September 6, 2010, Atlanta Dream-New York Liberty WNBA Playoffs Game 1 game story for the Atlanta Journal Constitution

Atlanta Dream downs Liberty

By Denis Gorman

For the AJC

10:45 p.m. Sunday, September 5, 2010

NEW YORK - As Sancho Lyttle stood on the blocks with less than a half a minute remaining on the clock and Angel McCoughtry on the foul line, the following words raced through her head:

“‘Okay. We’re (up) by four points. If we get this rebound, it’s going to be over. Just go and get it,’” Lyttle said. McCoughtry missed the free throw but the loose ball bounced off the rim, to the left and into Lyttle’s waiting hands.

Seconds later, Lyttle was on the foul line with the game on the line and bedlam surrounding her. The Dream forward told herself “If I hit these two, it’s over,” she recalled 15 minutes after her two made free throws salted away the Dream’s 81-75 win over the Liberty at Madison Square Garden Sunday night.

The Dream leads the best of three conference finals 1-0. Game two is Tuesday night at Philips Arena. If necessary, game three would be in New York Thursday night. The winner of this series will play Seattle starting next Sunday in the WNBA Finals. Seattle swept Phoenix in the Western Conference Finals.

The Dream and Liberty split the regular season series, 2-2, with each team winning once and losing once on its home court. New York outscored the Dream by an aggregate 333-330 in the four games.

The Eastern Conference’s second and fourth seeds resurrected their track-meet-on-hardwood brands of basketball right from the opening tip. The Dream shot 28-for-72 from the field (38.9 percent) while the explosive Liberty finished the game with 44.4 percent shooting (28-for-63).

Atlanta had three players in double figure scoring: McCoughtry with 21, Lyttle had 18 and Erika DeSouza chipped in with 12. Liberty star Cappie Pondexter led both teams with 24 points but shot 8-for-20 from the field. Plenette Pierson had 18 points and Nicole Powell added 15.

The difference was the yeoman’s work the Dream did on the boards. Atlanta out-rebounded the Liberty 40-28 overall and 15-9 on the offensive glass. Lyttle grabbed 13 rebounds and DeSouza had 12 boards. The Dream’s control of the offensive glass led to 22 second chance points and 50 points in the paint, a fact not lost on Liberty coach Anne Donovan.

“You have to take care of the backboard and in the first half we did not do that,” Donovan said. “Atlanta is a very good rebounding team, so you have to keep your focus and put them on your backs and not give them shots and that is the area that we did not do. I think at halftime they had 15 second chance points. It is a tough task and I do not know if we are going to come out ahead on the rebounding margin, but what I know is that we cannot give them second shots. At that end, we have to do a better job.”

Down the hallway from where Donovan talked about the areas in which her team needed to improve, McCoughtry pulled no punches about her mindset and what she expects from her teammates.

“This is the playoffs. If you ain’t excited, there’s something wrong with you,” she exclaimed. “Celebrate now, enjoy the win, but when it’s time to get back to work, get back to work.”

http://www.ajc.com/sports/atlanta-dream-downs-liberty-607584.html