Seattle Storm forward Lauren Jackson described the team's loss to the Minnesota Lynx last week as "painful", in an article by Kevin Pelton of StormBasketball.com.
They've had a week to either put that behind them or grow from it, depending on whose perspective you prefer, and welcome the Indiana Fever into KeyArena tonight at 7 p.m.
But what you can probably expect tonight is that they probably won't end up down 26 points again at halftime: it's almost certain they'll play better and the Fever are not typically the type of team to race up and down the court in transition as the Lynx do - the Fever's 75.3 possessions per game was the second least in the league prior to playing Tulsa earlier this week.
However, one thing that the Tulsa game did show is that they have the capacity to share the ball extremely well - in addition to Spokane native Briann January having a double-double with 12 points and a career-high 10 assists, the entire team moved the ball extremely well.
Indiana Fever's Small Lineups Show Off Collective Ball-Handling Efficiency - Swish Appeal
Arguably the most impressive game as a distributor was that of January, who finished the game with an impressive 12 points and career-high 10 assists. Her game against Tulsa was as comfortable as she's looked as a distributor since entering the league and a lot of it was that she was generally under better control than normal while also maintaining her aggression, as shown by having a free throw rate over 100% (which is where she earned some late-game points).With January playing so well as a lead ball handler and others also distributing the ball efficiently around the perimeter, the Fever were able to overcome an inefficient scoring performance from Catchings.
The question entering tonight's game is whether that game against Tulsa was a sign of developing chemistry or the result of playing an 0-5 Shock team. The Fever haven't been particularly efficient with the ball this season and that also showed against the Shock, as they turned the ball over seven times (36 percent of their possessions) in the second quarter.