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When the Miami Sol ceased operations following the 2002 WNBA season, the team's all-time leading scorer, forward/guard Sheri Sam, was bitterly disappointed.
"I thought this was our year at Miami," Sam told the Minneapolis Star-Tribune last summer. "With our core coming back, and a top-three pick, I really think we could have won the East and pushed for a championship this year."
Sam's words echo those of Seattle Storm assistant coach Jenny Boucek to STORM.WNBA.COM earlier this off-season. Boucek and Sam may not have been able to accomplish those goals in Miami, but, reunited in Seattle - along with the Sol's shooting guards in 2002, Sandy Brondello and Betty Lennox - they have the chance to do the same with the Storm.
When Sam went to Miami, it was after being waived by the Orlando Miracle, despite having averaged 11.4 points and 4.6 rebounds per game the previous season as a starter. The Sol gave Sam a new start, and she quickly found her way into the starting lineup and emerged as Miami's go-to player, along with Brondello. She would flourish in the role over the next two seasons, boosting her scoring average to 14.5 points per game during the 2002 season, good for 15th in the WNBA and fifth in the Eastern Conference. For her efforts, Sam earned her first trip to the WNBA All-Star Game, playing 19 minutes, scoring seven points and grabbing five rebounds.
Sam finished her Miami career as the franchise's all-time leading scorer with 1,303 points, and also leads the franchise in 13 other categories - records, alas, that will never be broken.
Selected second overall in the Dispersal Draft (a pick before Lennox, meaning the Storm now has two of the top three picks in last year's Dispersal Draft), Sam ended up in Minnesota, where she wasn't really needed. The Lynx already had an All-WNBA shooting guard, Katie Smith, as well as Svetlana Abrosimova at small forward. To best make use of her talent, Minnesota Coach Suzie McConnell Serio went small, using Abrosimova at power forward and shifting Tamika Williams to the middle.
The lineup was effective for Minnesota, but Sam never quite felt comfortable.
"I still don't feel like I'm 100 percent clicking," she told the Star-Tribune. "I try to go out, read things and fit in where I can. But it's still hard, and I'm still adjusting."
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In Seattle, Sam should be more comfortable. She'll play her natural small forward, occasionally teaming with the Storm's incumbent small forward, Adia Barnes, who the team would consider the shooting guard in that alignment. Sam gives the Storm a multitude of skills in that role. She averaged 2.6 assists per game last year, a mark which would have placed her second on the Storm behind All-Star point guard Sue Bird, and had a fine 1.83 assist/turnover ratio which placed her in the WNBA's top twenty. Sam's 4.2 rebounds per game would have been third on the team, and Sam is a quality defender who finished fifth in the league with 2.2 steals per game during her final season in Miami.
Sam is best known as a scorer, a role that will be tempered somewhat alongside Bird and Lauren Jackson. Still, she makes the Storm a much more dangerous offensive team by giving them a fourth double-figure scorer in the starting lineup.
On Aug. 14 last season, Sam became the 25th player in WNBA history to reach 2,000 career points, finishing the year with 2,041. When you add in the 1,388 points she scored in the ABL with the San Jose Lasers, Sam is at 3,429 points for her professional career, making her one of the all-time leading scorers in the history of women's professional basketball.
The Storm would really like it if Sam could improve on her 38.3% shooting percentage from last season. She was above 43% each of her last two years in Miami, including 34.2% from downtown in 2002. With Bird and Jackson creating double-teams and shots for Sam, her shooting percentage can be expected to rise.
And maybe, just maybe, four Sol refugees will find the success they were hoping to achieve in Miami.
