Tuesday, May 22, 2007

Lennox a Game-Time Decision

Storm guard Betty Lennox missed Tuesday's practice for personal reasons and is a game-time decision for tomorrow night's game against Phoenix. The Storm is homing to get Lennox back for the game - if not, Coach Anne Donovan said her replacement would be a game-time decision as well. Presumably, Katie Gearlds and Tanisha Wright are the most likely options, with a chance of Shyra Ely moving into the lineup and bumping Iziane Castro Marques to shooting guard.

For Sue Bird, this is a matchup against her good friend and former UConn teammate (and current teammate with Spartak) Diana Taurasi. That's how the Storm-Mercury clash is naturally billed, though Bird and Taurasi don't really guard each other any more. That task falls to Iziane Castro Marques, who realizes she's in for a challenge and just wants to make Taurasi work.

Bird and Taurasi were joined in Spartak by Lauren Jackson for the playoffs, and they're trying to convince her to spend all of next off-season in Russia. Jackson's in a complicated situation because the Korean WKBL will be off next winter in preparation for the 2008 Olympics, but she is under contract. Jackson could be cleared to spend the season with another team, which would allow Spartak to have her all year.

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

I heard LJ say in an interview recently that because the Korean league was not playing next year due to the Olympics, that her contract is null and void. Is this not true? I'd hate for her to lose out on an opportunity to make some cash in Russia.

Anonymous said...

Personal reasons? Please don't tell me this is a "Holdsclaw development" like she pulled last year on LA. I love Betty, and I wish her the very best in life, but I'd rather her miss due to the obvious limp she had at the end of the game on Saturday. We needed a miracle on Saturday and now we need talent vs. talent against an amazing team like the Mercury. I hope she plays and I love her approach of letting the game come to her for once. I think it will help decrease her turnovers and she will have a better chance of being the scorer she can be. I hope she plays tomorrow...we will need her!

Online ZenDoc said...

If Betty doesn't play, we'll need another monster game from Izi plus Sue will have to step it up, and, of course, Lauren has to be on her game and at least 2 others will have to have really big games out of Katie, Ashley, Wendy, T, JB and Shyra in order for us to win against Phoenix. We will have to play good team defense.
- Zen Doc