The Lynx were up bright and early on Tuesday morning in order to get a practice in before taking off for Chicago to battle the Sky on Wednesday.
“Good, really sharp,” Minnesota’s coach Cheryl Reeve said of Tuesday’s practice. “We weren’t as sharp yesterday, I think with the day off on Sunday, it took us a little bit to get back into it, but today we were really sharp. We’re pretty focused.”
Wednesday’s day game will be a ‘School Day’ inside of Allstate Arena in Rosemont, Ill. With all of the starters still not having had a week in total to practice with one another, Reeve is confident that the team will play well despite the lack of practice time.
“Just having the mindset that Champions are Champions not because they do extraordinary things, it’s the focus of doing ordinary things really, really well, and that’s what this group does,” Reeve said. “We always tell them, ‘just do the little things, do our staples,’ and most of the time it works out.”
One Lynx player who is still most likely recovering from jet lag is forward Rebekkah Brunson. The 12-year veteran, who joined the team last Friday after playing overseas in the offseason, only scored two points in their victory over Phoenix on Saturday; but according to Reeve, it’s not the amount of points Brunson contributes that make her so effective and important to the team.
“She’s really hard to play against defensively and she’s going to hit the glass,” Reeve said. “I think she just gives us that calming presence that when Seimone or Maya raise up to shoot, that if they miss, they feel really good that chances are Brunson and now Sylvia, are going to pick up anything that they miss. She’s a big time security blanket for us on both ends of the floor.”
To support Reeve’s point, the 3-time WNBA All-Star tallied six rebounds and two assists/steals in their victory on opening night.