The Dallas Wings have dropped to 0-2 at home with an 84-68 loss to the Washington Mystics. However, Dallas got out to a good start leading after the first quarter 19-14. Washington played strong in the 2nd and 3rd quarters to put the game away for the Mystics.
Wings head coach Vickie Johnson spoke about the team taking pride in defending their home court. “We need to really take pride in defending our home court. That’s the biggest thing. It’s no way we played here as we played in DC and New York. We shared the basketball. We defended at the highest level. Then we got here in front of our fans, and we became selfish. A lot of one-on-one basketball. We didn’t move the basketball, and we didn’t take pride in defending our home court. And it’s unfortunate because we’re such a better team and the way we played tonight – it was bad.”
Dallas Dominated in the Paint
Dallas gave up 42 points in the paint, which is unexpected with the size that the Wings have on their front line. The Mystics bench outscored the Wings bench 47-3
“The rotation I don’t know about. It’s the flow of the game. For their bench to come in and have 47 to our three. I don’t blame it on the bench because their bench came and played against our starters and dominated our starters, Johnson said.” “Austin came in and played amazing and her energy level was on another level. Walker came in and produced and Burton came in and produced. The majority wasn’t against our bench, it was against our starters, and we can’t have that.”
Marina Mabrey and Isabelle Harrison led Dallas in scoring with 16 points apiece. Allisha Gray added 13, while Kayla Thornton scored 13 points. Wings star player Arike Ogunbowale struggled, scoring just six points on 3-12 shooting from the field.
Washington shot 51.5% from the field and 50% from beyond the arc and outrebounded the Wings 37-23. Dallas should not be getting outrebounded like that with their size, but Teaira McCowan only played nine minutes and Charli Collier one minute.
McCowan Needs More Minutes
If the Wings want to be a good team, McCowan will need to play more; coach Johnson spoke about McCowan’s playing time after the game. “Teaira (McCowan) hasn’t had practice with us yet. We try to throw her in and get quality minutes. Defensively, she’s still trying to figure things out. We can sneak in two or three minutes at a time. We need to get her some practice time; you know we play every other day. I thought she did well.
“We need to do a better job of putting the ball on the block to her more. They rotate Austin, Hines-Allen, Hawkins, and Delle Donne and they move like guards. So, it’s a little difficult to bring our fives in to be able to keep up with them, especially in transition when they leak out. And especially when they have guards running the court like Atkins and Cloud and Clark. It’s a little difficult, but I expect Teaira to be Teaira and fill in. Right now, we don’t have practice time.”
Dallas shot 41% from the field and 33% from three-point land. The Wings will need to play much better and get more from the post players as we advance through the season.
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I don’t understand why Johnson doesn’t play collier more. She knows the system better than McCowan even though she just returned from overseas she needs more playing time. Awak needs to play tougher cause the wings need a tall post player that can tough it out with the others. I’m still confused why Jefferson was released when she was more aggressive and willing to shoot than Harrison is. Ty looked like a deer in head lights last night. Afraid to shoot the ball when she was open. Wings need to not worry if Arike gets her points they need to shoot and rebound I can’t count the times someone shot and there was not a single wings player under the basket. Johnson needs to be more aggressive with this team on following up the ball.