Aces 86, Sun 68: Groundhog Day continues, but at least with Leila Lacan

 Even with a week off, the season of Groundhog Day continued Sunday afternoon against Las Vegas. The Sun showed really good energy and looked like they were crawling back into the game early in the second quarter. But, if you’ve been following all season, you’ve seen this movie before.

By halftime, it was a 15-point game, it grew to 20 early in the third quarter, and that was that. Again.


To repeat myself, it’s not about heart, the Sun showed plenty of that, it’s mostly about offense, Connecticut - who entered Sunday as the only WNBA team averaging under 1 point per possession - finished with 0.85 points per possession against a mediocre defense. They show 38.1% from the field, 27.8% from three-point land, rebounded 17.6% of their misses, and shot 19 free throws.


None of those numbers are any good, but consistent with what the Sun have been for most of the season, sadly.


You add in the Sun having no answer for A’ja Wilson, with Tina Charles having a bad shoulder and Aneesah Morrow just completely overmatched, and you get an 86-68 loss that saw the Aces play plenty of reserves for almost all of the fourth quarter.


Connecticut gets the red-hot Storm for the next two games as well, but there was one bright spot: the introduction of 21-year-old rookie Leila Lacan, who certainly wasn’t afraid, and somewhat unexpectedly, tied Charles for the second-most minutes with 24. She is a long-term project, sure, but it does seem like she’ll be fun to watch grow, even as the losses pile up.


Can we learn anything else from Sunday where the crowd numbers are still good at least?:




 

  1. Way too early to judge Leila Lacan on anything  - Lacan’s stats were far from impressive, she had 5 points, 1 assist, and 0 rebounds in 24 minutes (only taking 2 shots), but two things that stood out right away are her length and her defensive ability. Combined with Rivers, that could be a very tough defensive backcourt eventually. She looked a little timid offensively, which is probably to be expected, and that’s going to have to be part of her game to grow, she’s never been counted on professionally to be a big scorer. Which is pretty much everyone on the Sun, so….

  2. Someone just has to take charge offensively - To be fair, that is one thing Aneesah Morrow does try to do, and she took 14 shots in 22 minutes (making just four). When she’s bottled up or getting a lot of attention, it has to be someone else, and probably not Charles, who almost seems to feel bad taking mid-range jumpers all the time because no one else can get their own shot. Again Jacy Sheldon was 2-for-3 from behind the arc and 3-for-5 overall, but didn’t have enough volume to make a difference.

  3. This probably didn’t do too much for Las Vegas’ confidence -  I wrote in the preview how the advanced numbers were actually worse than their losing record coming in, and they won the game, but didn’t exactly look like a championship team for much of the contest, especially in the first 18 minutes or so. One thing they can take forward is Wilson making 8 of her 10 shots, it does seem like she has her groove back from mid-range. NaLyssa Smith looked more comfortable as well, but we’ll see where Las Vegas goes from here.


Player of the game:  Tina Charles - Really not much to go to here, so Charles playing hurt for a 2-15 team and getting 11 points will get the nod here. It didn’t look like the shoulder bothered her too much, so hopefully she won’t have to continue to play hurt.


Inside the numbers : 1 -  Number of teams that did not have an All-Star, and, yes, it’s just the Connecticut Sun. I thought they might give Tina Charles a nod just because, but that’s tough to do. 


Under the radar: One of the reasons Las Vegas was able to pull away in the second quarter was because of their zone defense, which again, baffled the Sun. It’s almost unfair to mix things up against an offense as poor as Connecticut has been, but it probably won’t be the last time. Lacan did have a nice pass for her lone assist to Charles in that stretch, so there was that.


Quotable:  “I think the biggest thing is just finding the positives, trying to stay up, because in this league, you don’t have time to lay back and soak in all that, because you’re playing like three or four games a week, and you’re traveling like two, three times a week. So I think just really learning from your mistakes, trying not to repeat those same mistakes, and just going to the next game hoping for a win, and trusting your preparation, your teammates and the program, and just hoping to continue to turn it around.” - Saniya Rivers


Next up: Wednesday vs. Seattle, 11 a.m. EDT (Camp Day)

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