Posted by Dan on September 29, 2008
2008 WNBA Playoffs Recap – September 28 – No. 1 Detroit Shock 64, No. 3 New York Liberty 55
Eastern Conference
No. 1 Detroit Shock 64, No. 3 New York Liberty 55
YPSILANTI, Mich. – Ten minutes away from advancing to the WNBA Finals, the New York Liberty showed its age. So did the Detroit Shock. Detroit overcame a seven-point fourth-quarter deficit to keep its season alive with a 64-55 victory over the Liberty.
The victory tied up the Eastern Conference Finals and forced a deciding game three on Monday night. For the second game in a row the contest will be played at the Convocation Center on the campus of Eastern Michigan University – which is an hour west of Detroit – because of a scheduling conflict with the Palace of Auburn Hills, the Shocks’ normal home court.
Either Detroit or New York has in the Eastern Conference finals every year accept 2005 since the league expanded the playoffs in 1999. The Shock have won both of the game threes they’ve played in – 2007 against Indiana and at Connecticut in 2006. New York has split both of its game threes – losing to Connecticut in 04 and beating Charlotte on the road in 1999.
After a fairly even first quarter, the Shock dug themselves a hole by only scoring 25 points in the second and third quarters. New York scored 19 points in the third period with Erlana Larkins’ lay up staking the Liberty to 46-38 lead with 1:03 to play in the third.
In the fourth the Liberty, the youngest team in the league, showed their age, and their nerves. New York had three turnovers and a missed lay up during the first two minutes of the quarter and that allowed Detroit to go on a 5-0 run to close within 46-44. Deanna Nolan made four free throws around a Taj McWilliams-Franklin lay up to give Detroit the lead, 50-49, with 6:48 to play.
“I think we showed our youth,” New York head coach Pat Coyle said. “For three quarters, we played really well, but early in the fourth, we missed some shots and got rattled.”
A three-pointer by Loree Moore temporarily gave the Liberty the lead back, but her three ball at the 6:10 mark would be New York’s last points four nearly four and a half minutes. Five different players scored during an 11-0 run as a close game turned into an easy victory of the Shock. Elaine Powell hit a jumper to put Detroit up 61-52 with 1:58 left to cap off the run and get the Shock thinking about game three.
“We played Shock basketball in the fourth quarter, and we started having fun again,” Detroit head coach Bill Laimbeer said. “We just needed to hit a few shots and get things going on defense.”
Her fourth-quarter scoring barrage pushed Nolan to a team-high 22 points to go along with six rebounds. Katie Smith added 11 points and pulled in five rebounds as well. McWilliams-Franklin grabbed 11 rebounds.
Detroit got a huge boost both emotionally and on the court from the return of forward Plenette Pierson. During game two of the opening round, Pierson was dropped to the ground by Indiana’s Ebony Hoffman and separated her shoulder. She missed game three of that series and game one of the one with New York. Runner-up for WNBA Sixth Woman of the Year, she scored 10 points off the bench.
Only one player managed to get into double figures for New York as Christon led the way with 16 points. McCarville was next with nine points while Cathrine Kraayeveld had seven points and nine rebounds.
Good defense at both ends of the court kept the shooting percentages low. Detroit shot 39 percent (23-of-59) to the Liberty’s 37.3 percent (22-of-59). New York was able to keep itself in the game by knocking down the outside shot. The Liberty were 9-of-26 from behind the arc, compared to Detroit’s 2-of-10.
The Shock compensated for their lack of three-point shooting by getting to the free throw lane more. Detroit made twice as many free throws, 16-of-23, than New York took, 2-of-7. Another area where Detroit had a distinct advantage was on the glass. The Shock had a 36-to-24 advantage on the boards with four players grabbing five or more rebounds.
Posted by Dan on
2008 WNBA Playoffs Recap – September 25 – No. 3 New York Liberty 60, No. 1 Detroit Shock 56
Eastern Conference
No. 3 New York Liberty 60, No. 1 Detroit Shock 56
NEW YORK – As the youngest team in the league, the thought of being on the doorstep of the WNBA Finals may have been overwhelming to the New York Liberty. Fortunately for the third-seeded team in the Eastern Conference they were able to recover from a poor finish to the first quarter and beat the top-seeded Detroit Shock, 60-56, in first game of the conference finals.
The Liberty started the game by only scoring eight points and played even for the next two quarters before making their move in the fourth. New York outscored Detroit 24-14 in the fourth to prevail by four.
The series now shifts to Detroit for game two and potentially game three. Game two will be played Sunday afternoon, but the game will not be played on the Shock’s home floor. Because of scheduling conflicts with The Palace of Auburn Hills, the game two and game three, if necessary, will be played at the Convocation Center on the campus of Eastern Michigan University in Ypsilanti, Mich., which is about an hour away.
For the opening minutes of the game it looked that Detroit was the younger of the two teams as they managed to score only two points for the first four minutes of the game. A lay up by Shameka Christon at the 3:06 mark of the first quarter gave the Liberty an 8-7 lead, but that would be the last points the host would score the rest of the period.
Detroit went on a 10-run from the three-minute mark of the first quarter through the first 2:26 of the second to capture a 17-8 advantage. A lay up by Janel McCarville would stop the Shock’s run and sparked one by the Liberty. She personally outscored Detroit 9-2 over the next two minutes to pull New York within three, 19-16.
The Shock would recover and take a six-point lead into the locker room, 29-23. Just like it did to start the game, New York played excellent defense to start the second half. Again it was McCarville capping a run that gave the Liberty a 34-33 lead with 5:25 to go in the third.
Katie Smith made a pair of baskets that helped Detroit take a 42-36 lead at the end of three quarters. Once again the Liberty’s defense came through as they held the Shock to just one point through the first 5:24 of the fourth quarter. Essence Carson and Cathrine Kraayeveld combined to score eight points in two minutes to push the Liberty’s lead to five, 55-50, with 1:55 to play.
Deanna Nolan, who scored the Shock’s last 11 points, hit a trio of free throws to close the margin to 57-56 with just 18 seconds left. After Erin Thorn hit two free throws, Nolan missed a three pointer that would have tied the game and another Thorn three sealed the victory.
McCarville led the way for New York, producing a team-high 17 points. The only other Liberty player to reach double figure was Christon and she produced a double-double with 11 points and 11 rebounds.
Sixty-three percent of Detroit’s scoring came from two players. Nolan scored a game-high 22 points and Smith added 13 more.
Both teams played great defense as neither team shot better than 36 percent from the field with New York having a slight edge – 35.9 percent to 34.4 percent. Neither team was particularly sharp from behind the arc, as Detroit shot 31.3 percent (5-of-16) to Liberty’s 4-of-14 (28.6 percent).
As a result, both teams had a number of rebounds. After Christon’s 11 boards, four more New York players had four or more rebounds and Detroit had six players that grabbed that many boards. The Liberty had a one-board advantage, 37-to-36.
Posted by Dan on September 24, 2008
2008 WNBA Playoffs Recap – September 23 – No. 1 Detroit Shock 80, No. 4 Indiana Fever 61
Eastern Conference
No. 1 Detroit Shock 80, No. 4 Indiana Fever 61
DETROIT – Over the last six seasons the Detroit Shock have been the top team in the WNBA’s Eastern Conference. They are one step closer to continuing that reign by beating the Indiana Fever, 80-61, in the first round of the WNBA Playoffs.
Detroit, who has advanced to the WNBA Finals three of the last five years and won a pair of titles, moves on to face New York in the Eastern Conference Finals. The best of three series begins on Friday.
The Shock eliminated the Fever from the playoffs for the third year in a row. Last season it was in the conference finals and the year before it came in the opening round.
The game, and the Fever’s season, was nearly over before it began. Steaming from Ebony Brown being fined but not suspended after she dumped Plientte Pierson onto the court and separated her shoulder in game two, Detroit came out on fire in the first quarter.
“Obviously, that was a spectacular performance on both ends of the floor,” Shock coach Bill Laimbeer said after the game.” That was the way a championship-caliber team plays.”
Deanna Nolan and Katie Smith hit a pair of shots to help stake the Shock to a 12-0 lead at the 7:09 mark. Indiana missed its first three shots and had three turnovers before it got on the board with a Tammy Sutton-Brown jumper at 6:31.
Following a Tully Bevilaqua free throw at the 5:39 mark, the Fever would only score two more points the rest of the quarter. Detroit ended the half on a 16-2 run that was capped by a Nolan jumper to give the Shock at 30-7 lead after the first quarter.
It wouldn’t get any better for Indiana in the second quarter. The Fever would not score for nearly the first three and a half minutes on the quarter and a jumper by Nolan at the 5:34 pushed Detroit’s margin to its largest of the game, 31, at 41-10.
The lead would hover around 25 until Indiana closed the first half on a 6-2 run. Nolan hit a runner as the clock expired to send the Shock into the locker room up 49-19
Indiana would try to make a game of it in the third quarter as it cut the lead by 13. A pair of Tamika Catchings’ free throws with 52 seconds left sliced the margin to 56-43. At that point the Fever were on cruise control with most of the reserves in the game.
“I think we were stunned,” Catchings said. “There was a point where you looked up at the scoreboard and we were down by 30 in the first half, and they were still coming at us on both ends of the floor. I just wanted us to wake up.”
As one would expect in a blow out, Detroit had the advantage over Indiana in nearly every facet of the game. The Shock had six more rebounds than the Fever – with the half dozen margin coming on the offensive glass – and they forced Indiana into committing 21 turnovers. Indiana had its troubles behind the arc where it only managed to shoot 11.8 percent (2-of-17).
Four players reached 10 points or more for the Shock with another reaching nine markers. Leading the way was Nolan at 21 points. Smith was next with 15 followed by Kara Braxton (12) and Taj McWilliams-Franklin (10). Four players had five or more rebounds, led by Aleix Hornbuckle with eight boards to go along with nine points.
Leading the way for Fever in the scoring column was Sutton-Brown with 20. Catching came close to a triple-double with 15 points, eight rebounds and eight assists. Katie Douglas had 10 points. Hoffman went scoreless, but did have 10 rebounds.
