On a clear spring evening at Climate Pledge Arena, the Seattle Storm laced up to take on the visiting Dallas Wings. The Wings, despite an early lead, could not weather the Storm and fell 83-77, bringing them down to the very bottom of the standings with a disappointing record of 1-7. The Storm broke their 3-game losing streak and improved to 4-4 for a 6th place spot in the standings.

The Wings were missing one of their star players, the number one 2025 draft pick and national collegiate champion guard Paige Bueckers. She suffered a concussion during a game against the Sky and sat out this game in Seattle. Bueckers is the Wings’ second-leading scorer, only behind guard Arike Ogunbowale.

Still, even without Bueckers, they came out of the gates moving and shooting the ball well. In the first quarter, Ogunbowale was very successful in the isolation game, making multiple contested midrange stepbacks. Seattle was kept in the game by back-to-back threes from center Li Yueru.

The game stayed close from there, and Seattle’s interior defense made it difficult for the Wings to score close to the basket. Forward-Center Ezi Magbegor tallied three blocks in just the first quarter, and the teams headed into the break with Dallas only up one point.

In the second quarter, the Storm opened by going up by five points in the first minute and a half of the quarter, their first lead of the game. Despite the start, Dallas’ started to take advantage of Seattle’s aggressive help defense and found a lot of open cuts to the basket, quickly catching up and overtaking the Storm.

Again, Seattle’s defense tried their best—Magbegor had two more blocks in the quarter, bringing her to five blocks before the half. However, their shots couldn’t fall, and Dallas’ scoring culminated with a buzzer-beater 3-pointer by center Luisa Geiselsoder to give the Wings a comfortable eight-point lead going into the halftime break.

According to Storm forward Gabby Williams, coach Noelle Quinn told the players in an impassioned speech that they wouldn’t be able to win if they didn’t get back into the flow of the game and play with intensity.

“In Noelle’s halftime speech, she talked to us about just getting out of our heads, you know? I think we suffer a lot from paralysis by analysis, and we just need to play basketball,” forward Nneka Ogwumike said.

The speech seemed to work, as the Storm quickly started chipping away at the Dallas lead. Despite a Williams ankle injury early in the quarter, the Storm grabbed hold of the game as guard Erica Wheeler came in and gave them an explosive burst in scoring. Her aggression and ability to drive and kick the ball made her a motor for the offense, and strong defensive play shuttered the Wings’ offense and completely nullified their original lead. Quinn acknowledged how important having a veteran like Wheeler is.

“It is good to have that, like, that boom. [Erica] understands the moments in this league, she also understands her role, she understands how to be a great teammate and that energy becomes contagious,” Quinn said.

The Storm went on a 16-2 run in the third, but for Williams, it wasn’t about extending the run—it was about taking each possession one at a time.

“I didn’t even realize that we were going that much of a run, because like I said, it was about winning each possession,” Williams said.

In the fourth quarter, the Wings struggled to play against the Storm’s defense. Ogunbowale, the Wings’ leading scorer, fizzled out after a good first quarter and only had eight points for the game on 4-15 shooting. Both Quinn and Williams emphasized the importance of their active defense and how it kept them in the game, allowing them to score.

“We had 33 deflections. I thought that was an indicator of our defense just moving and finding the spots to impact on the end of the floor. We’re physical, we’re communicative, we’re on a string and we really use that as a catalyst for our offense,” Quinn said.

Williams added that the defensive intensity was much better than their other games, but emphasized that they needed to bring that intensity to their rebounding, as they were obliterated in the offensive rebound game, only having three to the Wings’ 20.

“[Our defensive intensity was] much better, though now we’ve got to rebound. We’ve just got [to] rebound and finish these possessions out, but it’s a step in the right direction,” Williams said.

The Storm extended their lead and ran with it in the fourth quarter. Despite some squabbles with Wings players and some hard fouls, the Wings were unable to regain momentum, which wasn’t helped by their turnovers and missed shots. Their bench ended up with 30 points, and players like Williams and guard Zia Cooke were instrumental to the Storm’s win.

While this loss solidified the Wings’ spot as the worst team in the WNBA, the Storm escaped their losing streak and hope to improve their situation in the middle of the standings. Their next game is against the Phoenix Mercury, where the Storm will hope to once again establish a winning record.