Dropping a game to the league-leading Minnesota Lynx is not enough to spark frustrations for Las Vegas Aces coach Becky Hammon just yet. Her team has now recorded its 12th loss of the season, just two shy of its total regular-season losses last year. However, there is no cause for alarm according to Hammon.
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Speaking in the postgame press conference, a video of which The Sports Tribune’s Arion Armeniakos shared on his X page, Hammon addressed the Aces’ performance.
“Yeah, all things considered, I mean, I’m not too terribly upset. I understand that there’s definitely some things that we can do better. I thought Minnesota played great. They did what they needed to do. I’m still more concerned with our group and us trying to get to a point where we’re clicking on all cylinders and I don’t know if we were there yet, clicking on all cylinders night in and night out. Not defensively, not offensively, so we still have room for growth and at the end of the day, I mean, we lose by five and I don’t think we did some things particularly well, so I’m optimistic in those ways.”
The Aces fell 92-87, their second loss to Minnesota in three meetings this season. For coach Hammon, however, this loss is not a major concern, even though she agrees that the team still needs to be better in a number of other aspects of the game.
Her perspective is understandable, with the Aces losing by just five points to a league-leading Lynx team in red-hot form all season. In fact, when responding to another of Armeniakos’ questions in a pregame interview, Becky Hammon described the Lynx as the measure for success this season, per another X post by Armeniakos.
“Every team is different. To me, Minnesota is the ultimate measuring stick. They’ve been the best team all year. They play with a consistency that great teams have to play with. Is this game going to tell the whole story [about the Aces]? No. But I think it will give us a decent look at where we are and where we want to be. But after today, we’re still not going to be where we want to be.”
As it appears, Coach Becky Hammon has picked up the message she needed from this loss. It’s not frustration or anger. It’s an awareness of the level they are at, which will direct their efforts towards being better equipped going forward. As the playoffs are closing in, the Aces will need to make the changes sooner rather than later.