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.
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