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Mercury-Fever Preview

Aug 12, 2010 - 6:11 PM By MATT BEARDMORE STATS Writer

Phoenix (14-15) at Indiana (19-10), 7:00 p.m. EDT

The Indiana Fever opened last week's road trip with a slight lead in the Eastern Conference. They return to Conseco Fieldhouse looking to maintain their slightly larger cushion.

Indiana goes for a season sweep when it faces the slumping Phoenix Mercury for the second time in six days Friday night.

Two days after moving percentage points ahead of Atlanta with a 95-93 home win, the Fever (19-10) took a one-half game lead over the Dream with a 104-82 victory at Phoenix on Sunday.

In the teams' first matchup since the WNBA finals, Indiana outscored the defending champions 30-12 in the fourth quarter while holding the Mercury (14-15) more than 15 points below their league-leading average.

Tamika Catchings led Indiana with 24 points and 10 rebounds. The Eastern Conference player of the week then helped the Fever extend their East lead to 1 1/2 games Tuesday, scoring 11 points and grabbing 11 boards in an 82-76 win at Los Angeles. Atlanta fell 80-70 to Seattle the same day.

"Every victory is critical," said Fever coach Lin Dunn, whose team has dropped two of three at home. "Every game is must have."

Coming off back-to-back losses and trying to hold off three teams for the second seed in the West, the Mercury know it.

Phoenix, which had its season-high four-game winning streak snapped Sunday, lost 91-82 to Chicago on Tuesday to begin a four-game trip. The Mercury shot 42.4 percent, committed 16 turnovers and were outscored 16-2 to end the third quarter as they lost to the Sky for the first time in 10 matchups.

"We missed some shots and had too many turnovers," said coach Corey Gaines, whose team plays four of its final five games on the road.

Mercury guard Diana Taurasi, the league leader with 23.6 points per game, had 21 against Indiana on Sunday. She returns to Conseco Fieldhouse for the first time since scoring 16 in a 90-77 victory in Game 4 that prevented Indiana from winning its first championship.

Fever guard Katie Douglas had her worst game of the finals in that matchup, scoring seven points and shooting 2 of 14. Douglas, though, hit 11 of 17 from the field and scored 28 with a season high-tying six assists at US Airways Center on Sunday.

Indiana will try to sweep the season series from Phoenix for the second time in three years.