Seattle Storm Vs. New York Liberty Halftime Score: Lauren Jackson Returns Strong As Storm Take 32-27 Lead

While some players struggle just to find a rhythm when returning from an extended injury absence, Seattle Storm center Lauren Jackson not only made her presence felt but also played arguably her best nine minutes of the season against the New York Liberty tonight.

In her first game back from a hip injury that has sidelined her since June 21, Jackson started and scored a game-high 10 points in nine minutes to lead the Storm to a 32-27 halftime lead over the visiting New York Liberty at KeyArena.

Jackson showcased her trademark versatility, scoring in the post, from the line, hitting two 3-pointers, and showing complete confidence both banging inside and taking long jumpers. However, with Jackson still playing limited minutes, the Storm were plagued by familiar problems that helped keep the Liberty in this game.

After getting out to an outstanding 17-3 start in the first quarter with Jackson scoring five early points, Liberty guards Essence Carson and Cappie Pondexter started to get hot to keep them in the game with a team-high seven points apiece. Consecutive jumpers by Carson cut the lead to 17. After playing basically even from that point on in the first period, the Storm started to beat themselves in the second period.

Falling into their unfortunate pattern of settling for jumpers and turning the ball over with Jackson out of the game, the Storm went without a free throw and committed four turnovers in the second quarter as they were just outplayed by the Liberty in the second quarter. Swin Cash added eight points and a game-high four rebounds, but the combination of the Liberty's aggressive defense and rushed decisions offensively led to the Storm shooting 27 percent in the second quarter.

With the initial excitement of Jackson's a thing of the past, this is turning into the defensive battle that might have been expected now as the Liberty only shot 29 percent themselves in the second quarter.

Seattle Storm Center Lauren Jackson Will Return From Injury Against The New York Liberty Tonight

Seattle Times reporter Jayda Evans tweeted earlier tonight that Seattle Storm center Lauren Jackson will be making her return to the court tonight at KeyArena after being out due to a hip injury for about nine weeks.

However, it remains unclear whether Jackson will start or enter the game off the bench* - although Evans said she will come off the bench, the Seattle Storm have tweeted that Storm coach Brian Agler was unsure about whether start. Agler chatted with Kevin Pelton of StormBasketball.com earlier this week about the pros and cons of starting her compared to bringing her off the bench.

"That's part of the issue - is it better to get her playing when she's warm right after warmups?" said Agler. "Because it's easier to manage minutes when they don't start. She's going to have limited minutes. What that limit is, we're still gauging. If there's a plan on paper that I can give you, we don't have that, but there are a lot of generalities that we're discussing."

Jackson has been out since the second quarter of the Storm's first game in Tulsa on June 21 where she suffered a hip injury. After an initial evaluation, the word was that she'd be out 8-12 weeks so returning tonight is within that rather wide window of what the Storm expected.

Also as expected, Storm guard Tanisha Wright will be back with the team tonight after missing their previous game in Phoenix for family reasons.

*Update: Evans is now tweeting that Jackson will start tonight.

For more details on Jackson's injury, visit our storystream.

Seattle Storm Officially Sign Polish Center Ewelina Kobryn

The Seattle Storm announced today that they have officially signed center Ewelina Kobryn today.

Most importantly, she has joined the team on the east coast, giving the team 10 healthy players for their road trip with center Lauren Jackson out for 8-12 weeks after having surgery on her hip.

STORM: Storm Signs Kobryn
Kobryn joined the Storm on the East Coast, where the team opens a three-game road swing with a game against the Connecticut Sun, July 1. It continues with games at Washington, July 3, and at Indiana, July 5. Seattle’s next home game is July 9 vs. Los Angeles.

Storm coach Brian Agler discussed what Kobryn might add to the team in a previous interview with StormBasketball.com.

STORM: Kobryn Expected to Add Post Depth
"She's a typical European post player," he said, "though she's probably more defense- and rebound-oriented than some of them. She's versatile. She can stretch the defense and shoot the three-point shot. She has great instincts for the game. I've watched her play. Some of our team members have played against her. We've watched film on her. We have a good grasp of what she can bring us."

For more on what Kobryn might offer, see our storystream. For more on the Storm and the WNBA in general, visit SB Nation's women's basketball site Swish Appeal.

What Recent Seattle Storm Addition Ewelina Kobryn Will Add With Lauren Jackson Injured

Nobody on the planet can actually be expected to "replace" a player like 6-foot-6 Seattle Storm center Lauren Jackson.

However, with the understanding that Jackson would have surgery and be out for 8-12 weeks this season, the Storm chose to waive rookie forward Ify Ibekwe on Sunday and sign 6-foot-3 Polish center Ewelina Kobryn for some immediate help as first reported by Seattle Times reporter Jayda Evans.

Women's Hoops Blog | Storm signs Polish center Ewelina Kobryn | Seattle Times Newspaper
Assuming Kobryn...is able to obtain a visa and pass a physical, she'd join the Storm in Washington, D.C. on Wednesday during its White House visit. The Storm will be honored by President Barack Obama for winning the 2010 championship then depart on a three-game road trip against Connecticut (July 1), Washington (July 3) and Indiana (July 5).

Storm coach Brian Agler has done pretty well in the past scouting European talent (Czech forward Jana Vesela was a nice find for the team during their championship run last season as was luring guard Svetlana Abrosimova back to the WNBA from her native Russia) and says that he's had his eye on Kobryn for some time, according to Evans.

The 6-foot-3 Kobryn comes to the Storm from TS Wisla Can-Pack Krakow, where she has played since 2007. She is regarded by some as among the best players on the Polish National Team, but Luis Cristovao describes some of her limitations in making a WNBA impact in outlining her potential in an article for SB Nation's women's basketball site Swish Appeal.

Eurobasket: New Seattle Storm Signing Ewelina Kobryn & The Americans in the Competition - Swish Appeal
Kobryn has some difficulties attacking the basket, as she lacks the pace and mobility to be a major player in WNBA. However she is effective under the basket, where she gets nearly all her points, as she almost never gets to the line. When she did manage get to the line at Eurobasket, she was 21-of-23 in her attempts. Her effectiveness when fouled could give her another opportunity to add points and prompt the opposition to attempt to avoid giving Kobryn free throw tries.

Interestingly, getting to the line is something the Storm haven't done particularly well in, but right now any scoring presence off the bench would be a great asset - the Storm are 10th out of 12 teams in bench scoring as of right now getting only 13 points per game. With forward Le'coe Willingham likely taking her 7.2 points per game to the starting lineup to replace Jackson, that might be an even stronger area of need.

Ibekwe, was definitely a promising rookie, but as a defensive player in college who still needed some time to develop it should be obvious why the Storm opted for the more mature Kobryn in the face of Jackson's injury. 

Kobryn will become the third Polish player to play a regular season game in the WNBA upon seeing her first game action. Agler was an assistant for the San Antonio Silver Stars when the WNBA's second Polish player, Agnieszka Bibrzycka, played for them in 2006.

Seattle Storm Center Lauren Jackson To Have Surgery Thursday, Miss Most Of Regular Season

Seattle Storm coach Brian Agler dropped a bit of a bombshell during the team's visit to the White House in honor of their 2010 WNBA Championship.

As tweeted by Seattle Times reporter Jayda Evans, Agler announced on the White House lawn today that star center Lauren Jackson will be having surgery tomorrow meaning that she is expected to be out 8-12 weeks.

“This is a really, really tough decision,” said Jackson in a Storm press release, “but after talking with my doctors and my family, we felt that immediate surgery is the best course of action. With something painful like this hip injury, I want to be especially proactive. I plan to stay in Seattle to be here with my team and try my best to be back on the court as soon as possible.  My goal is to be at full strength by the end of the season.”

While it's obviously a huge blow to lose a player of Jackson's caliber, it's also worth emphasizing that the Storm are 4-2 with only a sub-par contribution from Jackson thus far this season. The Storm have been without Jackson for most of the last two wins and was averaging career-lows across the board with 9.2 points per game on 30 percent shooting and 4.8 rebounds per game.

Not that she wouldn't have gotten better or that her very presence doesn't help the Storm especially on defense, but in terms of the team's performance this season it will be less of a loss than it has been in past seasons when she has averaged 19.5 points and 7.9 rebounds per game prior to this year.

Nevertheless, the past also provides reason for hope as the Storm still aim to make the playoffs in a competitive Western Conference without Jackson. Kevin Pelton of StormBasketball.com reminds us that the Storm have actually played extremely well without Jackson over the past four years - their 15-9 record turns out to be a higher win percentage than any team in the league over that time period.

Last, if there is a silver lining to this whole ordeal, it's that Storm point guard Sue Bird tends to shine in those stretches without Jackson to the point of looking like a MVP candidate. As described on SB Nation's Swish Appeal this morning, Bird should be squarely in the MVP debate this year and that alone could make watching her individual performance exciting on its own - were she to win MVP this year, she'd be the first point guard ever to do so.

Losing a player of Jackson's caliber is definitely bad news. But the Storm's season is far from over.

“Lauren informed me of her decision to have surgery yesterday,” Agler said in the release, “and I offered her our full support. We will miss her a great deal, but I have a lot of confidence in our team and know they will rise to the challenge. Every member of our team now has a greater opportunity to impact our season.”

And watching how they respond to this latest instance of adversity could be even more compelling in some ways.

For more on the Storm and the WNBA, visit SB Nation's women's basketball site Swish Appeal.

Seattle Storm Center Lauren Jackson Out 'Minimum Of Three Weeks'

After suffering an injury against the Tulsa Shock this past week, Seattle Storm center Lauren Jackson will miss a "minimum of three weeks", according to coach Brian Agler in a statement today.

Although it's never good to lose a player of Jackson's stature, she has had a tough start to the 2011 season. Through the Storm's first five games, Jackson has had career-lows of 9.2 points per game, 4.8 rebounds per game, and 30 percent shooting from the field.

None of that is to say that the Storm won't miss her presence - particularly defensively - but the impact of her loss will be considerably less this year than it might have been in past years.

When making cuts in training camp, Agler cited depth on the interior as one of his concerns and now should be the time to test the quality of some of their young depth with increased game action. Both rookie forward Ify Ibekwe and rookie center Krystal Thomas have averaged less than five minutes per game thus far this season, but at least one of them would presumably see more minutes with the Storm needing to fill Jackson's 26 minutes per game.

For more on the Storm and the WNBA, visit SB Nation's women's basketball site Swish Appeal.

Seattle Storm Got A Gift From The Clock On Tanisha Wright's Key Basket

After Seattle Storm guard Tanisha Wright scored a driving layup with under 40 seconds left last night against the Tulsa Shock, the officials had a long discussion trying to figure out whether the shot beat the clock.

Jessica Lantz, who covers the Tulsa Shock for SB Nation's Swish Appeal, was a little bit confused by their decision.

Tulsa Shock Drops Heartbreaker to Seattle Storm, 82-77 In a Game of Coulda, Woulda, Shoulda - Swish Appeal
But wait. Did the shot really count? The refs said yes. My math says no. Four seconds ran off the game clock when three seconds were on the shot clock, creating a sum of negative one second. Unless you're in a nifty parallel time traveling universe similar to the Island on Lost, there is no such thing as negative one second.

"Well, they said that there was no way that they could tell from the angle of whatever the camera was," Richardson remarked on the call that was under lengthy debate at the scorer's table. "They couldn't tell so you go with the official judgement. And that's - three seconds is a long time for dribble, dribble and then go into the basket and score. There's nothing you can do about it other than you've got to take your pill and swallow it, I suppose."

Lantz correctly notes that when the game clock stopped, it read 38.3 after the play started at 42.5. But the key question is about whether the ball left Wright's hand before the end of the play.

Looking at the replay it's extremely close but she definitely got the ball off by 39.7 seconds and the game clock continued to run because she floated the ball high off the glass and the game clock didn't stop until the officials blew the whistle to go to replay.

However, going back further in this shot clock sequence, it shouldn't have even gotten to 39.7 seconds - the play began at 1:05, meaning the 24 second clock obviously should have ended at 41 seconds. Somewhere in there, the Storm got approximately an additional 1.3 seconds. It appears that the shot clock started late at the beginning of the play and that .5 seconds ran off the clock 43 seconds left after the officials signaled the timeout to bring the clock down to 42.5.

Of course, as much of a back breaker as it was for the Shock - who were looking for their second consecutive home win - there was still a lot of time left for another Storm possession so it's not as if this one possession cost them the game.

But the bigger question, given the way the play unfolded, is why 6-foot-8 center Liz Cambage wasn't in the game - Wright received little resistance in her drive to the basket and a shot blocker like Cambage would almost certainly have helped in that scenario.

Seattle Storm Center Lauren Jackson To Have MRI On Injured Hip Upon Return To Seattle

Seattle Storm coach Brian Agler said after the team's 82-77 win against the Tulsa Shock tonight that injured center Lauren Jackson will have a MRI on her left hip after suffering an injury that forced her to sit out most of the second quarter and all of the second half.

"We're going to get an MRI as soon as we get back tomorrow, and they told us she wasn't going to come back in," Agler told media after the game, pausing before continuing. "I hate to say anything. I mean they're telling me what it is, what they think it is, but they won't know until they get a picture of it."

Starting the second half without Jackson, the Storm rallied from down six points and played one of the best quarters of their young season to outscore the Tulsa Shock 30-13 and withstood a late run by the Shock to emerge with the win. It's a scenario the team has dealt with before and Agler suggested that it might have even inspired a team that entered this game lacking something after a bad loss to the Los Angeles Sparks.

"There's no question I'm really proud of how we played," Agler said. "When you get a team that's in the duldrums like we were sometimes it takes something drastic to get them out of it. It might be a big play, it might be getting beat badly like we had one time, it may be, unfortunately like this, someone out and they have to sort of circle the wagons and come together."

Seattle Storm Vs. Tulsa Shock Final Score: Storm Hang On For An 82-77 Win On The Road

The most encouraging thing about the Seattle Storm's 82-77 win tonight is that they showed flashes of the type of chemistry and fluidity that we've become accustomed to from them during the third quarter against the Tulsa Shock.

The Storm used a 30-13 third quarter to erase a six-point halftime deficit and hold on for their first road win of the season, with Lauren Jackson's status still in doubt after suffering a left hip injury in the first half.

While defense helped them grab the momentum in the third quarter, with under a minute left and only up by three with three seconds left on the ball it was Tanisha Wright's aggression on offense that ultimately sealed the game. Wright got the ball on the left wing off of a sideline inbounds pass from Sue Bird and drove hard to the basket with little resistance from the Shock's defense to make a contested layup and put the Storm up by five points.

Sue Bird led the Storm with a game-high 21 points on 8-for-10 shooting as well as a game-high six assists and Swin Cash was a rebound away from a double-double with a game-high nine rebounds and 17 points. Forward Tiffany Jackson led the Shock with 20 points and 10 rebounds.

Seattle Storm Forward Lauren Jackson Out With A Strained Left Hip

After playing 13 minutes in the first half, Seattle Storm forward Lauren Jackson did not start the second half against the Tulsa Shock and now word out of Tulsa is that the reigning WNBA MVP is out with a strained left hip.

There is no word about when or if she might return at this time tonight or how she sustained the injury.

Jackson has struggled all season and some fans have wondered if it had to do with the Achilles tendon injury she suffered this off-season. Although this is presumably unrelated, it only makes a disappointing start to the season worse.

Perhaps ironically, without Jackson in the lineup the Storm have actually started to find a rhythm on both ends of the floor and quickly erased Tulsa’s lead and got up by six points a few minutes into the half.

Jackson’s injury puts pressure on two people: Le’coe Willingham, who came in to replace her and Sue Bird who is once again forced to carry the team’s scoring burden.

Seattle Storm Down 37-31 To Tulsa Shock At Halftime

The Seattle Storm haven't been shooting too terribly by the percentages or in comparison to their last game.

But the post game has still presented a problem for the Storm as they find themselves down 37-31 to the 1-5 Tulsa Shock.

The Shock are outrebounding the Storm 18-12 overall, beating them 18-12 in points in the paint and beating them by a less significant 4-0 second chance points. Part of that is certainly due to Storm forward Lauren Jackson getting off to another rough start, but also Shock forward Tiffany Jackson getting a team-high seven rebounds while 6-foot-8 center Liz Cambage has five and a team-high nine rebounds.

Sue Bird is once again carrying the load for the Storm with 10 points on 4-for-5 shooting and one assist. Swin Cash is supporting her with eight points and four rebounds.

The Storm have to find their way in the post to box out and rebound more effectively.

Seattle Storm Look For First Road Win Against The Tulsa Shock On ESPN3

Although the Tulsa Shock's 1-5 record looks abysmal, this isn't a game that the Seattle Storm can afford to take lightly.

Not were the Storm caught off guard by a surprising 84-75 loss at the hands of the Shock in Tulsa last August, but they're also struggling to find their shot right now.

And if the Shock have paid attention to what the Los Angeles Sparks did to the Storm during a resounding 74-50 defeat on Sunday, they'd be wise to follow a similar defensive game plan - play zone.

With 6-foot-8 rookie center Liz Cambage and 6-foot-4 rookie Kayla Pedersen (Stanford), the Shock have been formidable at times with their 2-3 zone in halfcourt sets, despite the buzz about coach Nolan Richardson's trademark 40 Minutes of Hell style of play that won him a NCAA men's basketball National Championship at Arkansas. The Shock should probably be expected to turn to the zone defense early and often give the Storm's talent, regardless of how the reigning champs have performed thus far this season.

The Storm are currently ranked 11th out of the WNBA's 12 teams in shooting efficiency and have the league's lowest offensive rating, according to Kevin Pelton of StormBasketball.com. Their struggle to hit threes (26.3 percent) and get to the free throw line, allow teams to pack it in and make it difficult on the Storm to establish anything in the paint. As the Indiana Fever did with some success, the Sparks sat in a zone to pack the paint and waited for the Storm to shoot them out of it.

The Storm shot 4-for-20 from beyond the arc and 30 percent for the game.

The result is two-fold: a stagnant offense relying on jumpers a bit more often than usual and Sue Bird shouldering a large responsibility for scoring in addition to being the team's lead ball handler.

Kristi Toliver Leads Dominant Los Angeles Sparks Bench Effort Against The Seattle Storm - Swish Appeal
While Bird and Swin Cash combined to 5-for-7 in the second quarter, the rest of the team only shot 2-for-9. That means two things: first, they simply weren't able to establish anything in the paint, partially because they're not able to knock down outside shots consistently. Second, Bird is shifting into more of a scorer's role, which is not bad at all but noteworthy in terms of the fluidity of their offense.

With her game-high 15 points and three assists, Bird was responsible for 72.12% of the team's overall production and it's safe to say that that's uncommon for the Storm.

Of course, Storm fans will recall stretches of both 2008 and 2009 before last season's dominant championship run when Bird similarly just took over games, so her shouldering such a large load is not entirely unheard of. But the bottom line is that this team has got to start hitting shots to be successful, not just against the Shock but down the road this season.

There's no reason to believe they'll continue to shoot so poorly this season given that they were among the best shooting teams in the league last season and have returned the majority of their scoring personnel and added veteran scorer Katie Smith. But they're not going to go as far with Bird carrying so much responsibility for their success as they would with a more well-rounded team effort.