The Dallas Wings beat the Las Vegas Aces 96-66 in WNBA Commissioner's Cup play Monday night at College Park Center in Arlington, with Arike Ogunbowale scoring 22 points and Jessica Shepard finishing one assist short of a triple-double.
ESPN's game summary marked the result final and listed Dallas at 9-5, with Las Vegas falling to 10-4. The Wings led by as many as 30 and won their fifth straight home game, according to the AP recap carried by ESPN.
Ogunbowale And Shepard Set The Dallas Pace
Ogunbowale made five 3-pointers and added seven assists without a turnover. Shepard had 15 points, 15 rebounds, nine assists and two steals in 31 minutes.
Shepard did much of the damage early. ESPN reported she had 13 points, eight rebounds and five assists by halftime, when Dallas led 56-37 after a late Las Vegas run trimmed a larger margin.
Azzi Fudd added 19 points on 8-for-9 shooting for Dallas, and Paige Bueckers had 10 points and seven assists. The Wings finished with 30 assists and only eight total turnovers, a useful explanation for why the game never tilted back toward Las Vegas.
Dallas Builds Lead Before Halftime
Dallas scored 29 points in the first quarter and led by 28 with 3:13 left in the first half. Las Vegas closed that half on a 9-0 run, but the Aces never got the margin below double digits after the break, according to ESPN's recap.
Bueckers ended a six-minute Dallas field-goal drought with a 3-pointer early in the third quarter, pushing the lead to 59-39. The team stats stayed in the same direction: Dallas shot 49% from the field and 10-for-28 from 3-point range, while Las Vegas shot 40% and 5-for-21 from deep.
The Wings also won the rebounding count 41-31 and had 10 steals. Their largest lead was 30; ESPN's team page credited Las Vegas with no lead in the game.
Aces Bench Scoring Not Enough
Jewell Loyd scored 21 points off the bench for Las Vegas and made five 3-pointers. A'ja Wilson added 18 points, but the rest of the Aces' offense did not keep pace.
Chelsea Gray went scoreless in 29 minutes, and Jackie Young finished with six points on 3-for-13 shooting. Las Vegas also committed 14 turnovers.
The result gives Dallas a 2-0 season-series lead over Las Vegas. ESPN noted that Shepard had 22 points, 20 rebounds and 10 assists in the Wings' 95-87 win over the Aces on May 28.
For Dallas, the value is not only the scoreline. A 30-point Cup win over a 10-win Aces team, with Shepard again controlling the glass and passing lanes, is enough substance to carry beyond a single box score.