Sun riding momentum into Game 3

The plane ride to Sacramento was long, but it would have seemed even longer yesterday had the Connecticut Sun not pulled out a Game 2 overtime victory Thursday night in the WNBA Finals.

The Sun beat the Monarchs, 77-70, at Uncasville, Conn., to even the series, 1-1, and headed to California for tomorrow's Game 3 and Tuesday's Game 4 in the best-of-five set.

Brooke Wyckoff hit a 3-pointer with two seconds left in regulation to tie the game, send it to overtime, and give the Sun a spark.

''This win helps lot," said Sun guard Nykesha Sales (19 points). ''It gives us the momentum now. They had the momentum going in, and now we have it. But they're going to be tough playing in their building. The fans can do a lot to help a team, and their arena is just as full as ours, and it's actually a little bigger." (Arco Arena has a capacity of 17,317; the Mohegan Sun Arena holds 9,341.)

Sun standout Lindsay Whalen, who has an injured knee and a sprained ankle, is day to day.

Sacramento coach John Whisenant said if his team had any momentum, it was lost once the score was tied. ''We were flat, and didn't score," he said.

Whisenant said it would have been nice to go home needing to win only one more game.

''I came in here expecting that we could win two, and I think that's the way our players think," he said. ''We talked about it in the locker room and said we're still going back, 1-1 . . . we've got two at our court now. But I don't really think home court makes a lot of difference. These two teams are very close and it just comes down to who plays well."

Thursday's stats bear this out: Each team finished with the same number of rebounds (35) and turnovers (14). But the Monarchs' bench outscored the Sun's, 29-15.

''We were not as alert and intense [Thursday] as we have been throughout the playoffs," Whisenant said. ''We played like we had tired legs. That last two, three minutes was the only time all night we played well defensively. We got ourselves back in the game and got control and had the lead. When we play that way, I think we can win, but there was just a breakdown. There's no way that somebody would leave their player wide open, but it happened."

The wide-open player was Wyckoff, who said she knew the Monarchs were busy worrying about Sales and Katie Douglas.

When Wyckoff saw Taj McWilliams-Franklin (24 points, 16 rebounds) decide not to shoot, ''I knew, here it comes," said Wyckoff, who was on the sideline with a torn anterior cruciate ligament when the Sun were in the playoffs last season. ''It's a dream."

''They had a lot of energy from beginning to end," Griffith said of the Sun. ''They were more hungry than we were. I think we kind of put it in the back of our heads that we were going back home, but like I've been telling them from Day 1, nothing is guaranteed."

Just the trip to California, which is not that long for the Sun, after all.