It’s been almost two months since the Fever and Storm faced off, their last matchup coming in late June, with the Storm defeating the Fever by 12 in Seattle. This time around, though, it was a much different Indiana squad, and the game was on the Fever’s home court.
➡️ Fever v Storm photo gallery
In June, the Fever were 7-12 and struggling to find their identity and were still suffering from some fatigue after a grueling schedule to start the season. Fast forward to Sunday’s game and the Fever were coming off a huge break from the All-Star Weekend and Olympics, as well as another win over the Mercury to complete a season-sweep of Phoenix- a guaranteed morale-booster.
Both teams came out swinging, not afraid to shoot the ball quickly and Seattle getting on the board first with an Ezi Magbegor two pointer and forcing a Fever shot clock violation with some tough defense and fresh Olympic Gold Medalist Jewell Lloyd knocking down another basket.
After Kelsey Mitchell missed an open layup from a beautiful pass from Caitlin Clark, Clark crashed the boards and got the first Fever points. After an early timeout, the Fever started to slow down and get into a groove, tying the game at 9 and forcing some Seattle turnovers.
With just over a minute to play in the 1st Quarter, a Clark lob to an open Lexie Hull saw the Fever take their first lead of the game but a few late Seattle shots saw the Storm take a four-point lead after one quarter of play.
Late in the second quarter, the Storm started to get cold from the field and the Fever took advantage, with back-to-back Lexie Hull baskets and the crowd getting even more behind the Fever and the halftime score seeing a one-point Fever lead.
The stat line was fairly even at halftime, with both teams neck-and-neck in steals, turnovers, blocks, field goal percentage, assists and free throw percentage. The separating factor was three-point shooting at this point, with the Storm shooting 71% compared to a rare Fever 23%.
Still, though, the Fever were able to find a way to hold the lead at the half but could have led by more but had missed seven layups in the first half.
The second half saw the Fever playing much more poised and paced. They stepped up their defense and held the Storm off, forcing a few key missed baskets. Halfway through the third quarter, Clark broke the rookie single season assist record and continually found Hull for open shots, but the Storm continued to threaten the lead.
The fourth quarter saw plenty of lead changes until the last 5 minutes, when the Fever broke the game wide open and pulled away with a 19-point lead and cranked the defense up to a level the Storm just couldn’t contend with.
The trio of Lexie Hull, Kelsey Mitchell and Caitlin Clark were completely unstoppable once they hit their stride, racking up 72 points combined, transforming the Fever from a team that looked like they got lucky making their way into the playoff standings to a team that’s a legitimate threat to any team in the playoffs.
With the 17-point win over 4th-ranked Seattle, the Fever ride a two-game win streak heading into a two-game trip to Minnesota and Atlanta before returning home to face the Sun next Wednesday.
-Reggie Edwards
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