Former Connecticut Sun guard signed with the Seattle Storm on Wednesday. Phillips was signed as an unrestricted free agent.

A year ago the Sun was close to trading Phillips' rights but the deal fell through. My understanding of Phillips' situation was that her rights would be owned by the Sun and she would be classified as a "reserve" player as long as they offered her a contract. Obviously that is no longer the case or Seattle would not have been able to sign her as an unrestricted free agent.

Before UConn's game against Oklahoma on Monday, Thibault, assistant coach Scott Hawk and general manager Chris Sienko will be sitting down with members of the media so we'll be able to find out the dynamics of Phillips' situation but the bottom line is she was not going to come back to Connecticut so good for her that she was able to sign up with the defending WNBA champions.

With the Sun getting nothing in return for Phillips and Anete Jekabsone-Zogota's decision to skip the upcoming WNBA season, it would appear as if Danielle McCray will be playing a rather crucial role for the Sun in the upcoming season.

McCray is playing well in Israel, averaging 17.2 points, 7.8 rebounds, 3 assists and 1.8 steals per game for Hapoel Rishon Lezion. She is one of three Connecticut Sun players in Israel as Kerri Gardin is averaging 16.5 points, 12.2 rebounds, 2.2 assists and 2.2 steals for Elizur Holon and Renee Montgomery is averaging 18.4 points, 3.9 assists and 2.1 steals for Maccabi Ashdod.

Staying on the subject of overseas basketball, the first round series in the EuroLeague are now all in the books.

Ros Casares, Cras Basket Taranto, Bourges Basket and four-time defending champion Spartak Moscow Region won the decisive third games on Wednesday. Former UConn star Sue Bird had 18 points, four rebounds and three assists in Spartak's 69-63 victory over Beretta-Famila.

The quarterfinals begin on Feb. 22 with Fenerbahce playing Spartak, UMMC Ekaterinburg (led by the Connecticut Sun's Sandrine Gruda) facing Cras Basket Taranto, Wisla Can-Pack meeting Halcon Avenida and Ros Casares playing Bourges Basket. A player to watch for Halcon Avenida is Alba Torrens, who is averaging 16.3 points per game. Her WNBA rights are owned by the Sun but there's no word about whether she plans to come over to the U.S. after playing for Spain in the EuroCup.

UConn senior forward Maya Moore was one of five players named to the Academic District 1 University first team making her a candidate for Academic All-American honors once again.

Moore carries a 3.70 with an individualized major titled "sports, media and promotion." She is not only leading UConn with a 24 point per game scoring average but also is top in rebounds (8.1), assists (4.0), steals (2.4) and blocks (1.4).

Amherst's Jaci Daignault was named to the District 1 College first team as the psychology major with a 3.4 GPA and is the leading scorer with an average of 14.5 points per game for the 19-1 Lord Jeffs.

St. John's DaShena Stevens, a former Trinity Catholic star, as well as Sacred Heart teammates Callan Taylor and Kiley Evans were second team District 1 University selections.


SUN RE-SIGN WHITE, GARDIN
The Connecticut Sun are bringing back guards Tan White and Kerri Gardin.

White was signed to a two-year contract while Gardin was inked to a training camp contract.

Here's a link to the official release from the Sun

Pretty sure it wasn't the intention of either team, but the Connecticut Sun and New York Liberty managed to extend the WNBA preseason schedule all by themselves.

The Tuesday morning game needed three overtimes before the host Liberty emerged with an 89-84 win. Make no mistake, this was an exhibition in name only. The players and coaches pulled out all the stops in this one.

The play of the game was Cappie Pondexter's block of a Kara Lawson layup attempt in the second overtime. If Lawson converts, Connecticut is up four with less than 20 seconds to go. Instead Pondexter blocked the shot, grabbed the ball and fired an outlet pass to Essence Carson for the game-tying basket. Even more impressive was that Pondexter made the play shortly after picking up her fifth foul.

A few observations:
First, at first glance the lines of Pondexter (14 points, 11 rebounds, 8 assists) and Montgomery (8 points, four rebounds and three assists) look decent but they were a combined 10 of 40 from the floor. Montgomery had as shaky a game as I have seen from her. Twice she was stripped clean of the ball near midcourt, first by Pondexter and then by Leilani Mitchell. She had chances to win the game at the end of regulation and with time running out in the second overtime and misfired badly.

Second, whoever was keeping offensive rebound stats were not watching the same game I was. The final totals had Connecticut with 19 and New York with 16. I find those numbers hard to believe. NY owned the offensive glass and wish I had a tape of the game to break down the numbers.

Third, Tan White is going to make quite an impact for the Sun this season. She had eight points in rapid succession the last time out and on Tuesday she was phenomenal defensively on Pondexter. The number that jumps out at me is that White played 33:15 with a fair chunk of that time guarding Pondexter and was not called for a foul. It was quite impressive.

I also found it interesting the way the coaches divvied up minutes. In the second quarter the Sun used nine players and the Liberty 11 but in overtime both coaches went mostly with a six-player rotation. Connecticut Sun coach Mike Thibault did not make a sub in either the first or second overtime and was forced to make a move when Montgomery fouled out in the third overtime. It does not bode well that undrafted rookies May Kotsopoulos and Judie Lomax did not get in the game for the Sun. Kerri Gardin played 7:27 in the second quarter and did not play again.

For New York, Sidney Spencer did not play in the fourth quarter or any of the three overtimes, Ashley Houts did not play after seeing 4:35 of action in the second quarter while Erlana Larkins also saw a decent amount of playing time in the second quarter but never came back in again. While I have no idea what is going through the minds of Thibault and his New York coaching counterpart Ann Donovan, I would not be surprised to see either team scouring the waiver wire. There are going to be some very good players cut in the next couple of days. Erica White was just cut by Atlanta and I think she would be a nice fit as a reserve point guard in New York. Will Connecticut look at grab a wing? It's kind of hard to bring in a player just to be here until Sandrine Gruda reports but Thibault made it clear he will keep his eyes open. Would the recent news that Phoenix cut former Oklahoma stars Nyeshia Stevenson and Ashley Paris pique his interest? Time will tell.

One player not getting cut is former UConn star Kalana Greene. I spoke to the New York Liberty after she shared team scoring honors with 14 points and although there was not room for a story on her in tomorrow's paper, I will be putting together a story on her which should run in the next day or two.

Tina Charles ushered in her professional career with 21 points, 9 rebounds, 3 steals and 6 blocks as she led the Connecticut Sun to an 86-79 win over the Atlanta Dream.

Connecticut Sun coach Mike Thibault was quick to point out that Charles didn't do her damage against Atlanta's dynamic frontcourt duo of Erika de Souza and Sancho Lyttle but on the other hand, UConn's all-time leading scorer and rebounder didn't have All-Star Asjha Jones and rising star Sandrine Gruda on the court to take some of the defensive attention off of her.

Charles' output is the most for a Connecticut Sun player in a preseason game since Nykesha Sales, whose UConn scoring record Charles broke, dropped 30 on Phoenix in 2006.

Charles took her impressive debut in stride.

"I was calm," Charles said. "I was fine, I came into the game like any other game I have been playing my senior year. I have teammates who have confidence in me and respect my game, know what I can do is a good thing and it makes me want to go out and perform my best. I feel like that is what I have been developing my game to be my whole life is to be a go-to player, somebody you can count on, somebody your teammate will have respect for and that is something that Coach (Geno) Auriemma taught me that it is not about the wins, it is about having the respect of your teammates."

Connecticut had four players score in double figures and three are rookies as fellow first-round pick Kelsey Griffin had 11 points and second-round selection Allison Hightower finished with 10. Second-year guard Renee Montgomery, acquired in a trade which netted the Sun the No. 1 overall pick in exchange for Lindsay Whalen and the second overall pick, had 12 points and four assists.

If it wasn't clear before, the roster situation is pretty easy to decipher for the Sun. Charles, Griffin, Hightower and Montgomery will be joined on the opening day roster by Jones, DeMya Walker, Kara Lawson, Kerri Gardin, Tan White and Anete Jekabsone-Zogota. Since Sandrine Gruda won't be reporting until early June, the Sun can keep one of its training camp invitees until Gruda is put on the active roster. If I was guessing, I would say it will come down to Pauline Love and Judie Lomax vying for that spot. Watching Thibault pull aside Love for an extended coaching session late in Tuesday's preseason game would lead me to deduce that Love, who had more than 1,500 points and 1,000 rebounds in three seasons at Southern Mississippi, is a frontrunner to make the cut but I thought 2009 second-round pick Lyndra Littles was going to be around longer than she was in the 2009 training camp.

The Sun will have an open practice from 5-7 p.m. at St. Joseph College in West Hartford on Wednesday. Fans can watch the practice for free and there will be an autograph session following practice.

This is a busy week for Charles. She will take the last of her college exams on Wednesday, have another exhibition game on Friday and graduate on Sunday. Charles spoke about what figures to be an emotional day on Sunday as graduation day will be her final official act of what has been a special four years for her at UConn.

"It is going to be really important because my family has (had) my back my whole four years at UConn and they see the basketball aspect but now they get to take in what I have been doing academically," Charles said.

Among the interest spectators at Monday's Connecticut Sun practice was Sacred Heart coach Ed Swanson who was on hand to watch his former player Kaitlin Sowinski take part in training camp as an undrafted free agent.

With Sacred Heart set to play UConn on Dec. 5, naturally I spent some time with Swanson before doing my interviews with Sun players to get his take on playing the Huskies for the second time (UConn won 82-40 on Dec. 31, 2006).

At least one high-ranking official at Sacred Heart basically asked Swanson
"are you nuts" when news surfaced that the Pioneers was facing UConn. But with a veteran squad capable to win the Northeast Conference title, Swanson believes the time is right to play the Huskies again.

"With a senior-laden backcourt, a couple juniors so I think we have some people who can handle that situation," Swanson said. "It's the best RPI game in the country and it is an experience. Our players want to experience it. They grew up watching UConn and watched it the last two years (when UConn won an NCAA Division I record 78 straight games). It is as much about the experience from the game and helping us grow a little and gain a little bit more exposure for our program.

"They call specific years but I don't think if a team is young ... We have Alicia Apo, Maggie Cosgrove, Mo Reilly will be seniors and Callan Taylor will be a junior, that will help them a little bit and help our program mature at a different pace."

Swanson has positive memories from that 2006 game against UConn.

"If you remember that game, we were up five with five minutes to go in the first half and from that point on, I wish the game could have ended then," Swanson said. "They were a top 10 program and we got something out of it. That was the game where we kind of gained a lot of momentum for the rest of the year.

"We got exactly out of it what we wanted to and hopefully next year we will take that same mindset into the game. They say that everything is great leading up to the game except for the game and I look at it the other way, I'm hoping we get something out of it that we can parlay (into the NEC season)."

Naturally Swanson was fired up to see Sowinski getting a chance to earn a spot on the Sun. While the odds are stacked against her, it was still a special moment for Swanson and his two assistant coaches who were also in attendance.

"It is exciting to see one of our players at this level," Swanson said. "I thought a couple years ago Amanda Pape could have been (in a WNBA camp). She played overseas and didn't have as good of an experience as Caitlin did but it is great to see a kid who came in and as a freshman averaged 3 points and 3 rebounds on our '06 (Northeast Conference championship team) and now is in a WNBA camp."


Now for a few notes from Monday's practice. Tina Charles was not there, she was back at UConn taking a final exam and will graduate on Sunday. Her fellow rookies will be bypassing their graduation ceremonies. Nebraska's graduation is Saturday but Kelsey Griffin is not planning to fly back for the ceremony. LSU's graduation is May 21 but rookie guard Allison Hightower will be in uniform with the Sun for a game at Atlanta that day rather than accepting her degree. Hightower did say that LSU was willing to allow her to walk across the stage during the graduation ceremony in the fall so her family can bask with her in her special moment.

Asjha Jones missed practice again as she recovers from surgery to clean out debris in her left Achilles tendon. She is hoping to be cleared to practice next week. Connecticut Sun coach Mike Thibault said she would probably need to practice at least twice before he would consider playing her in the May 15 season opener against Chicago.

"I don't want her playing until everybody is comfortable. I want her being comfortable, I want them to be comfortable with it," Thibault said. "If it is the first game, great. If it is the second game, OK, I'll live with that. It is the long haul that is important. The plan is still for her to practice next week, we'll see. I don't want her reinjuring herself because she came back too soon."

Thibault said Anete Jekabsone-Zogota could practice as soon as Sunday which means she could see time in the preseason finale against New York on May 11. Sandrine Gruda is still planning to stay in Europe for a bit and probably won't report until the first week of camp.

Kara Lawson, Renee Montgomery, Kerri Gardin, DeMya Walker and Charles is the expected starting lineup for Tuesday's 11 a.m. exhibition game against Atlanta. Guard Sha Brooks, slowed by a quadriceps injury, missed practice on Monday and is questionable for Tuesday's exhibition game.

Although Thibault doesn't have to make a cut until Jekabsone-Zogota reports, he said he may make some moves in the middle of the week. However, it will be a one-way street as a lack of cap space will prevent the Sun from claiming a veteran off waivers without cutting another veteran.

It seems rather clear that Connecticut's roster will consist of Montgomery, Lawson, Jones, Gardin, Walker, Charles, Griffin, Hightower, Tan White, Jekabsone-Zogota and Gruda. One spot is available until Gruda reports meaning one of the six free agent invitees (Sowinski, Brooks, former Columbia star Judie Lomax, ex-Vermont standout May Kotsopoulos, Southern Mississippi product Pauline Love and former Cleveland State star Kailey Klein) appear to be vying for the one roster spot available until Gruda is added to the active roster.

If the Sun is looking to add a candidate for the WNBA's All-interview team to the roster, it would be wise to put in a claim for former Penn State star Tyra Grant, who was cut by Phoenix on Monday.

Grant was the Mercury's second-round pick (No. 24 overall) in April's WNBA draft. During Grant's junior season, Penn State was playing UConn in the Maggie Dixon Classic. With Penn State having a home game against Dayton the same weekend that the Yale volleyball team was playing in the NCAA tournament at Penn State, my bosses sent me down there to cover the volleyball tournament while getting some advance stuff for the upcoming Penn State game. Talking to Grant was a memorable enough experience that when I was in Colorado Springs for the U.S. Basketball training camp, I mentioned to USA Basketball's Jenny Maag that if she was looking for a quotable player to focus on, she should consider interviewing Grant. She took my advice and was not disappointed.

When former UConn star Asjha Jones decided to leave her UMMC Ekaterinburg team shortly before Christmas, her hope was that the injured Achilles tendon injury would heal without the assistance of surgery.

Waiting for a couple months upon returning home, Jones and the Connecticut Sun medical staff finally scheduled a surgery. The result is that Jones is still a reluctant spectator as the WNBA franchise opened training camp on Monday.

Jones should miss at least the first half of training camp. She may be back in time to play in the final exhibition game at New York on May 11. Even if she has to skip all three preseason games, Jones is hoping she will be ready to go for the May 15 regular-season opener against Chicago.

"We waited," Jones said. "We didn't do it right away to see if it would heal on its own and it didn't. It didn't progress far enough, we waited as long as we could and it (the surgery) had to happen."

The injury forced Jones to miss the final 11 games of the season, the first time she was sidelined for a prolonged period during her WNBA career. After winning two of the first three games without Jones, the Sun predictably struggled without the All-Star forward to carry the offensive load. The Sun lost five straight games all by at least 10 points and missed the playoffs for the first time since relocating from Orlando before the 2003 season.

"It hard to look back on that," Jones said. "It drives you forward. Even little things, where to sit on the bench do you want to sit in the middle of the team, do you want to sit by the coaches? It is hard to figure all of that stuff out. You want to help but you can't. You have KG (Kerri Gardin) playing the 4 (power forward) and that is not where she belongs. I felt guilty because now they are being put in a position where they shouldn't be."

With Jones out of action and the trio of Tan White, Anete Jekabsone-Zogota and Sandrine Gruda expected to be late arrivals, third-year forwad Gardin is the only person currently practicing with the team who has appeared in a game with the Sun. Lindsay Whalen is now in Minnesota after a trade which netted Connecticut former UConn teammates Renee Montgomery and Tina Charles. Amber Holt and Chante Black were traded to Tulsa (formerly Detroit), Tamika Whitmore was released while Erin Phillips and Kiesha Brown were not re-signed.

Former Sacramento Monarchs teammates Kara Lawson and DeMya Walker are among the new additions, joining Montgomery, Charles and fellow 2010 WNBA draftees Kelsey Griffin and Allison Hightower on a new-look Connecticut squad. Five training camp invitees including former Sacred Heart University star Kaitlin Sowinski were brought in. A sixth player, former Florida State guard Alicia Gladden, was not able to make it so a replacement for her is expected to be named shortly.

White, one of many travelers impacted by volcano in Iceland, could arrive by Wednesday according to Connecticut Sun coach Mike Thibault. Jekabsone-Zogota and Gruda are on opposite teams playing for Spartak Moscow Region and UMMC Ekaterinburg in the best of five Russian championship series. Jekabsone-Zogota could be in camp by the first week of May while Gruda is expected to miss at least the first five games before arriving in early June.

Give the Connecticut Sun hierarchy credit for making the WNBA draft interesting.

The three trades Connecticut made landed the Sun the No. 1, 3 and 7 picks. It essentially cost them Lindsay Whalen, Amber Holt, Chante Black and next year's No. 1 pick.

The result is that Kelsey Griffin and Danielle McCray hold head coach and player personnel director Mike Thibault's future in their hands. If they have the impact that Thibault thinks they will, the moves will be lauded. If they have the impact of former Connecticut first round picks Holt, Black and Ketia Swanier, it's likely that Thibault's run with the Sun could be over.

Personally, I think it was an incredible day for the Sun especially when you add in second-round pick Allison Hightower who I couldn't believe slipped out of the first round.

There will be some growing pains but I think the additions of No. 1 overall pick Tina Charles, Griffin and Hightower (McCray is still recovering from a torn ACL and won't play this season) to new additions Renee Montgomery, Kara Lawson and DeMya Walker change the Sun for the better. However, if the Sun miss the playoffs and the pick ends up turning into the No. 1 overall pick, Griffin will always be known as the player traded for the rights to Maya Moore.

I don't think that is going to happen. I expect Sandrine Gruda and Anete Jekabsone-Zogota to raise the level of their games as the two European stars continue to get more comfortable to the WNBA game. Asjha Jones is simply one of the best players in the league and should have more help in the frontcourt than she did last season.

The moves should make for an interesting training camp. Assuming Jones, Gruda, Jekabsone-Zogota, Lawson, Montgomery, Walker, Charles and Griffin make the team that leaves three spots for Hightower, Tamika Whitmore, Kerri Gardin and Tan White to fight over. If Hightower is as good as I think she is, I think that the final spot may come down to Whitmore and White. Connecticut Sun coach Mike Thibault said guard Erin Phillips will not be back with the Sun this season so she won't figure into the fight for the 11 roster spots.

On a side note, New York Liberty second-round pick Kalana Greene had some fun with Hartford Courant UConn/Sun beatwriter John Altavilla during her conference call with the Connecticut media today. John has periodically asked Charles and Greene about their thoughts on the upcoming WNBA draft and neither player would answer other than saying that they are focused on leading UConn to a national title. So when Kalana took a question from John today, her response of "now I can finally answer some WNBA questions" brought the house down.

EUROLEAGUE FINAL FOUR STARTS ON FRIDAY
Three-time defending champion Spartak Moscow Region, led by ex-UConn stars Diana Taurasi and Sue Bird, face the Gruda-led UMMC Ekaterinburg in the first EuroLeague semifinal on Friday while Ros Casares plays Wisla Can-Pack in the other semifinal in Valencia, Spain. The winners play in the championship game on April 11.

Tomorrow between 5:30-6 p.m., the 48 players who will play in the McDonald's All-American High School Games will be revealed live on ESPNU.

There will be 24 players picked to play in the girls' game and 24 boys' players for the Mar. 31 game in Columbus, Ohio. It will be the 33rd annual game although this is just the ninth year that a girls' game is being held.

Considering that UConn recruits Bria Hartley and Samarie Walker were just selected to play in the WBCA All-American game, which will be held on April 3, it would not be a surprise to see them selected to the McDonald's game as well. Hartley, Walker and the other three UConn incoming freshmen (Stefanie Dolson, Lauren Engeln and Michala Johnson) were nominated but then again, if you started for your varsity team there's probably about a 30 percent chance that your name was on the initial list of nominees.

The people at McDonald's do need a little assistance in the media relations department since I happened to stumble across the announcement by doing a little checking up on UConn recruits this morning. You would think they'd be trying to get the word out there. Then again, the people at the WBCA continue to risk antagonizing those who cover women's basketball by annually releasing its list of high school all-americans a day early to USA Today, the same publication which recently laid off its long-time voice of women's basketball Dick Patrick so it's pretty evident that working with the women's basketball media to publicize these games happens to be pretty far down in the pecking order of importance.

As I mentioned in an earlier blog, if UConn gets sent to the Dayton regional, the McDonald's All-American Game is on March 31, the day after the regional final so if fans are willing to stay in Ohio an extra day and don't mind a 70-mile trip from Dayton to Columbus, they can check out the all-star game.

Here's some info about tickets from an official McDonald's release
Tickets for both the POWERADE Jam Fest (March 29, 6:30 p.m. ET) and the
McDonald’s All American High School Basketball Games (March 31, 5:30 p.m. for the girls, 8 p.m. for the boys) can be purchased at Ticketmaster.com, by calling 1-800-
745-3000 or at the Value City Arena Box Office. Ticket prices range from $8-$13 for the POWERADE Jam Fest and $7-$55 for the McDonald’s All American High School
Basketball Games.

GARDIN RE-SIGNED BY SUN
Forward Kerri Gardin has been signed to a training camp contract by the WNBA Connecticut Sun. Gardin has played in 67 games over the last two seasons in Connecticut, starting 23 times. Gardin has averaged 4.7 points, 3.8 rebounds and 1.2 assists in her two years with the Sun.

Just got off the phone with Connecticut Sun general manager Chris Sienko who said the final bit of paperwork on Barbara Turner's contract came through and she is signed up for the upcoming season.

Turner's signing means that the Sun have its top six scorers returning. Turner, who averaged 8 points and 3.2 rebounds for the Sun in 2008, becomes the 10th player under contract for the coming season joining Lindsay Whalen, Ashja Jones, Tamika Whitmore, Amber Holt, Kerri Gardin, Sandrine Gruda, Erin Phillips, Ketia Swanier and Danielle Page on the roster. They accounted for 87 percent of Connecticut's points, 82 percent of the rebounds and 84 percent of the assists.

The Sun have offers out to unrestricted free agents Tamika Raymond and Svetlana Abrosimova and restricted free agent Jamie Carey. The team is continuing to negotiate with Anete Jekabsone, the fourth-leading scorer in the 2008 Olympics. Sienko said "we are not worried" about coming to terms with the 25-year-old guard. Lauren Ervin, the Sun's third-round pick, is also expected to be in training camp according to Sienko.

Although the roster limits have been cut from a maximum of 13 to 11, the training camp roster rules have not been altered. No WNBA team can have more than 15 players at camp at any time. With so many of the Sun players having European commitments, that should not be an issue or prohibit them from signing all the players from last year's team they want to.