enjoying and celebrating with our fans, or if it's playing the season opener when that whistle blows. I mean, have you seen the rings? You'd be smiling, too."
ETC.
* Next two Lynx games this week are not on TV. Lynx play at New York on Tuesday and are back home to face LA Sparks on Thursday.
* Bench players 46 and 51 points in the Lynx's two exhibition games. So what, you say, that was preseason. But the reserves had 40 points on Sunday and even more impressive was their shooting percentage. They went 16 for 23 for 69.6 percent. Seriously. Devereaux Peters was the worst shooter, one for two for 50 percent.
* One of the few changes on the administrative side for the Lynx is the addition of Paige Jackson. She is the team's first-year basketball operations and video coordinator. She handles travel, scheduling practices home and away, and uniform and equipment matters. She is from Carson City, Mich., and graduated from Central Michigan with a sports management degree.
Charde, in different uniform, looked at home at Target Center
Posted by: Roman Augustoviz under Lynx Updated: May 20, 2012 - 10:01 PMSo is the old Charde Houston back? The player who was a WNBA all-star in 2009?
Somebody asked her that question after the former Lynx scored a game-high 24 points for Phoenix in the Mercury's 105-83 loss to her old team.
"It kind of frustrates me when people say, 'the old Charde Houston,' " Houston said. "I haven't gone anywhere. I know what my capabilities are, and it's just a matter of having the opportunity to show my abilities. It's not the old, the new, it's Charde, period. It felt good to be with my new team. I'm happy that I'm here, and we're just going to improve."
Houston received a championship ring before the game -- as did Alexis Hornbuckle, another Lynx player now with the Mercury. She was a popular Lynx, and fans applauded her warmly.
Then she started making shots. Here's a breakdown of her 24-point game:
1st quarter/ Charde made four of eight shots, including three of four three-pointers for 11 points. The quarter ended with the score tied 20-all. Rest of team was four of 19 from the field.
2nd quarter/ Houston made only shot from field she took, a three-pointer. She also had a free throw for 15 points at halftime. The Lynx led 56-43.
3rd quarter/ Houston was 3x6, all three misses were from behind the arc. She had seven points this quarter for 22 total.
4th quarter/ Maybe Houston got tired. She played 29:46 after averaging 17 minutes the season before for the Lynx. She was only 1x7 from the field and missed two threes. She had two points to finish with 24, two shy of her career high. Her five three-pointers were a career high.
Mercury coach Corey Gaines said Houston's skills can help his team. "She can score, so it's a good fit for her," he said. "She's adapting. She's coming along. It's a new system for her, but she's learning."
Quickly.
"Any questions that I have, [Diana Taurasi is} always talking," Houston said. "This is my first year solely at the guard position, so I watch everything that Diana does. Every single thing she does, I watch. So I feel good, I feel confident, in knowing that I will be able to improve because I have one of the best guards in the country on my team."
Houston said, because of Taurasi's injury, she expected to start against the Lynx. "I was ready for it," she said. "I was not necessarily sure, but I was just ready.
"I feel great period. I just want to play well throughout the season. It is not about Target Center or Minnesota. It is about myself, our team and my adjustment. I just want to make sure that I prepare myself and just do well, not just this game throughout the entire season.
"I played all right [Sunday]. I never feel good. It doesn't matter how many points you have. I just want to shoot the ball well. Whatever shot I am giving, I want to maximize the opportunity."
Houston said the Lynx looked like she expected. "They just won. Everybody is coming back, so you know they are going to have a lot of energy," she said. "They play hard."
SIX ASSISTS FOR ROOKIE
Former Ohio State guard Samantha Prahalis, the No. 6 pick in last month's draft, made her WNBA debut and did some good things and some bad things.
She had 12 points and six assists, but also four turnovers.
"First game," Gaines said. "A couple bad turnovers. It's going to come. It's a learning experience. She wasn't scared. She came out and attacked and played, so I'm happy about that. She's probably going to learn the whole year. It's like any guard who comes into the league is going to learn, or any player, the whole year."
Prahalis said Diana Taurasi has helped her a lot. "When she is in, it's kind of like she just settles everyone down a little bit," Prahalis said. "She's kind of like a safety valve. She could take anyone or anything. She helps me set it up. 'Let's calm down. Let's run a play.' She's definitely someone who just settle everyone down, just gets control of the game."
After a week or two of feeling uncomfortable, Prahalis said, she is doing better. "The fast pace in the game [the Mercury plays], I really like it. I love it," she said. "That's why I think I need to do it more because I think we can get some more run-outs and I think we can get some more quick shots."
TAURASI MISSED BUT
Gaines said not having Taurasi [left hip flexor] in the lineup hurt his team, but there were other problems, too.
"Gave up too many offensive rebounds," he said. "[The Lynx] scored on put-backs and fast breaks. Last year they hurt us on half-court sets. They didn't really hurt us on those sets this year. So if you want to take a positive, maybe that's a positive. But still, they killed us on the boards. We're missing a couple of guns there."
The Lynx outrebounded the Mercury 40-28.
Taurasi averaged 3.2 rebounds per game last season. Also out for the season is 6-1 forward Penny Taylor with a torn ACL, although she would have missed the first half ot the season anyway training with Australia for the Olympics.
Lynx players get their championship rings
Posted by: Roman Augustoviz Updated: May 20, 2012 - 10:53 AMThe lights were dimmed and one by one, the Lynx received their WNBA championship rings on Sunday before their game against Phoenix.
WNBA president Laurel Richie and Lynx owner Glen Taylor hugged everyone and the crowd cheered. The rings were in little boxes.
The first to get hers was forward Amber Harris, who has a sprained left ankle and won’t play.
Then came out Alexis Hornbuckle in her Mercury uniform – she got traded in the offseason. But this was good fortune. She was back at Target Center and so was Charde Houston, another Lynx player who got traded to Phoenix.
The final two players to get their rings were Lindsay Whalen – “Minnesota’s own,” the PA announcer said – and Seimone Augustus – “an absolute force … the [WNBA] Finals MVP.”
Augustus thanked everyone – the team owners, coaches and, of course, the fans.
After the ring ceremony, a banner in the rafters was unveiled. It was simple but sweet. It had the Lynx logo on top and underneath the words, “2011 WNBA champions.” It will hang in Target Center forever, the PA announcer said.
About 100-plus fans, original season ticket holders, got to go on the court for the pregame festivities. They waited 13 years for this day – which is not quite, but almost forever, too.
There was news even before the game. Diana Taurasi, the Mercury’s leading scorer, who averaged 21.6 points last season, was scratched because of a hip flexor injury. She had a hip flexor. Houston took her place in the lineup.
Lynx owner believed in team, his faith was rewarded last season
Posted by: Roman Augustoviz under Lynx Updated: May 20, 2012 - 12:42 AMLynx coach Cheryl Reeve said one memory she will always have of her team's championship run involves team owner Glen Taylor. When he received the WNBA championship trophy from league president Laurel Richie.
Reeve has a lot of respect fro Taylor. "Mr. Taylor is an enlightened guy who understands that to be a leader in the community, means that you participate," Reeve said. "You are in the forefront in things like society issues, equality between men and women and that sort of thing.
"He is a leader and for him that was probably the reason that pulled him in [the WNBA]. The idea of the business model someday making money, was something that you hope for."
The Lynx made money in their first two seasons, 1999 and 2000, broke about even the third and have lost money ever season since, team sources say, until last season.
Reeve said Taylor has been passionate about the Lynx, often sitting with his wife Becky in front row seats between the team bench and press row.
"I joke with him about how close he sits to our bench," Reeve said. "Our fans and our players love it. The coach? Not so much. It is a little too close for me. He told me he heard some interesting words that came out of my mouth.
"It is a great story to have the persistence that he had and to stick with it at a time when, quite frankly, many people told him that he was nuts for doing what he was doing. And he probably still hears it.
"So it was really gratifying to be able to present – to see him with Laurel Richie handing him that trophy. There are moments of a championship that you will never forget. That is one of them.
"Where you say this guy, millions of dollars that he is invested in this team despite all the people coming out of the woodwork saying, ' Why are you doing it?' "
Richie will be at Target Center on Sunday morning when the players and coaches on the Lynx receive their championship rings at 11 a.m. -- fans are urged to be in their seats by 10:45 not to miss anything.
*The WNBA salary cap is $878,000 and team have to spend at least $844,000. So players on a team at the top of the cap, average $79,818. Other big expenses for teams are travel costs.
"We [fly] commercial," Reeve said, "and if we are fortunate to have frequent flyer miles, we may get an upgrade. That is where the NBA started. Bill [Laimbeer, former Detroit Shock coach] was always good about telling me that. 'Hey, I flew commercial when I first came into the league.' "
Other expenses settle around the operation of the team, Reeve said, such as the housing, the cars, etc.
Big coaches' salaries? Reeve laughed at that question.
THORN GOT LAST ROSTER SPOT
Reeve liked both 5-11 forward Queralt Casas of Spain and 6-0 guard/forward Julie Wojta of Wisconsin-Green Bay. But both were cut on Wednesday. They were the last two cuts.
Wojta, who has signed to play with a pro team in Belgium, came closest to making the team.
They both spent good time here, Reeve said.
"From a basketball standpoint , they really did some good things as they got more and more comfortable," Reeve said. "Their games are very different.
“For Julie, that was the one that was on a lot of people’s radar screen. We have talked to her about what needs to happen now for her to try to get a spot in this league," Reeve said. "We gave her a good, hard look and in the end we just said, we felt like having a third ball-handler [Erin Thorn] was really important to this squad. So that was what the separator was.”
Thorn, an unrestricted free agent, was signed by the Lynx in the offseason. She can play either guard spots and shooting threes is one of her strengths. Thorn has played six seasons with the New York Liberty and three with the Chicago Sky.
LYNX'S FOE ON TUESDAY LOSES
There was a big comeback in the only WNBA game on Friday and there was another on Saturday.
Connecticut outscored New York 27-15 in the fourth quarter at Madison Square Garden to beat the Liberty 78-73.
Cappie Pondexter had 19 points and Plenette Pierson 15 points and 10 rebounds for the Liberty who were playing their only game on their home court this year. The Lynx and New York will be at the Purdential Centerin Newark, N.J., on Tuesday. The Liberty has to play their because the Garden is in the second year of a three-year renovation.
Tina Charles led the Sun with 19 points and 13 rebounds. Three teammates also were in double digits.
New York outrebounded the Sun 44-42, shot almost as well 38.1 percent to 39.7 percent, had fewer turnovers, 10 to 11, but ... the Liberty were dreadful on three pointers (2 for 15) and at the free throw line (15 for 24).
The Sun stole this game.
* San Antonio beat Tulsa 88-79, but Silver Stars trailed at half and had to work to beat a three-victory team in 2011. ... Two rookies had good first games for the Shock. Glory Johnson, who many mock drafts had going to the Lynx, had 11 points and 10 rebounds and guard Riquna Williams had 12 points. Guard Temeka Johnson, traded from Phoenix, hAd 21 points and nine assists. ... Sophia Young had 20 points and 13 boards for SA.
* Indiana beat Atlanta 92-84 behind a bunch of three-point shots. The Fever made 12 threes on 12 of 21 shooting, the Dream just four. Katie Douglas, the lefty with touch, made three from behind the arc and had 21 points.\
* Chicago, the team the Lynx routed Tuesday in an exhibition game, won 69-57 in Washington. Sylvia Fowles had 23 points and 12 rebounds. She was 10 of 14 from the floor.
Attendance first weekend so far:
Washington, 11,415
Seattle, 9,686
Indiana, 9,403
New York, 8,112
Tulsa, 7,509
Lynx are expecting over 10,000. With time of game -- 11:30 a.m. -- and it being on national TV (Ch. 5), not sure they can draw more than Mystics did in D.C.
Ex-Gopher McCarville sitting out second WNBA season
Posted by: Roman Augustoviz under Lynx Updated: May 21, 2012 - 11:00 PMEx-Gopher Janel McCarville played center for the New York Liberty two years ago. But she won't be on the court on Tuesday when the Lynx play New York.
She is home in Wisconsin again this summer.
Seems McCarville got into a dispute with the Liberty and its new coach and general manager last year and never reported. They got off on the wrong foot right away. Coach/GM John Whisenant started fining her $1,000 a day from the day she arrived home in Wisconsin from a long season in Italy. That day also happened to be the start of Whiz's training camp.
She wanted four, five days home with her family. The Liberty suspended her for the 2011 season.
Whisenant visited her last winter in Italy, but McCarville decided to sit out this WNBA season, too.
Last month the Liberty released this statement from McCarville: "While I love the Liberty and the WNBA, I've decided to sit out the 2012 season to spend more time with my family. I sincerely appreciated and enjoyed the time that Coach Whiz spent with me in Italy earlier this year, and it has been great to hear from so many Liberty fans encouraging my return. I wish the team nothing but the best in its quest for a WNBA championship."
The Liberty still hold her WNBA rights. ... Hmm, if Taj McWilliams-Franklin retires after this season, and the Lynx are looking for a veteran center next season, and Lindsay Whalen returns [McCarville was in Whalen's wedding], how about a call to the Liberty, or to Custer, Wis., Janel's summer home?
* First there was the problem with McCarville last season, now this year she didn't come back and another center, Quanitra Hollingsworth will miss the first half of the WNBA. Q played for the Lynx for two seasons before being traded to the Liberty last season.
Q, an American who went to Virginia Commonwealth, is out because she is in Turkey. She became a Turkish citizen and is training with that country's national team as it prepares to host an international tournament that will determine the final qualifiers for the London Olympics. Turkey's women's basketball team has never advanced to the Olympics. Q hopes to change that.
AUGUSTUS MAY SIT OUT
Seimone Augustus, who injured her ribs on Sunday when she crashed into a courtside seat, practiced with the Lynx on Monday in New York. It was a light practice. She is questionable for Tuesday's game against the New York Liberty.
Augustus started all 42 games the Lynx played last year. In fact, four of the five starters did. The one exception was Taj McWilliams-Franklin. She was on the bench for one game in Tulsa when she suffered a minor injury in pregame warm-ups. She played starer's minutes that night anyway.
NBA TV LIKES LYNX
NBA TV, once the NBA playoffs are over, is going to do a lot of WNBA games this season. Forty-five to be exact.
It carried the regular-season opener between Los Angeles and Seattle on Friday. Will carry one WNBA game in June, seven in July before the break for the London Olympics, 12 in August and 23 in September.
Lynx games will be on 12 times. No other team will be on more than 10 times and several only four times.
"Many factors are involved when determining the schedule," a NBA TV spokesperson said, "but being the
defending champion is certainly one of them. Ultimately, when piecing together the schedule, we look for the most compelling games for our national audience."
Who will be the broadcasters for the Lynx games? "NBA TV simulcasts the local telecasts" was the answer.
The 45-game TV schedule is in line with NBA TV's traditional WNBA coverage. It also plans to cover playoff games, although how many has not been announced.
* wnba.com rates the Lynx No. 1 in its power ratings, with Atlanta and Connecticut No. 2 and 3, respectively.
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recent posts
- Postgame: Whalen picks up her play after Augustus' injury
- Ex-Lynx Houston looked at home at Target Center
- Lynx players get their championship rings
- Lynx owner believed in team, his faith was rewarded last season
- Ex-Gopher McCarville sitting out second WNBA season
- LA rallies in WNBA opener; NBA TV's look at league
- Ring ceremony won't distract Lynx, coach says
- Bench one bright spot in two preseason wins for Lynx
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- WNBA's GMs pick Lynx to repeat in landslide; Coco Miller cut
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