Parker gets Sparks off to magical start
She scores 30 points and Ogwumike adds 27 in an easy victory over the Sky.
SPARKS 95 CHICAGO 75
There were a few different Candace Parkers in the Sparks’ playoff opener at the Long Beach State Pyramid on Wednesday night.
There was scowling Parker after two first-quarter fouls. There was screaming Parker after a hardfought layup. There was smiling Parker after she poured in 19 first-half points.
And then there was smirking Parker, who ducked into the lane, finished a flashy layup and glanced at a leaping Magic Johnson before running back on defense.
It was that kind of night for the veteran forward, and it amounted to a 95-75 victory over the Chicago Sky in Game 1 of the WNBA semifinals. Parker had a gamehigh 30 points on a day when teammate Nneka Ogwumike received her trophy as the league’s most valuable player, and Jantel Lavender was named the league’s sixth woman of the year. Ogwumike also backed up the MVP honor, collecting 27 points, 10 rebounds and six assists.
Lavender had 12 points as the Sparks shot 52.9%.
Game 2 of the best-of-five series will be Friday at Staples Center.
“When she handles the ball in the middle of the floor there’s a lot of positive things that can happen,” Sparks Coach Brian Agler said of Parker, a two-time MVP. “And it’s not just her scoring.”
The Sky was without star forward Elena Delle Donne, who led them in scoring during the regular season with 21.5 points per game, because of a right thumb injury. And with Delle Donne looking on, Parker scored eight first-quarter points before turning it up in the second.
The 6-foot-4 forward started with a three-pointer. Then she executed a textbook pick-and-roll with Ogwumike, flipping a pass through two defenders in what turned into a threepoint play.
Then the Sky decided to double-team Parker, and she quickly decided she didn’t care. She crossed over between her legs, scooped the ball toward the rim with one hand and finished a finger-roll layup in traffic. Johnson, sitting courtside as a co-owner of the team, jumped to his feet. Parker offered a sneaky smile over her shoulder.
When Parker’s first-half highlights were added up, they looked something like this: The excited approval of an NBA Hall of Famer, and a 15-point lead for the Sparks.
“It’s always good to see the big boss at our games and getting hype for us,” Parker said of Johnson.
In the third, Parker completed a three-point play and later nailed a threepointer with 11 seconds left in the quarter. In the fourth, when the Sky cut the lead to 11, Parker high-stepped through the lane for a layup and hit a turnaround lefty hook two possessions later.
Whenever the Sky started to push back into the game, Parker was there to push the visitors back out of it.
“She’s an MVP-type player, she’s had a chip on her shoulder all season. I credit players who step up,” Sky Coach Pokey Chatman said of Parker. “That’s what bigtime players do.”