Emily Engstler’s basket with 1:17 left snapped a tie and the Portland Fire scored the final 10 points Wednesday night to rally past the visiting Seattle Storm 94-89.
Engstler’s fadeaway jumper put Portland (8-9, 2-5 Commissioner’s Cup) ahead 91-89. Engstler then drove the lane on the Fire’s next possession and fed Bridget Carleton for her seventh 3-pointer of the game with 40.5 seconds remaining for a five-point advantage.
Carleton scored a team-high 24 points and set a career high for made 3-pointers, while teammate Carla Leite added 20 points and 10 assists. Sarah Ashlee Barker contributed 12 points, and Karlie Samuelson came off the bench to net 10.
Dominique Malonga starred in defeat for Seattle (3-13, 0-7) with a career-high 28 points and a season-best 11 rebounds. Natisha Hiedeman added 19 points and tied her season high with five 3-pointers, while rookie Awa Fam matched her season best with 18 points on her 20th birthday.
It wasn’t enough to prevent the Storm’s ninth straight loss, one that saw the visitors get outscored 27-15 in the fourth quarter.
Coming off a 107-74 loss at Minnesota on Monday, Portland got off the mark in a hurry, particularly from 3-point range. The Fire made four in less than two minutes as they started the game with a 16-7 spurt.
Seattle quit turning the ball over and got going behind Hiedeman, who canned a pair of 3-pointers in a 16-5 run that allowed the Storm to take a 23-21 edge to the second quarter.
Neither team led by more than four points in a back-and-forth second period, which ended with Fam making a foul shot with 21.9 seconds remaining to give the Storm a 48-47 lead at the break.
After earning a 20-8 advantage in paint points in the first half, Seattle kept looking inside to Malonga in the third quarter, and she delivered. Malonga’s eight points helped the Storm establish the game’s largest lead at 68-56. While the Fire bounced back, they still trailed 74-67 going to the fourth period.
–Field Level Media
