Jones on a tear in the WNBA

Bahamian professional women’s basketball player Jonquel “JJ” Jones is playing as well as anyone in the Women’s National Basketball Association (WNBA), recently named the WNBA Eastern Conference Player of the Month for May.

On Saturday, she dropped in a regular season career-high 31 points as the Connecticut Sun took down the New York Liberty, 85-65, at the Mohegan Sun Arena in Uncasville, Connecticut, in the WNBA Commissioner’s Cup.

The WNBA Commissioner’s Cup is a new in-season tournament that began this season. The Sun find themselves with a 4-0 win/loss record in that tournament, and is the only team in the Eastern Conference of the WNBA that is undefeated.

In addition to dropping in 31 points, Jones was also able to grab 13 rebounds in 34 minutes of play. She also had three assists and one blocked shot.

Jones helped her team to a 6-2 win/loss record during the month of May. They are 8-2 overall, leading the Eastern Conference standings, and second just to the Seattle Storm (7-1) in the WNBA standings. The Storm handed the Sun one of their two losses this season.

Jones managed to average a double-double in May – 20.3 points and 10.5 rebounds per contest.

A couple other Sun players scored in double digits on Saturday night – Brionna Jones finished with 14 points and DeWanna Bonner poured in 13 points.

The Bahamian scored the first bucket of the game – a layup after winning the opening tip. That was Jones’ only made shot in the first quarter. The Sun never trailed in that quarter but there was a tie, 13-13, at 5:29 mark. At the end of the first quarter, the Sun led 24-19.

The Liberty took a 35-31 lead at the 3:39 mark of the second quarter. Jones was able to help the Sun cut the lead down to two points on a layup at the 2:58 mark of the second quarter, 35-33. She then helped her team regain the lead, connecting on a jump shot at the 1:40 mark. The Sun led 37-35 at that point.

After the Liberty tied the game at 37, Jones was able to get to the free throw line, and connected on both shots. It gave her team a 39-37 lead. With 36 seconds remaining in the second quarter, Jones was able to grab an offensive rebound and get a putback layup to give the Sun a 41-37 edge going into the intermission.

The ending of the second quarter and the start of the third was in favor of the Sun as they put together a 15-0 scoring, which ended in them going up 52-37 on a basket by Jones, with 7:01 remaining in the third quarter. Jones had 10 of those 15 points in that run.

The third quarter ended with the Sun up 62-47 as the Sun outscored the Liberty 19-12 in that quarter. In the fourth quarter, the Sun outscored the Liberty 23-15. Jones scored her 31st point on a three-pointer with 1:56 left in the game to put her team up 81-58. The Liberty was out of gas and the Sun held on for the win.

The former George Washington University player is ranked first in the league in rebounds per game at 10.4. Her 21.6 points per game has her ranked at number four in the league after 10 games. She is the only player averaging a double-double. The Holmes Rock, Grand Bahama, native has helped the Sun match their best start through 10 games in franchise history.

The prize pool for the Commissioner’s Cup is $500,000. In the tournament, each team will play 10 intra-conference games in the first half of the season. The team with the best winning percentage in both conferences will play each other in the championship game. The championship game is slated for August in Phoenix, Arizona.

The Sun return to action on June 13, when they take on the Western Conference leaders Seattle Storm at 2 p.m. at the Mohegan Sun Arena in Uncasville.

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