Former league MVP Nneka Ogwumike is showing few signs of slowing down in her 13th WNBA season, her first in Seattle, and the Storm are prospering.
Ogwumike shoots for her third 20-point effort in the past four games when the Storm (15-8) host the Atlanta Dream on Sunday.
Ogwumike matched her season high of 26 points in Friday’s 91-63 rout of the Minnesota Lynx, two games after she scored 24 in an 84-71 win over the Chicago Sky on Wednesday.
She knocked down 10 of 14 shots against Minnesota, while reaching the 20-point mark for the seventh time this season. Ogwumike is averaging 17.5 points and 7.4 rebounds.
“Nneka really got us going,” Seattle guard Skylar Diggins-Smith said. “We just kept going to her; she was killing underneath. We love heavy doses. I leave every game like, ‘How can I get Nneka the ball more?'”
Ogwumike, who spent 12 seasons with the Los Angeles Sparks before the offseason move to Seattle, said the unselfishness of Diggins-Smith is the reason for the success. Diggins-Smith matched her career best of 12 assists against Minnesota.
“It’s the crutch of our offense,” Ogwumike said of Diggins-Smith. “I think that is more about us making the shots that she distributes. I feel as though us locking into capitalizing on how she’s able to distribute the ball is the way that we can really highlight just how impactful her vision on the court is.”
Seattle is 6-2 on a WNBA-record nine-game homestand.
Atlanta (7-15) has lost six straight games and nine of 10, and the dismal stretch coincides with the loss of standout guard Rhyne Howard to a left ankle injury.
Howard was injured during a 68-55 road loss against the Minnesota Lynx on June 19 and has missed the last nine games.
Atlanta’s only win since Howard went down was a 78-74 road upset of the Connecticut Sun on June 28.
“We have what we have right now,” Dream coach Tanisha Wright said. “It’s a next-man-up mentality, and we’ll keep plugging away because we feel we have a good team. We don’t have all our pieces available to us, and we’ll keep plugging away until they’re available, and then we’ll see what happens.”
Atlanta is coming off an 84-70 home loss against the Las Vegas Aces on Friday. Cheyenne Parker-Tyus led the Dream with 17 points off the bench.
This is the first of three meetings between the teams this season.
–Field Level Media
