Column: Lynx All-Stars and League Roundup

It’s been quite a week for the Lynx, and quite a week for the league. All-Star announcements? Check. A new WNBA scoring record? Check. A great Lynx win? Check. A half-court buzzer-beater? Check.

I know you come here for the Lynx, and I love to write about them, but it’s been too good of a week around the league to stay entirely focused on Minnesota. So, I’m switching off—one story for us, one story for the rest of the league. Because I’m selfish and this is a Lynx site, I’m starting with one for us.

Lynx Represent!

Three Lynx players will be taking the floor at Target Center next week for the WNBA All-Star Game. Maya Moore, Sylvia Fowles and Seimone Augustus were all voted into the game by a combination of fans, coaches, and media members. It’s a really special thing to be able to play in the All-Star game on your home floor, and all three players are very excited about it.

Being named an All-Star is a great achievement for anyone, but I think it holds special meaning for Augustus. This year she sets a Lynx franchise record with eight All-Star appearances. Augustus has been with the Lynx longer than any other member of the team, and she’s been through thick and thin with Minnesota. Good times, bad times, Augustus has seen it all. To be able to play in the All-Star game in front of her hometown fans will be a truly special moment for her. If you’d like to see Augustus, Fowles and Moore in action, tickets to the game are still available here.

Cambage Unleashed

My goodness has Liz Cambage had a week. She set a new WNBA single-game scoring record with 53 points against the Liberty (grabbing 10 rebounds for good measure). Perhaps even more impressive, Cambage needed just 22 shots to reach that mark. She shot 17-of-22 (77.3 percent) from the field, hit 4-of-5 threes (80 percent) and missed just one free throw in 16 attempts. That’s an insane level of efficiency. If you’re looking for a comparison, the last NBA player to score over 50 points on better than 75-percent shooting and grab at least 10 rebounds was Michael Jordan in 1996.

To put a cherry on top, Cambage followed up her record-breaking performance with an incredible 35 points and 17 rebounds in her next game. Her 88 points over those two contests are the most ever in a two-game span. Cambage hadn’t played in the WNBA for several seasons before this one, but she’s clearly found a place among the league’s best.

Formidable Fowles

Speaking of incredible centers, Sylvia Fowles was amazing in her last game against Indiana. She scored 30 points on 13-of-15 shooting, grabbed 16 rebounds and blocked three shots. The Lynx rolled to a victory. They’re not going to lose many games with Fowles playing like that.

It’s so nice to see Fowles get loose and have a big game—she’d been struggling lately, and she was very upset with herself after her performance against the Connecticut Sun. Fowles takes the game very seriously—she’s a big key to this team and she knows it. Even in warmups, it was clear that Fowles was about to go off on Indiana, she was loose, happy, focused and energetic. She’s not going to score 30 every single night, but Fowles is unbelievably talented. It’s great that she got a game to remind everyone what she’s capable of.

Playoff Hunt

It’s a little early to start talking playoffs, but man have we got a good race on our hands. Only 6.5 games separate the No. 1 Seattle Storm and the No. 9 Las Vegas Aces. The Dream have won six in a row and are in fifth now, the Wings are hot and have climbed their way up to third and the Sun, who looked like the best team in the league at the beginning of the season, find themselves in eighth place with the young, hungry Aces gunning for their spot.

The Lynx are in sixth place in the league with a record of 13-10. The Dream, Sparks, and Wings are all 14-9. Anything can happen in this league, but it seems unlikely that anyone will overtake the 17-6 Storm for the No. 1 seed. Outside of that though, it’s anyone’s guess. It’s fair to say that the Liberty, Sky and Fever will be left out of the playoffs, but they all have talent on their squads and could make things difficult for the teams above them in a hurry.

By almost every metric this is one of the most exciting and fun WNBA seasons ever, and sports media is taking notice. We’ve seen more attention and coverage for WNBA games this season than in the past, and WNBA stars are finally starting to get some of the attention and media recognition they deserve. We’ve got a long way to go, but an exciting playoff hunt like this one is shaping up to be would be a huge win for the league—even if it makes fans very nervous.

The Name’s Larkins…

There are probably a few die-hard Lynx fans who remember Erlana Larkins from the 2012 Indiana Fever team that defeated Minnesota in the WNBA finals, but most of us hadn’t heard the name before she was signed by the Lynx to a seven-day contract last week.

That won’t be an issue anymore for anyone who watched the Lynx play the Fever.

Larkins showed a really incredible grasp of the Lynx’s system in just her second game with Minnesota. The way she sets screens and executes handoffs is really fun to watch. Danielle Robinson and Maya Moore especially benefited from her picks, and got a lot of opportunities to slash to the rim and take open pull-up jumpers.

On defense, Larkins showed a grit and persistence that really helped the Lynx’s energy. She spent a lot of time at the four playing next to Sylvia Fowles. This might not be possible against teams with more size in the frontcourt, but in certain situations Larkins could be the perfect piece to throw in at power forward to spell Rebekkah Brunson without Maya Moore having to slide over to the four—a position that exposes her on defense.

Short End Of The Stick

All-Star season means it’s also All-Star snub season. There is a ton of talent in the WNBA, and it’s hard to make these selections. This year the players who didn’t make the team that are getting the most snub buzz are Seattle’s Natasha Howard and Atlanta’s Tiffany Hayes.

It’s a fair point. Both players are having excellent seasons, and Tiffany Hayes also just gave us what might be the play of the year.

However, if you want to include Hayes and Howard, you need to remove a frontcourt and backcourt player from the current roster. It’s very easy to argue that certain players are deserving of making the team, but it gets a little trickier when you have to select players to be left out. Hayes and Howard both have many years ahead of them, and they’ll certainly be participating in future games. As hard of a pill that is for them to swallow after playing so well, if they keep up their level of play, they’ll get their moment.

Highlight Reel: 

Fowles was the Lynx’s engine on Wednesday, but the whole team was excellent. Yes, it was against the team with the worst record in the league, but it’s still fun to see the Lynx dominate like they did in this one.

Quote Corner:

“There’s this really, really deep appreciation for Seimone’s commitment to this organization and I know for her, what it means for her. To have been voted at this point of her career, at this time of this franchise. Our fans had so much to do with that but it speaks to Seimone that people wanted her here and I can’t say enough about her loyalty. She’s had opportunities along the way, where maybe early on when we weren’t winning as much maybe she wanted to be somewhere else. Roger Griffith has always talked about how special that relationship is with Seimone because she is so loyal and has meant so much to this franchise.”—Coach Cheryl Reeve on Seimone Augustus getting to play in the All-Star game in Minnesota.

“We were talking about Maya Moore being eight years old and being impacted by a player that changed her life and that we were going to be doing that today. That there were going to be kids here, both girls and boys that were going to see something that they did, either an interaction with a teammate maybe how hard they played, the chemistry that they exhumed. Maybe even making eye contact with a kid. It’s the same thing for boys too, so for boys being here and being exposed to women playing professional sports, it’s a great opportunity for them to see women in that light and as they grow older, maybe they leave here and really want a Seimone Augustus jersey and it just changes the next generation. These are the kids that become leaders in communities and then you see change.”—Cheryl Reeve on Camp Day.

“That’s the beauty of our team. It’s a good thing that we’ve got a lot of veterans where you can go back and watch film and have conversations with each other and just think about how we can help in different aspects. We know that our last game wasn’t our best but we’re pushing forward. I’m happy that we’ve got games that come quick, so we can get it over with.”—Sylvia Fowles on bouncing back.

“It was really fun having her be here every day that she’s here things become more comfortable. She’s a vet, she’s just confident and does things deliberately and she’s a great screen setter and is a willing passer. I really enjoy that aspect of doing what is probably one of my favorite things to do other than catch and shoot, is to cut. So, it was fun having those connections with her today.”—Maya Moore on Erlana Larkins. 

What’s Next:

The Lynx travel to Phoenix to take on the Mercury on Saturday night before hosting the Liberty on Tuesday. That will be their last game before the All-Star break. You can see the stars of the league all together on the Target Center court next Saturday, get your tickets here! I’ll be there, come say hello!