Connecticut Sun fall out of first place

                                                                 MOHEGAN — Kara Lawson stepped into the lane with just under four minutes to play with a wide open seven-foot jumper.

It fell short, barely grazing the front of the net on its way down into the hands of an Indiana defender.

“I can speak for myself, it’s frustrating. Those are good looks, ones that I’m really confident will go in,” the Connecticut Sun guard said. “You feel a little frustrated because in a game that was close, you let your team down because you didn’t do what you’re supposed to do.”

The veteran guard wasn’t the only one.

There were plenty of stories similar to Lawson’s as the Sun made a season-worst 22 of 72 shots (30.6 percent) and lost for the fourth time in five games to the Indiana Fever, 69-58, Thursday night at Mohegan Sun Arena.

What made it hurt a little worse was the game was for first place in the Eastern Conference and the Fever (12-6) were playing without their second-leading scorer, Katie Douglas, due to illness. It also ended Connecticut’s seven-game home winning streak.

“You just have to have a short-term memory — it happens — first time it has probably happened this bad in a while, but you have to move on,” Asjha Jones said.

It took Connecticut (10-6) four minutes and four seconds to score its first basket of the game, a jumper by Tina Charles (13 points, 10 rebounds). The Sun didn’t get out of the single digits in the first quarter and were still at just nine points with 7:17 left in the first half.

“I thought Indiana came out defensively with high, high energy and I thought for the most part we matched it. I didn’t know if either team was going to get past 10 in the first quarter,” Sun coach Mike Thibault said.

The Sun fell behind by as many as 17 in the first half, but Indiana was having its offensive troubles, too. The Fever shot only 33 percent for the game and let the Sun back in. It was just a nine point game at the half and Connecticut closed within three points with 5:27 left in the third quarter, 41-38, but never led.

“We had people who make shots wide open, had wide-open threes, but they didn’t go in,” Jones said. “We got the shots we wanted down the stretch, they just didn’t fall.”

The top four scorers for the Sun combined to shoot 12-for-47.

While Thibault was pleased for the most part with his defense, the Sun did allow 5-foot-2 guard Shannon Bobbitt to score a career-high 13 points.

“I felt we let her have a huge effect on the game,” Thibault said of the third-year guard. “I don’t mean that negatively toward her, but she’s not normally a 13-point per game scorer, and when you allow somebody to do that it hurts everything else you’re doing.”