So who says NBA officials always steal the attention? The league and its referees reached an agreement - very quietly reached an agreement - on a new five-year deal that was ratified by the owners Thursday in Dallas. (This means the refs occupied at least a few minutes of the owners' time amid discussions about their labor impasse with the players). The refs were working on a two-year deal they signed in 2009, but only after a league-imposed lockout left them watching replacement refs turn preseason games into even slower, more laborious, overregulated endeavors than usual. This year, the refs were up against it. With the players and leagues feuding, it was pretty wise to take what they could get, including the stability of a five-year contract.
Remember the WNBA
I saw a few familiar faces during the ESPN2 telecast of the New York Liberty-Indiana Fever opening round playoff game at Conseco Fieldhouse. Former Monarchs coach John Whisenant, who in his first year with the club, guided the franchise into tghe WNBA Playoffs, was there on the sidelines, arms crossed most of the time, as usual. In the deciding final minute, Nicole Powell, whose last-second jumper in Houston made the Monarchs' 2005 WNBA Championship possible, inbounded the ball to a wide open Cappie Pondexter for what would have been a game-winning three at the buzzer. Instead, the ball bounded off the back of the rim, enabling the Fever to capture the best-of-three series opener.
Yeah, we miss the Monarchs.
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