WNBA: Shock, Storm rally to win playoff openers

AUBURN HILLS, Mich. (AP) -- The Atlanta Dream had a chance to win their first playoff game and put the defending WNBA champions on the ropes.

They didn't take it.

Deanna Nolan scored 25 points and Kara Braxton added 16 as the Detroit Shock rallied for a 94-89 victory over the Dream in the opener of their Eastern Conference first-round series.

"This is very frustrating, because we know we missed a great opportunity to win on their home floor," said Iziane Castro-Marques, who led Atlanta with 25 points. "Now we've got to go back to Atlanta and win two games."

The Shock trailed by 13 points midway through the third quarter, but dominated the final 15 minutes to take a 1-0 lead in the best-of-three series.

"This is a testament to our team -- we weren't going to give up," said Rick Mahorn, who replaced Bill Laimbeer as coach early in the season.

Detroit played with only nine players. Plenette Pierson (shoulder) has been out since the first game of the season, and Katie Smith (back) hasn't played since Aug. 27.

"We're not 100 percent -- we don't have Plenette, we don't have Katie, I'm not 100 percent, others aren't -- but this is the playoffs," Alexis Hornbuckle said. "We can't lose this game and say that we've got two games left. You've got to win every time you have a chance."

The Shock also benefitted from a strange coaching decision by Atlanta's Marynell Meadors in the final minutes.

Detroit led 90-89 with 16.1 seconds left and fouled Deanna Nolan. Nolan, who had been fouled hard by Sancho Lyttle a minute earlier, had to leave the game with what Mahorn described as "lightheadedness". Mahorn said he expected Nolan to be OK for Friday's game.

Her absence, though, meant that Meadors could choose who would shoot the free throws. She could have selected Olayinka Sanni, a career 67 percent free-throw shooter who hadn't played in the game, or Braxton, who has hit 66 percent in her career.

Instead, Meadors chose Crystal Kelly, a career 85-percent shooter who has finished in the top 20 in free-throw shooting in both of her WNBA seasons.

Kelly made both shots, moving Detroit's lead back to three.

"I guess since she made the shots, you can say I made a mistake," Meadors said. "We thought she would be cold, since she hadn't played since the first half. If she misses the shots, I would have looked pretty good."

Mahorn didn't expect Atlanta to select Kelly, but certainly didn't mind.

"I don't know how that happened -- maybe they had a misprint somewhere," Mahorn said, trying to hide a smile. "We certainly didn't mind."

Castro-Marques missed a tying 3-pointer and Nikki Teasley sealed the win from the line.

Shavonte Zellous scored eight points as Detroit put together a 17-0 run to finish the third and take a 65-61 lead. The lead grew to 10 with 4 minutes left in the fourth.

Erika DeSouza's three-point play pulled Atlanta to 89-85 with 1:40 left, and after a Detroit miss, McCoughtry's running hook made it a two-point game.

Nolan split a pair of free throws after the hard foul by Lyttle, but Cheryl Ford committed two fouls in a five-second span. Atlanta made two of four free throws to narrow the gap to 90-89, but that was when Meadors decided to bring Kelly into the game.

"Do I have to comment on that?" Hornbuckle said. "We were surprised and we were happy, and let's leave it at that."

The Dream led 30-16 after the first quarter, and 45-36 at the half, controlling the game until Detroit's big third-quarter run.

"In the first half, we were defending, rebounding and running," Meadors said. "In the second half, we didn't do those things."

Sparks beat Storm 70-63 in opener

LOS ANGELES (AP) -- Even without All-Star Lauren Jackson and Katie Gearlds, the Seattle Storm were no pushover.

Tina Thompson hit a key 3-pointer with 5:44 remaining and the Los Angeles Sparks went on to a 70-63 victory in Game 1 of the teams' Western Conference playoff series Wednesday night.

"Although they didn't have Jackson and Gearlds, it doesn't make them a bad team," Thompson said. "(Swin) Cash was very aggressive and that had a lot to do with Jackson not being there."

Thompson led the third-seeded Sparks with 16 points. Lisa Leslie added 14 points and 10 rebounds in what might have been the final home game of her storied career before she retires at season's end. Candace Parker had 13 points and 10 rebounds.

"It's like, `Don't have any regrets, don't leave the court feeling like you could've done better," Leslie said.

That's what she was thinking in the first half, though.

"I just (stunk)," she said. "I was being really soft and not finishing on my shots inside. They weren't really double-teaming me that hard. There were times we didn't play smart basketball."

Cash led the second-seeded Storm with 24 points after missing the final two games of the regular season because of her grandmother's death. Suzy Batkovic-Brown added 16 points and Tanisha Wright 13.

Sue Bird was held to four points after missing the final three games of the regular season because of a sore neck.

"My neck feels OK. I was able to get some rest and recover. It is what it is; you've got to play through it," she said.

The Storm were without Jackson, who is out indefinitely because of a stress fracture in her lower back. Gearlds sat out with an injured left knee.

Storm coach Brian Agler said Jackson would not play when the best-of-3 series moves to Seattle for Game 2 Friday night. He said her back has improved, but she is still "multiple weeks" away from returning.

"This team is a little more dangerous without Lauren because with her you know what offensive schemes are going to be," Leslie said.

Since winning the WNBA championship in 2002, the Storm has never advanced past the first round, losing the last four years, including to the Sparks in three games last year. The teams split their four regular season meetings, with each winning on their home courts.

"I feel really good about going to Seattle. We're definitely going to have to play on top of our game but it's doable," Parker said. "The game is going to be a lot more physical up in Seattle."

A 3-pointer by Wright left Seattle trailing 58-54 with 6:12 remaining. Thompson was called for an offensive foul -- her fourth -- but things quickly turned around for Los Angeles.

The Sparks outscored the Storm 10-2 to take a 68-56 lead with 3:04 left. Thompson launched the spurt with the 3-pointer and had a three-point play before Parker's 3-pointer ended it.

"There were quite a few big plays," Thompson said. "It was a little bit of all of us. The three-point play I had definitely got us excited."

Cash scored Seattle's final five points. They now must win two games at home to advance.

The Storm closed the third on a 9-4 run to trail 52-47, helped by 10 points from Cash in the quarter.

Seattle recovered from an 18-point deficit in the first quarter to trail 34-28 at halftime. The Sparks didn't score their first basket until 6 1/2 minutes into the second period, and were outscored 22-12 in the quarter.

Getting balanced scoring, the Sparks raced to a 22-6 lead in the opening quarter, when the Storm shot 11 percent from the floor and committed seven turnovers.

"We had a lot of turnovers that led them to get out in transition and get some easy buckets," Bird said. "Along with that, we fouled them entirely too much. We put them on the free-throw line 30 times. You can't give up 25 points to this team just on free throws. If you eliminate half of that, it's a different game."

The Sparks were favored to win the WNBA championship at the start of the season, then Leslie and Parker missed 19 games combined and the team staggered through the early going before going 10-3 to close the regular season.

Besides Leslie, Sparks coach Michael Cooper is leaving at season's end to coach the women's team at Southern California.

Leslie's husband, Michael Lockwood, and their 2-year-old daughter, Lauren, wearing a gold top in the Sparks' colors, sat courtside. Derek Fisher and Josh Powell, along with new teammate Ron Artest, of the NBA champion Los Angeles Lakers were there, sitting near Dwight Howard of the Orlando Magic, the team the Lakers defeated for their 15th title in June.

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