August 1, 2002

It Is A Night of Celebration for Seattle Storm.

What a win Seattle had against the LA Sparks at Staples Arena. Lisa Leslie's 30 Points could not stop the Storm from their back to back win against the defending champion. LA did not have Leslie in their first meeting with Seattle, but they managed to win. Second meeting was the same way with Dixon's absent except this time Seattle ran away with a 19-point win, setting record of Sparks worst defeat since 1999. Even fight broke out between Marciniak and Byers. It was not pretty, and LA planned to make Seattle pay for it at their next meeting.

Finally, the big day has arrived. Both teams came to the game with one and only reason" To Win The Game". Talks about Lauren Jackson and Lisa Leslie dislike of each other have added the spice to this much anticipated game. Seattle has won 4 consecutive games while LA lost against Miami coming into this game, but both need this game as much.

The storm is on a mission to be in the playoff and they showed it tonight. Lauren Jackson, Kamila Vodichkova and Sue Bird combined for 54 points. The rest of the team also stepped up and scored. Michelle Marciniak made a jump shot with 1 second left on the shot clock. That was a big play coming off the bench.

LA outscored Seattle on both field goal and 3-point shooting, but the free throw percentage killed them as Sue Bird scored 10 points from the free throw line even though she had quite a rough night on her shooting, 3-10 field goal and 1-5 from behind the arch. The storm also had two player with double-doubles: Sue Bird delivered 17 points and 10 assists while Kamila Vodichkova scored 18 points and 10 rebounds.

Seattle finished it off strong as a team. They are now 0.5 game behind Portland with the 81-76 win against LA. The only undefeated teams against Seattle this season are Houston, New York and Utah.

The next Storm game is on Sunday at Minnesota. In the mean time, they will have to wait for Portland result against Washington tommorow night to determine their playoff race status.