The Fire host their last of their four-game homestand to start their rebirth season, hosting the winless Connecticut Fire. Carla and Kam are questionable to play, the Fire signed a new player, and the legend BG, Brittney Griner is here to dominate in the post.

But first, a question: I have had feedback that Game Previews could be useful and informative (🤔), but I’ve also received feedback that I sure do send a lot of posts to people’s emails (😬).

Would you like a short, bare-bones preview for Fire games? I’m going to do one for the away game in Indiana tomorrow as an example, to which you could give feedback then, as well. (FYI: I can’t add polls directly into my posts here without a premium account, hence the Google Forms I’ve been using)

Ok, let’s talk ball.

These are an old set of standardized “only stats that matter”. Here’s a fun explainer video from Molly Brown on Instagram, who is going to be a great follow for any fan of my writing here: https://www.instagram.com/reel/DXusixFkrAA/

For a third consecutive game, the Fire needed to adjust their starting line-up at game time. Carla Leite and Kamiah Smalls were both scratched after showing up to pre-game on Monday, though coach Sarama says Leite is closer to playing than Smalls. Both injuries seem relatively minor, but they have not allowed Portland to establish any kind of rhythm with their personnel. That elite-feeling New York win remains on a currently unreachable pedestal.

Not helping their cause was Meg Gustafson leaving the game early in the second quarter and did not return to play, holding her mid-section like she got gut-punched. She walked off the court immediately to the locker room. She returned to the bench in the second-half with a back brace on, and was staying active and doing work with a member of the performance team (whose name I’d love to learn; I see the players working with him all the time, and looking like they have a great time doing it). The injury doesn’t seem like it should keep her out for too long.

Speaking of rhythm, this game had almost none of it. Portland shot, if you’re generous like me, average at best, while missing a lot of wide-open 3’s and shots in the paint. Connecticut shot 55% from the free-throw line, and fouls were blown at a high rate once again. If Bridget Carleton hit the wide-open 3’s she had available to her, even at her normal make-rate, Portland probably wins this game by 8-12 points. If Connecticut hit their free-throws at a league-average rate, and used that to establish any kind of rhythm, they probably win this game by 4-6 points. Both teams were struggling to find a spark.

Historical note about the win: Just 48 WNBA regular season games ever (.6%!!!) have had the winning team shoot worse than 51% eFG and beaten an opponent who shot 56% eFG or better. It hasn’t happened since mid-2024.

Connecticut had a couple of stand-out players and plays: it was a treat to welcome Brittney Griner to Portland, and to watch her play. She was funny and playful with teammates and opponents, she was locked the f. in when the game started, and she beat up on Portland in ways only the best veterans can. She didn’t have the world’s most dominant game, but she was a nightmare to see checking into the game, was a team-high +9, and got a couple critical rebounds that easily could have shifted the game, had Connecticut hit a couple more shots.

Aneesah Morrow came off the bench for the Sun and dominated Portland on the glass, securing a game-high 12 rebounds in 33 minutes, including 3 offensive rebounds. Like her former teammate at LSU Angel Reese, Morrow has a gift for rebounding, even when undersized at her position, and made Portland continue to look like a team that can’t win a rebound battle against a wet paper bag (okay, that’s a bit too harsh of the Fire, I’m sorry. I just love the wet paper bag analogy).

A favorite of some W fans (and, I’ll say it out loud, some online weirdos), Haley Van Lith got her first start for the Sun, and played a quality, efficient game, with 12 points, 3 assists, and ending at a +7 on the night. Shout-out to FIre fan J, who got to experience the Van Lith game in a unique way.

Speaking of Portland’s rotations, they kept-up their hockey-shift mentality, subbing in huge bench units in the middle of the first and third quarters. The Fire’s newest member, Holly Winterburn, filled in as the backup point guard, and just like Kam Smalls, looked like she knew what she was doing. It was a classic overly-physical and hard-fought “Welcome to the League” kind of game for Winterburn, but I liked the passes she made, the vision she had, some (not all) of the defensive rotations she made, and was overall looks like a really solid developmental player signing.

Haley Jones also made it into the first group of rotations, which she hasn’t been in yet this season. Unfortunately, she struggled to leave an impact on the game with the bump in playing time (0 field-goal attempts, 3 steals, 1 assist, 3 turnovers). With Gustafson leaving the game, Serah Williams got more run, and struggled in a way that rookies typically do, including some cheap fouls against the much bigger and much wiser Griner, who knew how to press Williams’ buttons. Serah had a good rebounding night in limited minutes, and showed other good signs alongside her rookie growing pains.

Sug Sutton once again looked mildly uncomfortable running the Fire systems, and did a lot of dribbling. Her night was a net positive, and she hit two of the more clutch shots of the entire game, but I look forward to Sug in a more specific role and with a little more team practice time.

Finally, in a game of scrapping and scrounging for points, the scrappiest scrounger of the Fire had, once again, the biggest impact on Portland’s win: Sarah Ashlee Barker. SAB was the best cutter on the team, the best secondary creator, the best help defender, and the best hustle player on the floor for either team. She is the only player on the Fire who routinely touches the paint, which is a vital component to a varied and hard-to-stop offense. She, frankly, was the only player who looked like they wanted to be the reason either team won the game. I won’t say she’s the Fire’s best player (so far/yet), but she has clearly been the most important across the four games so far.

And, as in every game so far, Emily Engstler was the third (or higher) best and most important player on the Fire, insimilar small/hustle ways that SAB was.

Bridget Carleton is a script runner, and needs her point guards to be available. Carleton is historically a route runner who hits open shots, and the Fire are asking more of her, which we’ve seen in flashes, but Carleton clearly wants to create from certain positions, and the Fire are struggling to consistently create those positions. The rotation and unavailability of the lead guards so far has created inconsistencies in the offense, which I think is the primary factor in Carleton’s offensive performances all feeling a little uneasy and hard-to-come-by. As with all things Fire, I actually do believe this will trend towards consistency and healthy variety, but the Fire have not quite established the firm ground upon which Carleton would best operate from.

This was the first game that I felt tiny pangs of worry for the development status of the team as a whole: the offense remained clunky and unsure of itself, and lapses on defense continued. The problems I was feeling resolved themselves over the course of the game, which is a real and positive sign of growth and maturity and intelligence and coaching, but in four games, the needle hasn’t moved very much for start-of-game performance. I put a lot of the blame on the uncontrollable injuries and availability issues the team has faced early on, so I am happily choosing to not feel any level of despair about the team yet, even if a victory against the team with the worst record in the league looked and felt so troublesome. It’s an expansion team, baby!

Third, and most importantly, Sarah Ashlee Barker is the third coming of Our Lord and Savior.

Battling injuries and roster changes, this Fire team was desperate for someone to step into the spotlight and make winning plays. Sarah Ashlee Barker simply put in the work to win a basketball game: cutting, passing, rotating on defense, swarming the ball, attempting to draw charges, tagging the rollers, setting screens, and on top of all of that, she shot 54% from the floor, had a positive assist-to-turnover ratio, and made the only plays that would win the game when time was running out.

After finding ways to affect the first franchise win on the margins, as well as hit the buzzer-beating game-winner, Sarah did all of that again, and this time tied for the most points scored on the team. Simply an MVP game from SAB.

A rock fight, back-and-forth game that gave the Fire an opportunity to compete in, and win, a game in a clutch scenario. These experiences are incredibly valuable, and will pay dividends for the players and the coaches. A blowout win will also be a good experience for this team to get someday (😂), but the Fire are 2-for-2 in clutch games, and you definitely take that.

The Fire wrap-up their opening 4 game homestand with a 2-2 record, which is better than I would have expected. Getting a win against Chicago or New York was a big ask, and getting a win against anyone in the league is far from guaranteed for this expansion team.

Up next, the Fire play their first ever road games: three straight games away from home. Their first? Kelsey Mitchell and Caitlin Clark’s Indiana Fever. Let’s hope for healthy ankles all around.

Have questions? Submit them through the link below, and I’ll answer them periodically!

Points per Possession - how many points a team scores for every possession they have

Effective Field-Goal Percent (eFG%) - field goal percentage with weight added to three-point shots

Turnover Percent (TOV%) - percent of possessions that ended in a turnover

Offensive Rebound Percent (OREB%) - percent of a team’s own misses that they rebounded

Free-Throw Rate (FTRate) - how many free throws a team makes per 100 possessions