The Connecticut Sun halted their franchise-worst, 10-game losing streak on Wednesday with a comeback victory over the visiting Seattle Storm.
Two days later and nearly 3,000 miles away, the rematch is on tap as the Sun and Storm battle on Friday night in Seattle.
The Sun (3-16) were scintillating in the fourth quarter by outscoring the Storm 27-9 to record a 93-83 victory.
Longtime force Tina Charles contributed season highs of 29 points and 11 rebounds for Connecticut.
“It feels amazing,” Charles said in an on-court postgame interview. “Came in knowing we were on a 10-game losing streak. … It was great to see this was a collective team effort. It wasn’t just me. Everybody involved got this win for us.”
Jacy Sheldon made four 3-pointers while adding 16 points and Bria Hartley sank three treys and scored 15 points.
Seattle blew a 14-point lead and Gabby Williams (21 points) was disgusted with her team’s play. The Storm (12-8) made 3 of 14 field-goal attempts (21.4 percent) in the fourth quarter and committed six turnovers that resulted in 11 Connecticut points.
“I will be the first one to say we disrespected Connecticut and we got what we deserved,” Williams said in the postgame press conference. “They are a team with a Hall of Famer (in Charles). They’re professionals. They can still hoop and we disrespected them.
“We went ‘OK now we’re up, we can relax,’ and we stopped playing basketball. We got what we deserve.”
Storm star Nneka Ogwumike, who had 12 points and 12 rebounds, was glad with how the scheduling worked out.
“That’s a blessing about this league in that you can play a team twice in a matter of 72 hours,” Ogwumike said. “So us being able to sit on this and use it to see how we can turn things around on Friday — I think that is kind of a blessing in disguise in all of this.
“You have to step forward and respect any team that steps on the court and gives you a good game, and that’s what they did.”
Skylar Diggins led Seattle with 23 points.
The Storm signed 10th-year veteran guard Tiffany Mitchell as a free agent on Thursday. Mitchell has an 8.6 career scoring average with four teams, including a 3.7 points in 16 games with the Las Vegas Aces this season before recently being released.
The Seattle backcourt has been thin of late with Lexie Brown missing four of the past six games due to health reasons. Brown battles Crohn’s disease.
The Storm beat the Sun in the team’s first meeting, 97-81 on June 27 in Seattle.
–Field Level Media
