On one side, we had the Connecticut Sun had to win today’s game to stay alive in the Eastern Conference playoff race.
On the other side, we had a Seattle Storm team that wrapped up home court advantage throughout the playoffs with their win against the Atlanta Dream on Tuesday with absolutely nothing to play for. Center Lauren Jackson didn’t play and the rest of the starters sat after the first quarter.
The context is important to understand the Storm’s 88-68 loss to the Sun at Mohegan Sun Arena in Uncansville, Connecticut.
Ultimately, the result doesn’t matter for the Storm — beyond the pride of the Storm’s reserves taking a bit of a hit after being down by as much as thirty — because wins and loses are simply irrelevant. Beyond establishing their place in history by pursuing more regular season records, the marginal value of a road win is hovering somewhere around zero.
What Storm fans might be able to take from this game is that the Storm got solid contributions from their reserves. Forward Abby Bishop continues to show why she made the roster after a competitive training camp, finishing with 14 points on 5-10 shooting. Although she went 1-5 from the three point line, she’s more than comfortable shooting the ball from deep and shows promise in the future as an inside-outside threat as she develops in the future. Defensive center Ashley Robinson continued to show growth on the offensive end, finishing with 8 points on 4-8 shooting, including a smooth turnaround jumper in the second quarter.
But none of that is to ignore the fact that the Storm took their worse beating of the season and, as competitors, are probably not pleased with the performance, meaningless or not. No demonstration of increased productivity from their reserves is going to make that magically disappear.
Nevertheless, the point is that there is absolutely no reason to be concerned or upset about the performance as a fan, even if you just wish that a team so dominant would steamroll every team in every game. They have much bigger goals in mind and resting their starters now is one part of that bigger vision.