What's Wrong With My Comets?

photos-Crystal Smith hustling for ball, Comets coach Karleen Thompson, Tina Thompson, Michelle Snow and Sheryl Swoopes.

One thing about me that didn't change with transition is that I'm a huge sports fan. And one of the sports that I love is basketball, be it college or pro.

I'm also a huge WNBA and Houston Comets fan. I frequently attended Comets games when the WNBA started play in 1997 before I finally got smart and purchased my season tickets before the 1999 season. I enjoyed being in Compaq Center's Section 126 watching the Comets dominate the league by winning four straight titles from 1997-2000.

I knew going into this 2007 WNBA season that it might be a tough one despite the fact they made it to the Western Conference finals before falling to Sacramento. There were a lot of changes in Cometland during the off season. A new owner in Hilton Koch. With Van Chancellor leaving to take the LSU women's job Karleen Thompson got elevated to become head coach and general manager. There were new faces in the lineup like first round draft pick Ashley Shields and vets Latasha Byears and Crystal Smith. But I was also comforted by the fact that we had Olympians Sheryl Swoopes and Tina Thompson in the lineup.

The 2007 version of the Comets started off losing their first 10 games before they finally broke through to beat the LA Sparks 74-64 on June 20. They followed that up by beating down the Washington Mystics 95-85. They had two games coming up with the Phoenix Mercury, who would have to play both of them with all-everything player Diana Taurasi serving a two-game suspension and Cappie Poindexter suffering an injury.

So the Comets bad luck was finally changing, right?

Nope. I caught today's broadband broadcast of the game and saw why they are losing. Inconsistent defense. Poor basketball decisions at various times and especially down the stretch. Too many forced shots. They play like the old champs with aggressive energy and suffocating defense for stretches of the games, but disappear at critical times.

Ashley Shields is a talented ballplayer but her shot selection is horrendous. You have the WNBA's second all-time leading scorer in Tina Thompson on your squad and she barely touches the ball in the 3rd and 4th quarters. Michelle Snow has yet to become the dominant player she has the talent to be. She's 6'5", dunked in college at Tennessee, but sometimes is just too passive when the Comets need her to be a nasty, shot blocking, snatch-the-rebound-off-the-glass inside the paint force, especially at crunch time.

One thing I do give them credit for is the Comets play hard and never quit. That's all you can ask as a fan. I have no doubts that Karleen Thompson is going to be a good coach in this league. She played at USC with Tina Thompson and LA's Lisa Leslie, was an assistant with Michael Cooper's LA Sparks teams that won WNBA titles in 2001-2002 and has been on Van Chancellor's last two staffs. She's learned from two of the best coaches in the game and I know nothing would please her more than getting the Comets back to elite level status. Sheryl being out for the next two to four weeks with a back injury hasn't helped either.

I love my girls, but they have major work to do just to get into the top four teams in the Western Conference to qualify for the playoffs. Even if they do, it'll be a short stay. I don't see it happening unless they start playing 40 minute ballgames and not 10, 20 or 30 minute ones.