ARLINGTON, TX — A win is a win, even one as disjointed as Wednesday’s 94-88 win for the Dallas Wings (20-14) over the Toronto Tempo (10-23) at College Park Center. And boy, howdy, did Dallas need this one.
Marina Mabrey nearly brought the Tempo all the way back from an 18-point third-quarter deficit, but the beleaguered Wings had just enough in the tank to outlast her fourth-quarter 3-point barrage.
Dallas had slipped from fourth in the WNBA standings less than two weeks ago to eighth entering Wednesday’s
game, but getting to 20 wins with 12 games still to play is a massive leap for this franchise, even as circumstances begin to conspire against them. The Wings stopped the bleeding after losses in five of their previous six games. They won with a depleted starting lineup on a night when their best player started 0-of-7 from the field.
Every win means something this time of year, even when the vibes are… a little off.
With her college coach Kim Mulkey sitting courtside, Odyssey Sims canned two 3-pointers in the game’s first three minutes to give the Wings an early 8-6 lead. Dallas gave Toronto three second-chance buckets back in the first four minutes of the game, though, as the Wings failed to box out too many times without Jessica Shepard in the lineup.
Shepard sat out Wednesday’s game after turning her right ankle in Sunday’s 103-90 loss at the Minnesota Lynx. Azzi Fudd (right knee) missed her third straight game on Wednesday as well, after team officials claimed her absence on Friday against the Golden State Valkyries came “out of an abundance of caution.” After missing three games, the only conclusion to be drawn is that her injury myst be more serious than the team initially let on.
Sims found Alanna Smith streaking out ahead of the play f0r a pair of buckets after her hot start from the perimeter. The second gave the Wings a 14-8 lead and forced Toronto head coach Sandy Brondello into an early timeout.
Dallas made hay on the back-cut throughout the first quarter. After Smith connected on her first 3-ball of the game to put the Wings ahead 25-17, Aziaha James played the overplay and got an easy one to give Dallas its first double-digit lead of the game, 27-17, with less than a minute remaining in the first.
The Tempo worked their way back into the game in the second, as Dallas lost its touch from outside and Kia Nurse found hers on the other end. She hit 3-pointers from left wing on back-to-back possessions for Toronto midway through the frame to bring the Tempo back to within 36-35.
But the Wings held Toronto to just two points in the final 4:51 of the half to reassert their control over the proceedings. It helped that Marina Mabrey missed all three of her first-half 3-point attempts. Dallas took a 45-37 lead into the break.
The Wings worked the lead all the way up to 18 points on Paige Bueckers’ third perimeter jumper of the third quarter, which put Dallas up 60-42 with 4:04 left in the frame. But Toronto refused to be put all the way down. They ran off a 16-4 run over the next three-plus minutes to pull back to within eight after two tough buckets from Nurse, forcing a timeout from an exasperated Jose Fernandez with 1:40 left. Dallas responded by hitting the last pair of buckets of the quarter out of the timeout to take a 70-58 lead into the fourth.
Frontcourt interrupted
Alanna Smith took over the starring role in the Wings’ frontcourt on Wednesday in Shepard’s absence. She had worked it up to 12 points early in the second quarter when she hit her second 3-pointer of the game from the left wing. Dallas needed everything she could give the team with a thin lineup.
She ended the first half with 12 points on 5-of-6 shooting and five rebounds. Awak Kuier, who had worked herself into Fernandez’ doghouse in recent games, made all three of her first-half shot attempts as well.
Smith recovered on the defensive interior with six minutes left in the third to get a big block late on an Isabelle Harrison attempt.
Kuier impressed in the third quarter as well, matching her first-half scoring output with seven more in the frame. She finished the night with 14 points, while Smith tallied a double-double with 13 points and 11 boards.
Paigey-on-the-spot
Bueckers had another head-scratching start the game, but her teammates picked her up, even with an injury-riddled starting lineup. She missed all seven of her first-half shot attempts against the Tempo and got frustrated with the officials when she was whistled for a fairly obvious reach-in foul with three minutes to play in the second quarter.
The double-teams came, but not as furiously from a Tempo unit not quite as equipped to run strong blitzes and hedges on defense. Toronto came into Wednesday’s game dead last in the WNBA in defensive rating (115.5). And when they did, Bueckers was Paigey-on-the-spot slinging assists to her open teammates.
She pulled up for her first bucket, a 3-pointer near the top of the key, less than a minute into the third quarter, and glanced toward the rafters as if to thank the basketball gods for the reprieve from the 0-fer. Then, she found Kuier out of a double-team the next time down open for her second 3-ball of the game to put Dallas up 52-42.
Once she saw one go in, it was back to business as usual for Bueckers. She nailed a mid-range step-back the next time down, then found Kuier again for a turnaround against a smaller defender, and the Wings had liftoff, up 56-44. When Bueckers made the same step-back move the next time down, with 5:39 left in the third, and saw the same result, Brondello called timeout with Dallas up 58-44. At that point, the Tempo had scored all of nine points in nearly 10 minutes of gametime.
Bueckers scored 13 points in the third quarter and nine more in the fourth to finish what started as an off night with 22 and eight assists.
3-point defense
At times this year, Dallas has given up far too much along the perimeters to good shooting teams. The Tempo came into the game fourth in the W in team 3-point shooting, at 35.8%, with Mabrey playing head of the beast.
This time, the Wings did a much better job of getting a hand in the shooter’s face. Through three quarters, Toronto shot just 4-of-23 (17.3%) from 3-point range. Mabrey had trouble even getting shots off, as Bueckers, James and Arike Ogunbowale jumped out on her 10 feet in front of the 3-point line to get the ball out of her hands, much like teams have done to Bueckers all season.
Then Dallas lost her in the fourth quarter, and it nearly cost the Wings the game. Mabrey scored 12 points on 3-of-3 shooting from 3-point land in the fourth, after the Wings had held the Tempo in check from deep all night until then. Mabrey found just a sliver of an opening in Dallas’ defense, which is all she needs.
Her first came on a step-back, after Sims overplayed an attempt for a steal in the passing lane, to pull Toronto to within 70-63 early in the fourth. She stepped back for another one with 5:50 left in the game, then connected on her third of the frame the next time down to pull the Tempo back to within five, down 79-74.
Mabrey finished the game with 23 points on 7-of-15 shooting (3-of-9 from 3-point range), after torching the Wings for 34 points the last time these two teams met.
