“They’re a tough team — you look at their roster,” said Mercury star Diana Taurasi, who was limited to just two points on Sunday. “But it’s whoever is best at the end of the day, and we’re going to have to be that.”
Crystal Langhorne scored 16 points to lead Seattle (12-22), which will miss the playoffs for the first time since 2003, and the first time during coach Brian Agler’s seven-year tenure with the Storm.
“It’s sort of uncharted territory for us,” Agler said. “We can debate about why it happened. But just being (in this situation) was not easy. That being said, we talked about it in the locker room. We don’t like being here, so we have to come back hungrier next year, so at this time a year from now, we’re finding a way to get ourselves in the playoffs.”
Phoenix didn’t give up the lead after scoring the first six points of the game. They were up 56-49 entering the fourth quarter, and extended the margin to 12 with 8:40 left. Seattle didn’t closer than nine after that.
The Mercury shot 54 percent from the field (30 of 66), the 18th time in 34 games that they topped 50 percent. Their season percentage of 48.4 was a league record, beating the old record of 47.4 set by Minnesota last year. The Storm hit just 37 percent (25 of 68) and finished with fewer than 70 points for the 18th time.
