Lynne Roberts drops defiant message amid ‘awful’ online banter

The Los Angeles Sparks haven’t exactly been a model of consistency this season, and part of that has had to do with a shuffling lineup that is currently without two of their best players in Kelsey Plum and Cameron Brink due to injury. Amid the Sparks’ up and down year, there has been no shortage of voices on social media with an opinion on how they think the team should be run. For Sparks head coach Lynne Roberts, it’s been easy for her to ignore the doubters. But she understands it might not be so easy for the players themselves.

Prior to the Sparks’ game against the Atlanta Dream on Monday, Lynne Roberts spoke about how she and her coaching staff had maintained a consistent message to the players as far as who and what they should be giving their attention.

“We all have to do that on our own. I’m not online, I don’t look at any of it. I know they [the players] do because it’s just the generation. And it’s on them,” Roberts said during her pregame press conference. “We talk about the people that are in the room are the ones you should listen to. The people that are online, the trolls that are awful out there, it’s a choice to read it. And so you got to protect your brain and what you’re taking in, and that’s just on everybody to do that in their own way.”

The Sparks are currently in the midst of a two-game win streak as they embark on the road for four consecutive games, beginning with the Dream. They are 10-11 and a full game behind the Washington Mystics for the eighth and final playoff spot in the league standings.

The Sparks’ game against the Dream is game No. 22 on the schedule, making this officially the halfway point of the regular season. At this same time last year, the Sparks were 8-14. They were also in the midst of what would become a five-game win streak and a stretch in which they would go 8-1 to firmly put themselves in the race for the postseason.

It would not be, however, as the Sparks would miss out on the playoffs by a single game. And Roberts does not believe that last season was a failure in any way. Despite getting off to a slow start, the team tripled their win total from the year before when they won only eight games. And she believes this year should not be considered a failure just yet either.

“I don’t think we underachieved last year, and this year is still going … I think for where we want to get, that’s not where we want to be. But tripling wins from one year to the next in my first year, I don’t think that’s underachieving,” Roberts said. “This year we have not hit our stride. We’ve played one game with everybody on our roster healthy. We’ve been injured all year and hopefully we can get KP and Cam back. Our whole system is designed around KP and her unbelievable talent … I’m not even close to thinking that we are underachieving at all.”