On some days, the Indiana Fever have looked like world-beaters. On others, they’ve looked painfully average—or worse.
The Fever’s loss to the Atlanta Dream on Tuesday would probably fall into the latter group. Indiana’s normally potent offense came to a screeching halt, mustering a season-low 58 points on 36.2 percent shooting from the field (20.8 percent on 3-pointers), and while the Dream didn’t shoot the ball much better, they did outperform the Fever significantly in the paint and on the boards.
“I think they hit us in the mouth,” said Fever head coach Stephanie White, who attributed her team’s 44-27 rebounding disparity to poor point-of-attack defense. “We didn’t do a good job of guarding our yard or being in rotation … when we’re in rotation off of straight line drives, a lot of [the Dream] are roaming free.”
White went on to bemoan the Fever’s “tunnel vision” on offense, while center Aliyah Boston, whose seven points were well below her season scoring average, pointed to a lack of physicality and reluctance to play through contact as the problem.
