There's no place like home, Dorothy says, at the end of The Wizard of Oz.
Lynx forward Hamchetou Maiga-Ba agrees. Every year Maiga-Ba returns to visit Mali, an impoverished country in west-central Africa where she was raised. She comes from a large Muslim family. Her father has three wives. Maiga-Ba has seven sisters and 13 brothers.
Lynx coach Cheryl Reeve is hoping Dorothy and Maiga-Ba are right about how special home is. Minnesota (5-11) starts a six-game homestand Thursday against San Antonio. And the Lynx need wins, in bunches, to improve their chances of making the WNBA playoffs for the first time in six years.
Target Center could be the place the turnaround starts. Six games is the Lynx's longest stretch of home games in the franchise's 12-year history. Eight of Minnesota's next nine games through Aug. 3 are at home.
"Clearly the biggest moment on our schedule is July," Reeve said. "It's our chance to make progress being at home."
"Every team wants to take care of their home," said Maiga-Ba, 32, in her ninth WNBA season. "It has to mean something, especially for us. We haven't done well in that department."
The Lynx are 2-4 at Target Center. Asked if the Lynx can put together a winning streak, Maiga-Ba laughed. "Of course," she said. "If we didn't believe that, then we should all go home. You have to keep working."
Or in Maiga-Ba's case, keep traveling. Basketball has taken her around the world. She left Mali to attend college at Old Dominion University from 1998 to 2002, then moved on to the WNBA. In various winter offseasons, she has played in Spain, France and the Czech Republic. In 2008, she was captain of the Mali team in the Beijing Olympics.
Maiga-Ba was a reserve for Sacramento her first five pro seasons, then started for Houston in 2007 and 2008 before the Comets folded. She returned to Sacramento last season for the Monarchs' final year of existence. The Lynx signed Maiga-Ba, an unrestricted free agent, on Feb. 17 after Reeve gave her assurances of meaningful minutes.
Maiga-Ba has started nine of 16 games and is averaging 4.2 points, 2.8 rebounds and 1.4 assists. "She is that steady veteran you can count on," Reeve said. "She makes the hustle plays."
That was the way Maiga-Ba was brought up. Her mother and an aunt played on Mali's national team before her. Her father, a retired customs officer, played soccer. Some of her Muslim friends had to quit basketball because their parents insisted their daughters dress more modestly. Hers didn't.
"I was very lucky," Maiga-Ba said. "They just had some rules. As long as I studied well in school and stayed out of trouble, I could play basketball."
Her father valued education. One year he gave all his children new bicycles -- except two who had poor grades. Lesson learned. Maiga-Ba was on the dean's list at ODU and speaks five languages.
The competitive attitude instilled by her family helped her on the court, too. She was on the Mali women's national team by 16.
Maiga-Ba and one sister are the only family members who have left Mali. "I keep going back home just to see everybody," Maiga-Ba said. "We all eat together. It is very much different here."
This season Maiga-Ba has even had to live apart from her husband. She married Baba Ba in 2005; he works in Sacramento.
"I love basketball, but we make so much sacrifices for something we love to do," Maiga-Ba said. "We miss baptisms, we miss weddings, we miss all kind of stuff just for us to play. So we don't take [basketball] for granted, that's for sure."
Wherever the games are played.
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