Storm center Janell Burse was back at practice for the first time since having surgery on her left wrist on Monday. She’ll be in a soft cast for five weeks before beginning rehabilitation.

Burse isn’t planning, however, to have surgery on her partially torn left shoulder labrum. That had at one point been in the plans, but because Burse suffered no subluxations – incidents where the shoulder comes out of the socket – after training camp, she doesn’t believe surgery is necessary.

“The thing was, after the season, if it was a big problem, get it fixed, but it hasn’t been a problem at all,” Burse said. “I don’t know if it’s healed itself or just went away. I’m not going to get operated on just because two months ago I had this injury. It’s not bothering me at all.”

That decision means Burse will have the ability to play overseas this off-season. Rehab from shoulder surgery would last approximately six months, essentially taking up Burse’s entire off-season.

Some other notes:

- Storm Head Coach Anne Donovan is thrilled her team finishes the season tomorrow against L.A., while other teams are in action up to Sunday.

“This whole schedule’s been good (lately),” said Donovan. “We’ve been able to take several days off here, rest and then practice hard in between games. It’s been a good thing.”

- Katie Gearlds has moved ahead of Shyra Ely in the rotation, something which probably should have been apparent from the last few games. Ely has slumped a little on offense, while Gearlds has been shooting the ball well and aggressively giving the Storm a dangerous element off the bench. Donovan also cited Gearlds’ improvement on D.

- Donovan was “thrilled” with the way Ashley Robinson executed on Tuesday as the post opposite Lauren Jackson. The Lynx played way off of Robinson, using her defender to give help on Jackson’s cuts, and Robinson did a good job of diving to the basket. Robinson scored a season-high seven points.

We know the Storm is IN. We know the Storm will be the fourth seed in the West. But who will finish with the top spot in the conference and opposte the Storm in the first round of the playoffs? With six days left in the WNBA season, that is very much still up in the air.

Phoenix holds a one-game lead right now over San Antonio for first. That lead is bigger than it sounds because the Mercury holds the tie-breaker between the two teams, having won the season series 3-1. However, it’s also smaller than it sounds because the teams remain tied in the all-important loss column.

Phoenix’s advantage stems from having played two more games than San Antonio. If the Silver Stars win out, that advantage disappears (though, again, the Mercury would still win the tie).

So how about the schedules?

Phoenix has only one opponent left on the docket: A home-and-home with Sacramento that could be difficult.

One loss by the Mercury would leave the door open for the Silver Stars if they can go undefeated. San Antonio too has the Monarchs left to play, at ARCO on Wednesday while Phoenix is resting.

Obviously, the Mercury hopes Sacramento wins that game, but that would also give the Monarchs more to play for in the season-ending home-and-home series. Sacramento can’t finish in first – Phoenix would hold the tie-breaker because of conference record – but still could finish second, an effort that would be greatly advanced by beating the Silver Stars. So keep a close eye on that game tomorrow.

I think Phoenix will probably hold on for first, but this last week could get very interesting.

By the way: If you haven’t checked it lately, the NBA Access with Ahmad Rashad page has now posted video of the episode featuring Sue Bird and Jackson. Click on “Season 2 Episodes” to watch.

You’ve probably already seen that the Storm will be without starters Janell Burse and Lauren Jackson during the team’s two-game road trip to Minnesota and Detroit. We’re sending our best wishes out to Lauren and her family.

So what now for the Storm? Anne Donovan spoke last week when surgery on Burse’s wrist was set for Aug. 14 about the possibility of adding a 12th player, and that now seems likely to provide some depth in the post.

Presumably, Wendy Palmer and Ashley Robinson will start up front on this trip, and they both have played well lately off the bench. Robinson stepped up in the second half of Saturday’s win over Phoenix, grabbing eight rebounds in 20 minutes. Palmer got the lion’s share of the minutes Friday when Jackson sustained a groin injury at Sacramento and finished with eight points and six boards.

Palmer and Robinson can replace a lot of what Burse and Jackson provide on defense and on the glass. Obviously, neither of them can match Jackson’s scoring prowess and the Storm could use big games from Sue Bird and Betty Lennox in these games.

Another thing Donovan mentioned last week was that now would show why it was important to have a backup forward in Shyra Ely who could play in the post. Ely played some minutes at the four against the Mercury and should be able to match up with Kristen Mann in Minnesota and Swin Cash in Detroit. If Ely is playing the four, that might mean some more minutes on the perimeter for Katie Gearlds, hoping to build off Saturday’s 13-point effort.

A couple other notes:
- Several people have been looking for a chance to see Saturday’s feature on Sue Bird and Lauren Jackson from NBA Access with Ahmad Rashad. If you visit that homepage, you can see a brief preview. Past episodes have been archived under the “Season 2 Episodes” tab. The Bird/Jackson clip should be posted soon.

- WNBA.com’s Adam Hirshfield has a Q&A with Betty Lennox that is very well worth reading. I’ve been covering Lennox for four years and I still learned plenty from her answers about her path to this point in her WNBA career. Most notably, I was unaware the hip injury that cost Lennox nearly her entire second season in Minnesota was so serious.

I broke my hip my second year with Minnesota (2001), and I thought that
everything I had worked so hard for was coming to an end way too early for me.
The doctors told me that I wouldn’t be able to run or walk again without a limp,
so I figured that my career was over. But I had surgery and I fought hard coming
back, and I ended up making my return way early because I was so determined to
play.

- Led by season-ticket holder Jill Gallagher, StormFans.org members have been raising money for Simone Edwards’ Simone4Children organization. Gallagher recently traveled to Jamaica to see the kids who are benefiting from these donations and help hand out school supplies. She chronicled the experience in several posts on the StormFans message boards.

Despite Anne Donovan’s desire not to make a big deal of it, rightfully citing that wins are much more important this time of year, this milestone shouldn’t go under the radar.

At last night’s game, the Storm gave out LJ for MVP rally cards which were featured on the ESPN Classic broadcast and prominent throughout the game. Now you can show your support for Jackson by downloading the collage of photos and LJ for MVP message as your desktop screen background:

800×600
1024×768