Kathy Goodman: Another Sparks season ends

The end of the postseason is always tough because it’s so unexpected.  I program into my BlackBerry calendar all the possible playoff dates through to the championship; I arrange meetings around game times; I postpone my social life until after the playoffs conclude.  We set up contingency plans at the team for game entertainment — anthem singers, halftime entertainment, video elements — through the postseason.  But we never absolutely know when our last game will be played until it’s over.  Saturday’s game was that game this season, when the Seattle Storm won 81-66, eliminating us from the playoffs.

In June, everyone told us not to worry — we would never make the postseason.  Everyone counted us out, and we were declared dead over and over.  But our team just wouldn’t die.

We definitely had a tough start.  We had a lot of new faces on our team, requiring some time to gel. I remember walking into the Sparks office one day early in the season, where we had a team photo from the 2007 season, the first season Carla and I bought the team.  I remember being struck by the fact that, except for our equipment manager, our video coordinator and our general manager, no one else in the picture was on our roster or with the organization.  Not our coaches, trainers or a single one of the players.  We needed some time to create a team.

We started the season a bit short-handed, with Ticha Penicheiro battling Achilles problems and Vanessa Hayden with an off-season knee injury.  We were still putting pieces together as the season started, signing Chanel Mokango and trading for Kristi Toliver.  Just as it seemed we had started to come together, we lost Candace Parker to a season-ending shoulder injury.  A week or so later, Betty Lennox left the lineup with a knee injury.  We were left with nine active players on our roster, including two rookies — Andrea Riley and Mokango — and two second-year players — Lindsay Wisdom-Hylton and Toliver. Now the team would have to start over, trying to find a new identity and new chemistry.

Our team battled through it all and came out in the second half of the season a better and stronger team.  Everyone complained that our team was too old and our veterans couldn’t carry the load.  Instead, Tina Thompson set the league record for the most points scored by any player in the WNBA and won Western Conference player of the month in August, and Ticha, in her 12th season, once again led the league in assists, notwithstanding her injury-plagued start, which limited her minutes.

Outsiders were still doubting, but on the inside, we knew this team would make the postseason.  We were just hoping we could make the postseason last a little longer.  I had the dates marked in my calendar all the way through the last possible WNBA Finals game in September.  It is hard not being prepared for the end.  I feel like we don’t have a chance to thank the fans for all of their support, and I feel like the players still have games left in them to play.  But we ended Seattle’s postseason early for two years in a row.  This year was their turn to return the favor.

And the good thing is, I know when next season starts.  I just need to open my calendar to May 2011.  See you in nine months, when we try all over again.

-- Kathy Goodman, co-owner of the Sparks

Photo: Sparks guard Ticha Penicheiro drives against Storm guard Tanisha Wright during the second half of Sunday's game. Gus Ruelas / Associated Press

Kathy Goodman: OMG!!

I had faculty meetings Thursday morning in preparation for returning to school next week and couldn’t quite figure out how I could get from L.A. to Minnesota after my meetings in time for our 7 p.m. game against the Minnesota Lynx, so I decided to settle in with my computer and watch online. That proved to be a bit difficult.

I have a bad Internet connection at my house, and too many applications running on my computer, making downloading the LiveAccess feed problematic. Instead, as the game started and I was still trying to wrestle my computer into submission, I booted up the WNBA Center Court app on my BlackBerry to at least follow the score while I looked at online alternatives.

Ultimately, I ended up "watching" the game with my BlackBerry, toggling back and forth between the Center Court app and the text messages I was getting from my mother (who was watching the LiveAccess feed in Syracuse) and Penny Toler (who was watching the game live in Minnesota) and keeping an eye on my Internet browser updating the play-by-play in real time on the WNBA website. As the Sparks dug a deep hole in the first half, I might be forgiven for allowing my mind to wander a bit.

I reflected on the huge changes in how I had followed women’s basketball over the last two decades. When I followed the Stanford team in the early '90s, there was virtually no women’s basketball on television at all.  You saw a game live or not at all. ESPN2 carried the women’s Final Four back in 1993, but it was not yet part of the basic cable package, so you had to search far and wide to find a sports bar that carried the channel AND was willing to turn on a women’s sporting event, even if a national championship were at stake.

Twenty years later, I was cursing my ISP for not providing an immediate crisp feed over my crummy Internet connection, while at the same time wishing I wasn’t seeing what I was seeing as Minnesota took what seemed like an insurmountable lead in the second quarter. 

As the third quarter wrapped up, we just didn’t seem to be making much headway. We had slowly whittled away at Minnesota’s lead, from 13 at the end of the first quarter, to nine at the half, to six at the end of the third quarter, but we needed a serious run to make this work.

“Watching” the fourth quarter through a combination of Internet play-by-play and text messages from Penny proved to be one of the most suspenseful half-hours of my life. We battled back to get within two, but could never seem to get closer.

Finally, with 1:16 left, we made it a basketball game. DeLisha Milton-Jones hit a three-pointer that gave the us our first lead since the beginning of the first quarter. I was texting my excitement when Lindsay Whalen made a jumper, putting the Lynx back up. Then a shooting foul committed by the Lynx with 40.2 seconds left sent DeLisha to the line. I held my breath while Penny’s text arrived simultaneously with the play-by-play update -- DeLisha missed both free throws, leaving Minnesota up by one. DeLisha then fouled Whalen, sending her to the line for two shots. Again, simultaneous texts (this time from Penny and my mother) and play-by-play update, all reporting that Whalen had missed both of her free throws. 

With 21.6 seconds left and down by one, we called a timeout. This is agony for the online follower. What was happening? Was the timeout over? Had play resumed and my computer crashed?

Then Tina Thompson, who had struggled to score all game, shooting just four of 14 up to that point, sank the go-ahead basket with just 4.3 seconds left in the game!  Another eternity of dead Internet while the teams huddled for a timeout and I wondered if the game had ended without anyone telling me. All I wanted the play-by-play line to read was one more line: “End of 4^th Quarter.” But instead, it announced that Ticha Penicheiro had been called for a foul on Whalen with 1.1 seconds left.

Whalen, who is a 90% free-throw shooter was not going to miss another two in a row, but I was hoping hard she would miss at least one to give us a chance at overtime. No such luck. Lynx up by one with 1.1 seconds left.

We called a timeout to advance the ball, but we were going to need a BIG shot to make it. Texts were flying in and out as we waited for the timeout to end. And then three things happened at the same time: Text from Penny: “Tina just scored!”  Text from my mother: “WOW!!!” Play-by-play refreshed and calmly announced: “Thompson Jump Shot Made.”

I bolted off my couch and jumped around my living room, as I texted Penny and my mother the only thing I am thinking: “OMG!!!” Sparks win 78-77. We needed this game, and we got this game.

I am not taking any chances on the Internet on Saturday, though.  I have booked my ticket to Tulsa!

-- Kathy Goodman, co-owner of the Sparks

Photo: Tina Thompson celebrates with teammates after making the winning shot during a game against the Minnesota Lynx in Minneapolis, Minnesota on Thursday. Credit: Kyndell Harkness / Minneapolis Star Tribune / MCT.

Kathy Goodman: Thank you, Lisa Leslie

The L.A. Sparks are fighting hard for a playoff spot as the season winds down. We played the Indiana Fever on Tuesday night and we knew it would be tough.  Ticha Penicheiro was nursing a sore knee from our game on Sunday evening, and Indiana is currently No. 1 in the Eastern Conference and looking to defend their Eastern Conference title from last season.  The Sparks have been playing tough since the All-Star break, so we were still confident we could get the victory, but the Fever brought their vaunted defense to town.  The Sparks played tough all night with seven players, but the Fever got the win, 82-76.

The highlight of the evening, however, was being involved in retiring Lisa Leslie’s jersey at Staples Center.  I have been a Sparks season ticket holder since the first WNBA game in 1997, and so I have seen Leslie play throughout her professional career.  Even before there was an WNBA, I followed women’s college basketball, and Leslie was all over the college game in the early 1990s.  I followed her career from USC to the Atlanta Olympics to the Sparks. The first time I ever met Lisa in person, however, was by happenstance.

I was working in Beverly Hills and had ducked out of my office with a friend to get lunch at Baja Fresh.  I was eating my burrito when Lisa Leslie walked in. I worked in the film business at the time and had met a lot of famous people, but at that moment, I looked up and said out loud (and maybe too loud), “Oh my god, it’s Lisa Leslie!”  My friend, who knew nothing about women’s basketball (or really about any sports), knew exactly who she was.  “Are you going to talk to her?” she prodded me. What would I say?  But I also couldn’t imagine being this close to her and not saying something.  It was in 2000 and she was, of course, again on the Olympic team. I decided to use that as my hook, screwed up my courage and walked over to her. “Sorry to interrupt your lunch,” I said, knowing I was about to sound like an idiot. “I’m a Sparks season ticket holder, and I just wanted to tell you how great I think you are and to wish you luck at the Olympics,” I gushed.  She smiled and said, “Thank you so much!” And then I knew enough to walk away and let her eat her lunch.

I would never have imagined that a decade later, I would be standing at the center of Lisa Leslie Court at Staples Center during an ESPN broadcast, hugging her and congratulating her on her jersey being retired in the rafters of the building as part of a tribute that the team I co-own put together. Some paths are more hidden than others. 

There was never a question that Lisa’s jersey would hang in the rafters next to Jerry West’s, Magic Johnson’s, Wayne Gretzky’s. I admit that I wouldn’t have minded if she had taken a few more years to get it there, but I am certainly happy to have had the chance to have been a small part of Lisa’s storied career.  In many ways, she embodies everything we want the WNBA to stand for as a league, which is not surprising, since she helped create it.  I am not sure there will ever be another basketball player in any city who will be able to wear that No. 9 jersey with the same grace, drive, determination, integrity and accomplishment as Lisa Leslie.

-- Kathy Goodman, co-owner of the Sparks

Kathy Goodman: I can't complain

The Sparks came in to play the New York Liberty at the end of a four-game, 10-day trip that had us zigzagging across time zones four times. Although the trip started rough in Indiana, we rallied from there, winning in Connecticut and Minnesota, moving us into fourth place in the Western Conference standings (and a playoff berth). We all were looking for a final win in New York to cap our trip, but it wasn’t to be. We fell to the Liberty on Friday night, 88-79, but I can’t complain.

We knew this would be a tough game. We were playing in Madison Square Garden and the Liberty was  fighting for its own playoff spot in the East. The New York rivalry with L.A. is longstanding on many fronts, not the least of which is in the WNBA, and our games against the Liberty are always hard-fought. This one was no exception. The game was tied 14 times, the lead changed 19 times and until the last two minutes of the game, no more than five points separated the two teams.

The start of the game didn’t necessarily signal what was to come. In the first quarter, both teams shot under 40% and the Sparks went 0 for 3 from the three-point line. By the end of the quarter, the Liberty was only up by two. The second quarter couldn’t have been more different. Both teams went on a scoring tear, with the Sparks shooting almost 65% from the field (and 50% from three-point range) and the Liberty shooting just over 61%.  At one point, the Liberty pushed its lead to five, but the Sparks kept fighting back, with Tina Thompson and Marie Ferdinand-Harris scoring from everywhere when we needed them to. The quarter ended up a draw — 28 points for each team — and the Liberty carried its two-point lead from the first quarter into halftime.

We needed to make a big push in the second half — see if we could break the game open. We had held New York’s Cappie Pondexter to single-digit scoring in the first half, and Janel McCarville had scored only three points. If we came out strong in the second half, we might be able to steal this game in Madison Square Garden.

The Sparks started the second half with two quick baskets to take the lead, and then it was trading baskets from there. The hot shooting from the second quarter continued for both teams, and neither L.A. nor N.Y. could get a run going. Instead, the lead changed hands six times with three ties and by the end of the quarter, our free-throw shooting (four for four in the quarter) allowed us to take the lead. Ten minutes left of our longest trip of the summer and we were up by one.

The fourth quarter started a little more slowly for us. It took us until a little more than two minutes had elapsed in the quarter to finally get a basket — a nice three-pointer from Marie that brought New York’s lead back down to one. From then on, like the third quarter (and the rest of the game, really), neither team made much progress — trading baskets and trading the lead. Finally, in the last 2 1/2 minutes of the game, it looked like the long trip and having only nine active players on our roster and our hard-fought wins and all those time zones were catching up to us. Noelle Quinn missed a jumper and Leilani Mitchell grabbed the rebound and went coast to coast for a layup, pushing the New York’s lead to five, the largest it had been in the game. Then we made a bad pass, allowing Mitchell another steal and Marie Ferdinand-Harris fouled her in what was called a clear path foul. Mitchell made both her free throws, pushing the lead to seven, and then on the ensuing N.Y. possession, Pondexter found Nicole Powell alone outside the arc and she buried the three. The Sparks fought back, but 10 points was too much to make up in the last minute and a half in the game and New York took the game.

Four of our five starters scored in double digits and Ticha, who scored six, had seven assists in the game.  We were perfect from the free-throw line (16 for 16). We shot just over 48% for the game. We were within one rebound of New York on both the offensive and defensive glass. We are holding a playoff spot now and headed home, where we play six of our last nine games. I know we didn’t win, but I can’t complain. It’s going to be an exciting run to the end.

-- Kathy Goodman, co-owner of the L.A. Sparks

Kathy Goodman: Is two wins a streak?

 I wasn’t planning on going to the Sparks game against the Minnesota Lynx on Tuesday night.  It is getting close to the time that I have to go back to my real job, teaching high school, and I thought I would skip the Minnesota game and just go to the game in New York on Friday to see East Coast family.  But after our win against the Connecticut Sun last Saturday night, I just didn’t want to miss the beginning of what I thought might be a win streak.  When I expressed this change of plans to one of my friends, she asked me, “Is two wins a streak?” I told her I would decide when we had two wins.

I felt our team played with a different attitude in Connecticut.  Something intangible, but with a confidence and teamwork they had been working toward all season.  I wanted to see firsthand if they could keep it going in Minnesota.  When the game started, I did have a moment of pause.  We opened the game with three missed shots in a row, followed by a 4 1/2  minute scoring drought.  When the Lynx had run up an 11-2 lead in the first five minutes, I sat back and thought, ”This might be a longer game than I had hoped.”  By the end of the first quarter, we had shot a woeful 25% and had scored only 10 points.  The one saving grace was that the Lynx had had almost as much trouble scoring, and we were only down by six. 

The second quarter was a different story altogether.  We started with a younger lineup, Marie Ferdinand-Harris the only vet of the group, and they showed defensive tenacity.  A minute and a half into the quarter, our starters got back in and showed some scoring punch.  We went on a 14-2 run to finally take the lead in the game and then didn’t look back. The Lynx’s shooting woes continued, scoring only two field goals in the quarter and a total of 10 points on 10% shooting.  The Sparks shot over 63%, with Noelle Quinn adding 11 of her total 17 points in the second quarter, and all of our second quarter baskets were scored off assists.  By the time the horn sounded for halftime, the Sparks were up by 3 and I felt like we could win this game too. 

But, of course, there was the third quarter looming ahead.  I had all of halftime to wonder if I was going to get the first quarter Sparks or the second quarter Sparks back for the second half of the game.  The third quarter turned out to be just a battle.  In the early going, we pushed our lead to five, but the Lynx would not let us run away with it, forcing a tie several times.  Our shooting as a team dropped back into normal range, but now Marie Ferdinand-Harris took over scoring duties, connecting on five of six shots, scoring 10 of her 12 points in the third quarter, including beautiful back-to-back baskets late in the period to push the Sparks lead up to seven.  With only the last 10  minutes left to play, we now had a five-point lead and three players in double-digit scoring.  We were getting killed on the offensive boards (13-3), but were out-shooting Minnesota.

Kathy Goodman: Road woes continue

The Sparks started their game Thursday against the No. 1 team in the East, the Indiana Fever, so strong, with back-to-back three-pointers from Tina Thompson, who picked up where she left off Tuesday against the Tulsa Shock. Marie Ferdinand-Harris dropped in a third three-pointer in the first 3½ minutes, and the Sparks were up, 11-4. We held on to that lead until the Fever settled down and its outside shots started falling, and then Indiana came back, ending the first quarter up by one. That was fine with me -- being down by only one point after the first quarter in the home arena of the No. 1 team in the East meant that we were playing really hard.

In the second quarter, we played even harder. Our shots were not falling, but we were keeping Indiana from scoring. Ticha Penicheiro stepped up for five of her eight points in the game in the second quarter. Noelle Quinn hit her first basket, a three-pointer, and we pushed on Indiana hard enough to hold a one-point lead going into halftime.

If only the game had ended there. But we had a second half to play, and I feared the Sparks' third quarter.

My fears appeared well-founded at first. We opened the third with five consecutive turnovers and our only saving grace was that the Fever was having shooting woes of its own. At the 8:36 mark in the third, Tammy Sutton-Brown connected on free throws to give Indiana a four-point lead, but for the next 2½ minutes, the score remained fixed at 36-40, until Quinn made a three-pointer that triggered an 8-1 run by the Sparks. When the Sparks took a 44-41 lead after a stagnant opening to the half, I got excited. But the Fever fought back and with the exception of a free throw by Lindsay Wisdom-Hylton, we did not score another point in the quarter. A hook shot by Ebony Hoffman set off a 15-1 run by the Fever that included three three-pointers, and Indiana had broken the game open.

The fourth quarter for the Sparks started worse than the third did. Down by 11, the Sparks didn’t score a point until 3½ minutes in (on free throws by Penicheiro) and didn’t score a field goal until there was 3:46 left in the game. That is no way to mount a comeback. In the meantime, the Fever had gone on a 12-2 run (a 27-3 run overall, including their run to end the third quarter) and we just didn’t have anything to respond with, or the time to do it in. Indiana wrapped up the game easily from there and won 76-57.

We have three more games on this trip. I hope they worked out the travel fatigue Thursday, but the WNBA schedule is not kind to us over the next nine days, as we fly east to Connecticut on Friday for a game Saturday, back to the Midwest to Minnesota on Tuesday and then back to New York one more time for a game next Friday. With only one win on the road so far this season, we will need to use everything we have to be focused and ready for the next week and a half.

-- Kathy Goodman, co-owner of the L.A. Sparks

Kathy Goodman: One step forward, one step back

The Sparks had a good plan going into our game against the Chicago Sky on Friday night.  We knew we were facing a serious inside presence with Sylvia Fowles, recently named Most Valuable Player in the WNBA All-Star Game and the very close No. 2 draft pick behind Candace Parker; the only woman to be charged with a goal-tending penalty.

With Lisa Leslie retired and Parker sidelined with her shoulder repair, we have been a little less dominant in the paint than in seasons past. Therefore, we needed a plan to neutralize Big Syl’s 19 points if we wanted a chance to get the win.  By the end of our game, we had held her to just 10 points and only eight shot attempts for the game.  Unfortunately, we let the Sky's three-point shooters loose, and we fell to the Sky, 68-80.

We’re in the middle of a three-game road trip before returning home for a single game on Tuesday and heading back out on the road again for another 10-day East Coast swing.  We wanted to maximize our time away from home and were happy coming out of our win against Tulsa on Tuesday night, seeing the possibility of a 3-0 road swing. We knew Chicago would be a tough opponent for us.

They are in last place in the East right now, but given the dominance of the Eastern Conference this season, their record would be good enough to put them in second place in the West.  We needed to slow down Sylvia Fowles and get our outside shot to fall and we could take this one.  Last season we were the worst three-point shooting team in the league, but we had improved substantially this season, so this was not a bad bet.

The game started a little tough with a quick foul on Delisha Milton-Jones, but we were the first to score.  Fowles didn’t take long to get on the board, and by the end of the first quarter, she had 6 points on 3 of 5 shooting, a steal and a block.  We had kept the game close for the first five minutes but the Sky went on a 13-4 run for the next four minutes, including three 3-point shots to end the first quarter and we were looking at an 8-point deficit at the end of the period.  Our 3-point shot was less efficient (0-2) -- we were definitely not executing our game plan.

Things looked a bit better on the Sylvia Fowles front in the second quarter.  We held her scoreless but the Sparks were getting crushed on the boards.  In the second quarter alone, the Sky out-rebounded us 11-4 (including five offensive boards).  We shot 50% from the floor in the second, but the Sky shot 60% from beyond the three-point arc. We had slowed Sylvia down, but their outside shooting was killing ours. Part One of the game plan -- slowing down Sylvia -- was working fine, but it left Erin Thorn and Catherine Kraayeveld open to shoot at will from 3-point range (they were a combined 5 of 6.) We went into the locker room down by 13 at the half. This was not the first half we were hoping for.

We were just as successful containing Fowles in the second half -- she scored only four more points in the game.  Unfortunately, we couldn’t stop their 3-point shooting and we could not get our shots to fall. Noelle Quinn, who has been averaging 48% from 3-point range, didn’t attempt one 3-point shot in the game, though she did end up scoring 12 on 60% shooting. Tina Thompson, who has averaged just under 38% from three-point range, went 1 of 3.  We ended the game with three of our players in double figures (Milton-Jones with 21, Thompson with 15 and Quinn with 12), but let five of the Sky players score double figures, with Kraayeveld and  Thorn scoring a combined 7 of 9 from outside the arc (and no attempts inside).  The nine 3-point shots the Sky made to our two made the difference in the game. 

Tuesday’s win over Tulsa pushed us up in the standings, but our loss Friday night pushed us back again.  One step forward, one step back. Still in fifth, but if we get San Antonio on Sunday and Tulsa on Tuesday at Staples Center, we’re in a playoff position. One game at a time.  See you Sunday.

-- Kathy Goodman, co-owner of the Sparks

Kathy Goodman: in the Moment

I am not sure how to describe my mood coming into Thursday night’s game against the San Antonio Silver Stars. Resigned may be the best word. I knew what our team was capable of. I knew we were far from out of the running in the Western Conference if we could get a couple of wins, especially since Minnesota had lost its game earlier in the evening. I knew our next three games — this one, Saturday afternoon and Tuesday night — were going to be crucial since they were against Western Conference teams. I also knew that we had a very long losing streak behind us. San Antonio was in second place in the West, and we had played a terrible game of basketball against them in San Antonio earlier in the season, but I knew our players were just sick of losing. So I decided to try my best to live in the moment — not celebrate an early lead or despair at early setbacks — just let the game unfold. 

The game opened with a defensive rebound by the Sparks, followed by a three-point basket by Delisha Milton-Jones. I tried to stay in the moment and not see this as a sign of good things to come. By the time we got to the end of the first quarter, I was seeing some good things: San Antonio had twice as many turnovers as we did, and we had a third more assists than they did. But I also saw they had the rebounding edge and were beating us on both points in the paint and second-chance points. But we were actually winning the game — 18-12.  Still, a lot of basketball left.  I resisted the impulse to project a positive outcome.

The second quarter was even better. We led the Silver Stars in every major statistic: field goal percentage, rebounds, assists, steals, blocks. We outscored them in the paint and in second-chance points. And we just flat outscored them, leading by 15 points going into halftime, 39-24. But I had been there before. I was not going to let a big halftime lead lull me into a false sense of confidence. Our team had made an art of letting leads slip away in the blink of an eye in the third quarter. I wasn’t going to give in to optimism. I was going to let it all continue to unfold.

The third quarter started with a Sparks turnover and foul. Oh no, I thought. I have seen this too often this season. But the Silver Stars weren’t any better off, and it took a good minute and a half before anyone scored — and it was Tina Thompson on free throws. Well, I thought, I don’t care if there’s no scoring in the third, as long as we can keep this lead! But then, there it was: the Big Third Quarter Run. San Antonio reeled off 10 straight points over the next three minutes, capped off with a Becky Hammon three-point basket. San Antonio had cut our lead to seven. Marie Ferdinand-Harris came back with what looked like a last-second three to get the lead back up to 10 again, but after review, the referees waived it off and ruled it a shot clock violation, and the Silver Stars kept shooting. Over the last 4-1/2 minutes of the quarter, they went on a 14-7 run, erasing our entire first-half lead and even taking the lead for a bit. When we got to the end of the third with a 48-48 tie, though, I refused to give into defeatism. I had withheld a prediction of a win based on our first-half lead, so I wouldn’t predict a loss based on our third-quarter slide.

Ten more minutes of basketball.  By now, Phoenix had finished its game and had lost. With Minnesota and Phoenix both losing, I knew that if we did lose this game, it wouldn’t be devastating, but a win would give us a big boost in the standings.

The fourth quarter opened with a Sparks turnover and the first fast-break points of the game, courtesy of Hammon. I was trying really hard to just stay in the moment and not think of the outcome. The score stayed close for the next 5 minutes — we led by as much as four, but then San Antonio regained the lead.  I knew the game was going to break open one way or another. With just under 5 minutes left in the game, it did. The Sparks went on a 12-0 run and with 1:46 left in the game and we led by 11. The end of the game was in sight. I let myself go and started celebrating with the rest of the arena. With under a minute left and the Sparks up by nine, San Antonio started fouling, and our fans started dancing.  We had waited patiently for this final moment.  Sparks win, 73-63.

A moment worth waiting for.

-- Kathy Goodman, co-owner of the L.A. Sparks

Kathy Goodman: Hope springs eternal

We did not play a good game on Thursday night against the Washington Mystics, so I was, not surprisingly, a little pessimistic coming into Sunday’s game against the Atlanta Dream, which is   atop of the Eastern Conference.  I took some time on Saturday to get a little perspective and inspiration by visiting the Martin Luther King Center and the Carter Center in downtown Atlanta.  By game time, I was fairly philosophical and just wanted us to play some good basketball, win or lose.  So why is it the Sparks had to start so strong and get my hopes up all over again?

We knew Erica DeSouza and Sancho Lyttle were going to be tough in the post.  With Iziane Castro Marques and Angel McCoughtry running around shooting from anywhere, we had to keep our composure, play smart defense and aggressive offense to stand a chance.  We were a tough team in the first half, getting their bigs in foul trouble and locking up their shooters.  When the first half ended, DeSouza and Lyttle had spent most of their time on the bench with a combined five fouls, and McCoughtry and Castro Marques had shot a combined 5 of 21.  The Sparks, on the other hand, had three players in double digits and Ticha Penecheiro had dished out five assists.  We had led by as many as 16, but a late flurry by Atlanta cut the lead to 11 at the half.

I was happy we were playing the kind of basketball I knew we could play.  Atlanta was playing hard, but we were definitely hustling for rebounds and loose balls, playing hard and together.

And then the third quarter started.

The opening three minutes of the third quarter reminded me of Washington all over again.  Atlanta came out with intensity and we couldn’t stop them.  In three short minutes, they went on an 11-4 run, cutting our lead to four.  We settled down a little bit then and for the rest of the quarter, we held them off, but all our hard work of the first half was lost.  We entered the fourth quarter with a slim lead — 65-63 — but that was almost solely because Atlanta had shot so poorly from the free throw line.  The Dream had missed six of their 10 third-quarter free throws. 

As the fourth quarter began, I was wondering whether I would have preferred it if I thought we had never had a chance in the game.  Atlanta was first in the East; the Dream  had scored over 100 points when we played them in Staples earlier in the season; I didn’t have a real reason to be hopeful.  Except that first half.  When we played the kind of basketball I knew our team could play.  If they played like the first-half Sparks, we’d be good. If they played like the team that played the first three minutes of the third quarter, it would be hard.  Although we started the final period by pushing the lead to four, in less than two minutes, Atlanta forced a tie.  Philips Arena, which had been fairly quiet during the game, erupted.  Within another minute, the Dream took the lead for the first time and never looked back.  Castro Marques, who had been held to four points in the first half, exploded for 21 in the second half. Yelena Leuchanka, coming off the bench for  DeSouza, scored six of her eight points in the fourth quarter, all in the paint.

We just couldn’t hold on through the fourth quarter.  The Dream won, 89-81.  I wanted those three minutes back at the beginning of the third quarter, but I thought the tradeoff might be that Atlanta would have the chance to retake some of their free throws (they made only 19 of 35.)  In the end, though, I just can’t help remembering those first-half Sparks.  We are still just a game out of fourth, two games out of second in the West.  We play New York on Tuesday night at Staples Center.   Hope springs eternal.  I think we can win that one.

-- Kathy Goodman, co-owner of the L.A. Sparks

Kathy Goodman: Omens

I hit LAX to get on the red-eye to Washington, D.C., on Wednesday night in order to see the Sparks play the Washington Mystics on Thursday.  I was hoping to get into first class, but the gate agent told me that I was No. 3 on the list and there was only one unclaimed seat in first.  Oh well.  I can sleep anywhere, so I got on the plane when my group was called and settled into my coach seat.  About three minutes before the flight was about to take off, a flight attendant came to our row.  “Katherine?” she said, looking at me inquisitively.  I saw a boarding pass in her hand.  “Do you want it?” she asked.  It was seat 3A, and it took about 20 seconds for me to be heading up to the front of the plane.  I sent a text to my co-owner Carla Christofferson: “Got a last-minute upgrade.  Am suddenly feeling very optimistic about this road trip.  Good things are coming.”

We spend our lives looking for evidence of what is to come in the events that are happening to us now. I didn’t expect to win on our Eastern road trip — the East has been killing the West all season long.  We had beaten Washington in our last meeting, but we had Candace Parker and Betty Lennox, both of whom are now sidelined with injuries.  So I didn’t get on the plane with high expectations.  But the unexpected upgrade seemed like a symbolic echo of an unexpected win.  (This is what comes of teaching high school English — I spend a lot of time imposing metaphors and symbolic thinking on real life.) This is now officially my story of how there is no such thing as a good omen.

Maybe the magic voodoo of the upgrade was evened out by the fact that my room was not ready when I hit the hotel at 6 a.m. and I had to find a way to kill 3 1/2  hours before I could take a shower.  But the hotel staff told me when I checked in that they didn’t think they would have a room until 10:30 or 11, so when they handed me a key at 9:30, I thought it was another symbolic windfall of unexpected good fortune signaling the good that was still to come on the basketball court.

It is perhaps noticeable that I have written very little about the basketball game itself.  Let me cut to the chase.  We lost.  The Mystics won, 68-53.  I thought a lot during the game about what I was going to write, but although I thought our game against San Antonio earlier in the season was the low point, this game put that one to shame. It was, plain and simple, terrible basketball. It was no fun to watch and it is no fun to recap.

One of the very few high notes: Katie Smith was held to zero points, which seemed to be our one defensive achievement of the game, since she is the most prolific scorer in women’s professional basketball.  Of course, they didn’t need Katie Smith’s points because Crystal Langhorne scored a career-high 27 points.  Both Lindsay Wisdom-Hylton and Kristi Toliver played admirably off the bench (Toliver led the team with 11 points), and Noelle Quinn was our standout starter (with 10 points and seven rebounds.)  But otherwise, it was pretty ugly basketball.  We perked up a bit in the third quarter when we cut the Mystics’ lead to six, but that was as close as we got, and it was just generally not a good game.

What I thought were omens of good fortune were merely good fortune in and of themselves — to be enjoyed as they happened in the moment.  So, I have decided to stop thinking about last-minute upgrades, lucky shoes, the mystical shirt or anything else and instead just to live in the moment.

We’re flying to Atlanta tomorrow for a game on Sunday afternoon.  I am making no predictions.  I will just let it unfold.

-- Kathy Goodman, co-owner of the L.A. Sparks

Kathy Goodman: The win that almost was

I felt pretty good at the start of the game Friday night.  OK, I knew Candace Parker was out for the season to finally get her dislocated shoulder repaired, but I looked at our roster, and it still looked pretty talented to me.  If they played together, we could do pretty well. And the first half made me a believer.  In fact, the whole game looked really good, looked like a winning game, except for six crucial minutes.  Erase those six minutes at the end of the third quarter and we looked good; we looked like winners.  But those six minutes counted and we went down for another loss, this time to the Connecticut Sun, 78-75.

In the first two minutes of the game, we had a milestone to celebrate: Tina Thompson, the last of the original WNBA players from 1997, scored point No. 6,000.  She is only the second player in WNBA history to reach that milestone and the second Sparks player to do so -- Lisa Leslie was the first.

We played well throughout the first half, shooting better than 50% from the field, forcing nine turnovers, with twice as many assists as turnovers.  Our one weakness in the first half was rebounding, getting beaten 24-15, and we were especially weak on the offensive end, getting only one offensive rebound to Connecticut’s seven.  I wasn’t worried, though. We were moving the ball well (Ticha Penicheiro and Noelle Quinn each had four assists in the half) and we were capitalizing on their mistakes, scoring 10 points off their nine turnovers.  I felt like my optimism was being rewarded.

At the beginning of the second half, we were up by seven points and we came out shooting.  We made four three-pointers and a two-point jumper in the first 3 1/2 minutes of the third quarter and just like that, we were leading by 16 points.  I was feeling really good about our chances then.  But the next six minutes killed us.  We did not score another point and Connecticut could not miss.  They went on a 20-0 run that made our lead evaporate. If not for a buzzer-beating three-point shot by Marie Ferdinand-Harris to end the quarter, the Sun would have ended the quarter up by four.  It was hard to believe that we were starting the fourth quarter down by one, when 6 1/2 minutes before we had been up by 16.

But we still had 10 more minutes of basketball.  We were only down by one and we had played incredible team basketball in the first half.  If we could get back to that, and erase whatever we were doing (or not doing) in the third quarter, this game was winnable.

We did not start the fourth quarter strong.  Tan White and Sandrine Gruda made back to back shots that put the Sun up by 5 in the first minute and a half.  Then, we got together and played some hard-nosed defense and forced some turnovers to pull ahead by one.  Connecticut went through a brief slump, allowing us some steals, but suddenly we couldn’t find the basket and all those turnovers went unrewarded.  With less than a minute left in the game, and down by three points, we ran a great play that left Ferdinand-Harris open alone outside the arc, but the ball danced on the rim and didn’t fall.  Connecticut couldn’t convert either and then Thompson found herself outside the arc, ready to shoot the three, but the foul on her by Asjha Jones was called a non-shooting foul and then we only had 5.8 seconds to make something happen.  Down by three, we got the ball into Marie, who shot a huge lunging desperation shot that improbably banked into the basket.  The scoreboard showed it as a three, but the ref signaled a two, and after review, it was scored as a two-point shot.  We just couldn’t get a break.  After a foul on White, who made both her free throws, the last 0.8 seconds wasn’t enough for any more heroics.  The game was over and we had lost by three.

I just can’t be too down, though.  Phoenix lost tonight.  Tulsa lost tonight.  We’re still just one win out of third place in the West, and two wins out of second.  We’ll get there.

--Kathy Goodman, co-owner of the L.A. Sparks

Photo: Connecticut's Anete Jekabsone-Zogota collides with the Sparks' Noelle Quinn as they go after a loose ball during the first half on Friday night. Credit: Mark J. Terrill / Associated Press