Storm Surrender 27-Point Fourth Quarter In Road Loss To Sun
By Christan Braswell, edited by Charles Hamaker
Uncasville, CT - The halfway point in the 2025 WNBA season has come and gone, with one thing being painfully clear about the Seattle Storm. Through 20 games, the team is consistently inconsistent. Don’t take it just from fans, because players and head coach Noelle Quinn have repeated the phrase several times.
After beating the defending champion New York Liberty on Sunday for the second time this season, Seattle proved the phrase to be true once again by losing to the Connecticut Sun, 93-83.
Before beating the Storm on Wednesday, the Sun won their last game 31 days ago back on June 8th. The last time the team scored 90-plus points was on October 8th in the 2024 WNBA Semifinals against the Minnesota Lynx. Both streaks were ended against a Seattle team that holds championship aspirations.
Storm stars Skylar Diggins and Ezi Magbegor led the charge in the opening frame, where Diggins scored or assisted on six of Seattle’s first seven possessions, good for eight points and three assists. Magbegor had a new season-high (14 points) in Sunday’s win over the New York Liberty. Against the Sun, she scored eight points to start, combining with Diggins for 18 of the Storm’s 27 first-quarter points.
A balanced Sun scoring attack in the second quarter, where three players scored six points or more, kept the team within striking distance. Sun center and future Hall of Famer Tina Charles finished with a double-double and led all scorers with 29 points and eleven rebounds. Three other Connecticut players tallied double figures as well.
After taking an eight-point lead into halftime, the Saniya Rivers show took center stage to start the second half, scoring or assisting on 11 of the Sun’s first 16 points. Diggins did all she could to keep Seattle in the fight with a four-point play at the end of the third quarter to increase the lead to eight at 74-66. From that point on, Seattle’s light went out and the team stopped competing.
“A lack of focus, I don’t know,” said Williams. “You can say a million things about it. I think the fourth quarter, we started to panic. I will be the first one to say that we disrespected Connecticut today. We got what we deserved. That’s a team with a Hall of Famer; they’re professionals. They still can hoop, and we disrespected them. I think we went, okay, we’re up. Now we can relax, and we just stopped playing basketball, so we got what we deserved today.”
Connecticut crafted a 27-9 stretch with mini runs in the final frame, holding the Storm to a single point for the first three minutes before Williams scored at 6:57. The Sun then went on a mini 7-0 run after Williams’ bucket. Missed free throws, poor communication, and a clear panic set in, as Williams previously stated. Connecticut had 11 points off six Storm turnovers in the fourth alone, ending any chance of a storied comeback against the worst team in the WNBA.
Quick Storm notes
Seattle outscored Connecticut 26-12 in the paint before halftime, tying the Storm’s largest positive paint scoring differential in a half so far this season at +14.
Four of the five Storm starters reached double figures in scoring during the first half.
Erica Wheeler and Skylar Diggins each recorded at least five assists before halftime, marking the third time this season that a pair of Storm teammates each recorded five or more assists in the same half. The rest of the league has only combined for three such halves in 2025.
Skylar Diggins and Gabby Williams each exceeded 20 points, marking the 10th time this season that a pair of Storm teammates scored at least 20 points each, which is tied for the most by any WNBA team in 2025.
Skylar Diggins led the Storm with 23 points, seven assists, three rebounds, and a steal. Diggins tied Courtney Vandersloot for the second-most career games with at least 15 points and seven assists (66). This marks Diggins’ career-best 12th consecutive game with a three-pointer and 20th consecutive game with at least one free throw made, which is the WNBA’s second-longest active streak. Diggins has now scored 20 points 117 times, which is tied for 16th in WNBA history.
Gabby Williams matched her season high with 21 points on 64.3% (9-for-14) shooting from the field and 40% (2-for-5) from deep while knocking down the 100th three-pointer of her career.
Ezi Magbegor got off to a hot start with eight points on 80% (4-for-5) shooting from the field in the first quarter to match her highest-scoring quarter of the season and scored 10 points in the first half to tie her season high for points in a half. Magbegor finished with 13 points, five rebounds and three assists, including her 300th career assist. Magbegor also passed Betty Lennox for 11th on the Storm’s franchise assists list (302).
Erica Wheeler dropped 10 points with seven assists and a steal while knocking down 40% (2-for-5) of her attempts from beyond the arc. Wheeler has recorded a steal in 13 consecutive games, tied for the seventh-longest steals streak in franchise history, and has made at least one three-pointer in a career-best nine consecutive games. Wheeler dished out six assists in the first half to set her season high for assists in a single half.
Nneka Ogwumike scored 12 points with a game-high 12 rebounds for her 12th double-double in a Storm uniform, which moves her past Janelle Burse for the sixth-most double-doubles in Storm franchise history. Ogwumike has recorded 113 career double-doubles, which ranks fifth in WNBA history.
Alysha Clark led the Storm’s reserves with four points and three rebounds in her 400th career game.
What’s next?
Following this morning loss to the Connecticut Sun to close out this four-game road trip, our Seattle Storm return home to Climate Pledge Arena to begin a four-game homestand that begins with a rematch against this Sun side. That comes on Friday, July 11th with a tipoff time of 7PM PDT in a game that will be broadcast live on ION as the Storm will look for a bounce back effort after this frustrating loss against Connecticut. The Sun will surely be looking to build off the momentum of this game when the teams meet in Seattle on Friday, but following the frustration of this defeat the Storm will surely be searching for a big bounce back effort to reassert themselves and get back on track ahead of the WNBA All-Star break.
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