AT&T Center – The San Antonio Stars earned their second win of the season as they defeated the Seattle Storm 77-70 on Tuesday night in front of 3,319 fans at the AT&T center.
San Antonio started out strong as they raced out to a seven point lead and ended the first quarter with a nine point lead. Moriah Jefferson gave the Stars an early push and led the way for the Silver and Black scorers after the first 10 minutes with eight points.
“I think we did a really good job all around, especially defensively,” Stars guard Kayla McBride said. “I think that was really important for us to come out. They made a run at the beginning of the 4th quarter, and we kind of stayed in it. We’ve been used to being down in the 4th quarter, so to have that lead was a little bit of a comfort. We handled it really well.”
The biggest impact for San Antonio came from none other than second year forward, Dearica Hamby and third year guard, Kayla McBride. Hamby scored 15 for the game and grabbed 18 rebounds, while McBride’s 17 helped bring the Stars end their four game losing streak.
The Stars performed well on the boards, out-rebounding Seattle by 13. Additionally, one of the biggest problems for the Silver and Black this season has been turnovers. San Antonio only turned the ball over a total of 13 times on Tuesday.
“That was our best rebounding effort that I’ve seen,” Stars coach Dan Hughes said. “Hamby with 18 rebounds just kind of lead the way, and I thought that was pivotal, you know, in this game. The other thing was getting us a start. We just haven’t had a lot of starts. We got a start in that game and I think it was important.”
Rookie Breanna Stewart had 19 points and 15 rebounds for the Storm. Jewell Loyd added 17 points and Alysha Clark chipped in 14 for Seattle (4-8), who fell after their win over Indiana.
“I give San Antonio a lot of credit,” Storm coach Jenny Boucek said. “They played extremely hard, extremely hungry. They took it right to us and got us on our heels early.”
Up next: The 2-7 Stars now look to their next game on Friday at 7 p.m. against the Indiana Fever at the AT&T Center for the team’s annual Military Appreciation Night.
It was a great game and I think Moriah early start fired up the team from the beginning, Hamby did amazing rebounding and guarding breanna and mcbride play tough and tha fired up the team as well, Great job ladies!