Lynx makes its point with points

Emotions were running high among the players on the home team Saturday night at Target Center.

Phoenix was in the building, with normally dead-eye shooter Diana Taurasi.

But the Lynx were waiting and ready from the start for the highest-scoring team in the WNBA.

The Lynx crushed the Mercury 109-80 for their biggest victory of the season so far. Minnesota (6-3) scored on five of its first six possessions to take a 10-0 lead as an announced crowd of 5,911 screamed.

"First of all, we were doing this for Seimone," Lynx coach Jen Gillom said. "Second of all, the comment that was made after the Phoenix game [on June 17] by one of the players saying that they broke us was not well taken. And that was another motivating factor for us tonight."

Ten days ago, Augustus suffered a season-ending knee injury as the Mercury routed the Lynx 104-80 in Arizona.

"We are not broken," Gillom said, "and we wanted to prove that to that team. We may have had a bad night [in Phoenix]; we lost our best player. But we weren't broken."

Guard Candice Wiggins scored 22 points, 15 in the first half, for the Lynx. More important, in the long run, was the 22 by forward Roneeka Hodges. She has taken Augustus' starting spot.

"We knew the last time we played Phoenix it wasn't a pretty sight," Hodges said.

Taurasi, who averages 22.6 points, scored 28 in that game and was 7-for-8 on threes.

Saturday night, Taurasi was a miserable 2-for-15 from the field and missed all five shots she took behind the arc. She finished with only eight points, had three turnovers and was called for a technical after disagreeing with a foul called on her.

Point guard Cappie Pondexter, the other top scorer for the Mercury (6-4), had 19, as did reserve DeWanna Bonner. But Pondexter had four turnovers and only three assists.

The Mercury was 4-for-17 from behind the arc.

Another key was turnovers. The Lynx tied a team record by committing only one in the first half despite the frantic pace of the game and had seven total. The Mercury had 19 turnovers.

"[Turnovers] are killing us," Mercury coach Corey Gaines said. "We're usually one of the lowest turnover teams in the league."