Valkyries hope to end modest skid vs. Paige Bueckers, Wings
Golden State (10-12) fell to ninth place in the league standings and out of the playoff picture for now. The Valkyries dropped back-to-back one-possession heartbreakers at Las Vegas (104-102) and vs. Phoenix (78-77).
In their most recent outing, July 16 at Seattle, the Valkyries scored a franchise-low 58 points in a nine-point loss to the Storm.
Despite the slump, which has Golden State a half-game behind Washington for the eighth and final playoff spot, Valkyries forward Kayla Thornton told ESPN that the first-year franchise has "surpassed" what the team set out to do.
"I thought it was going to take us a little more time to get to know each other, to get to know the system," Thornton said.
The latest blow to Golden State involves Thornton, who underwent season-ending knee surgery on Friday. Thornton was injured during practice earlier this week.
Thornton leads Golden State with career-best averages of 14.0 points and seven rebounds per game. She is also one of three Valkyrie players averaging more than a steal per game, along with Veronica Burton and Temi Fagbenle, contributing to Golden State's defensive yield of 78 points per contest.
Only league-leading Minnesota has been stingier, holding opponents to 74.7 points an outing.
But the Valkyries rank near the bottom of the league in offense at 79.1 points per game, contributing to their ups and downs -- with the downs including an 80-71 loss the last time they faced Dallas.
The Wings (7-17), ahead of only Connecticut in the league standings, have had a trying season thus far. However, their June 17 home win over Golden State ended a seven-game losing streak and kicked off a current stretch of .500 basketball.
Dallas is 6-6 since that meeting, including an 87-63 blowout of Seattle on Tuesday in the Wings' return from the All-Star break.
Arike Ogunbowale scored 20 points in the win, bumping her season average to 15.9 points per game. She scored 19 in Dallas' defeat of Golden State.
Rookie Paige Bueckers, fresh off her first All-Star Game appearance, scored 20 last time out vs. Golden State, part of a sensational start to the No. 1 overall pick's career that reached a new milestone on Tuesday.
With her 14 points and six assists at Seattle, Bueckers matched Caitlin Clark for the fastest to 300 career points and 100 career assists. She's also scored in double figures in all 19 games she's played.
"It's all a credit to them and how we continue to play team basketball," Bueckers said. "Not one of us are going to go out of the rhythm and hunt our own shots and chase our own points and make sure our stats our great. When we play team basketball like that, things will end the way they're supposed to."
--Field Level Media
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