The Wings need scoring help, and they need it bad. Dallas fell to the Fever despite Caitlin Clark missing the game and the road team coming in on the second night of a back-to-back. They lost the game 94-86 and fell victim to mistakes that you expect to see from young teams. But this roster has a healthy mix of youth and veterans, so you expect more on this stage.
The Wings dropped a great opportunity
With the hottest ticket in the WNBA coming to town, the Wings hosted in the American Airlines Center, where the Mavericks play, as opposed to their normal arena. 20,000 were in the stands, and it sounded like it. It was a star-studded night with Kyrie Irving, Cooper Flagg, and Cade Cunningham in the building, among others like WNBA great Cynthia Cooper-Dyke.
Everything was set up for the home team to show why they had won three of their last four games, but they came out flat instead, despite Coach Chris Koclanes being very aware of that possibility. Before the game, I asked how they were prepared to battle the complacency that can set in after a player like CC is ruled out.
"We're pros, so it's not going to waver, and it's not going to change the level of intensity," he answered. Unfortunately, players are also human, and the disappointment of not having the great Caitlin Clark on the other side when, as Koclanes confirmed, the Wings were excited about the highly publicized matchup between the two, headlined by Clark and Paige Bueckers.
Bueckers and Ogunbowale can't afford to start slow
Arike and Paige have to get off to a much faster start. Neither player did much of anything in the first 15 minutes of this ball game. The rook made an easy layup in the first minute of the game and cashed in on a free throw from a tech, but she went quiet after that. Ogunbowale didn't get on the scoreboard until 4:25 left in the first half.
On top of that, Li Yueru was being picked on when the Fever could get her in ball screens. They used a ton of motion early in their offense to challenge Yueru to move her feet laterally, get up on guards coming off of screens, plus she had the pleasure of banging with Aliyah Boston. It was a tough night defensively for the Chinese fan-favorite.
This team just doesn't have the horses to pick up the slack when Bueckers and Ogunbowale start slow, so they can't afford it. The defense is too inconsistent right now, and so is the shotmaking from the role players. But unless they can add to this team, this problem is going to pop up all season long. They'll have to improve their defense to have a shot at stringing together more win streaks.