Lynx lose to last-place Fever as Napheesa Collier struggles with fouls, shot

How the Lynx fare when Napheesa Collier struggles to score is difficult to predict.

What happens when she's not on the floor isn't.

Once Collier fell into early foul trouble Thursday, an Indiana Fever team that had lost nine of its previous 11 games took advantage and didn't look back. As her teammates failed to fill in the gaps, Collier's rough night resulted in a 91-73 Fever victory at Gainbridge Fieldhouse that dropped the Lynx to 14-16.

"Anytime [Napheesa's] off the court, it's a different look for us," fellow frontcourt starter Jessica Shepard said.

"Defensively, she impacts plays. Offensively, obviously she's our go-to player."

The three-time All-Star forward missed her first seven shot attempts and failed to record her first points until the 5:34 mark in the third quarter, after she scored a combined 50 points in the Lynx's two previous meetings with Indiana.

By game's end, Collier had eight points on 3-of-12 shooting, with five rebounds, two assists and two turnovers.

And yet, the Fever only led by a modest six points when she was subbed out with three fouls and 3:44 left in the first half. Just possessions later, the Lynx even cut their deficit to as few as two points.

But the absence of their top rebounder proved too much to overcome.

Indiana finished the half on a 10-2 run, which was kickstarted by a stretch of eight unanswered points — three of which were tallied at the end of a possession that included five offensive rebounds. NaLyssa Smith, a strong 6-4 forward, nabbed two of them and tapped out another. Kelsey Mitchell then eventually downed the long-range jumper, moments removed from an earlier miss.

"In that moment, we definitely needed her," Shepard said.

"It's inexcusable for us to give up that many offensive rebounds on one possession, and that was really a momentum killer. I mean, when you see them grab five offensive rebounds in one possession, that just shows how much they wanted it and how little we were giving."

It therefore mattered less that Rachel Banham, who finished with 18 points, hit a few threes and a jumper for 11 first-half points off the bench, or that Shepard made all three of her field goals and five free throws to score 11 of her 13 points after two quarters.

The story of the half, and then the game, arguably revolved around the Fever's eight offensive rebounds, the mark of an overwhelming interior presence that only grew as the evening progressed.

Aliyah Boston crashed the boards as much as anyone, and she pulled in 13 rebounds — five offensive — to steer Indiana to a 39-26 rebounding advantage.

"We got out-everything today, from an effort standpoint," said Lynx coach Cheryl Reeve. "Indiana came with a sense of urgency and a passion to win the game that we lacked for whatever reason. You can fix things by playing harder, so we'll start there. … We're not a team that can just show up and just play the game."

Although Reeve said 6-5 backup center Dorka Juhász would not face a specific minutes restriction in her return from a right hamstring injury, she had minimal impact with four rebounds and one assist in only 13 minutes of action. She last played less than 20 minutes on June 20, when a steal was her only recorded statistic across eight minutes of playing time.

Now that her squad is fully healthy for the first time since late May, Reeve indicated that she especially will have to figure out the best rotation for her bigs; Collier, Shepard, Juhász and Nina Milić each have dealt with at least one injury this year.

The Fever pounded the ball inside against them, scoring 34 points in the paint.

"Indiana ran their stuff with such intentionality and pace, and then we lacked that," Reeve said. "We've got to kind of look at that and go, 'OK, when we have certain groups out there, what are we running?' "

The Star Tribune did not send the writer of this article to the game. This was written using a broadcast, interviews and other material.