The San Antonio Silver Stars went into halftime on Thursday night down 37-26 to the Phoenix Mercury. At that point, Adrian Williams had tallied 16 points for the Mercury and the Silver Stars had racked up 13 turnovers. It seemed that San Antonio was headed for their fifth consecutive loss.
But the Silver Stars came out of the locker room renewed. Phoenix had a 13-point lead with 19:20 left in the contest. But then the Silver Stars went on a 26-6 run, playing match-up zone and relentless on offense.
If you ask the Silver Stars, the stellar half exemplified the level that they expect themselves to being playing.
"I was watching team that I'm used to coaching," said head coach Candi Harvey. That's the aggressive attacking team that we're used to seeing."
"Now we know how we should be playing," said reserve Gwen Jackson. "This is the team that I see in practice every day. We came over the hump."
Marie Ferdinand had 12 of her game-high 22 points in the stretch. Phoenix' Williams was held to two points in the second stanza.
"We played great defense with the 2-3. It really bothered them. It took a lot of shots away from them," said Ferdinand. "We were very active in the second half in the zone and that's how we went on the run."
The Silver Stars outscored the Mercury 44-18 in the second half (24-2 in the paint) on their way to a 70-55 victory.
"This was very important to come from behind and believe in ourselves," said Harvey. "We really came together and now we need to sustain it."
Semeka Randall had her first start of the season in place of Adrienne Goodson at small forward, but spent the majority of second half running the point for the Silver Stars. Randall finished the game with nine points and five rebounds. Goodson had 13 points and eight rebounds off the bench. Margo Dydek was also in double-figures for San Antonio with 12 points. Anna DeForge had 10 points in 18 minutes for Phoenix.
