Comets lose to Libs

The Houston Comets "tragic number" to be eliminated from the 2007 WNBA Playoffs is down to one.

The Comets (10 - 19) were beaten 77 to 71 by the New York Liberty (12 - 16).

Since the Storm won the regular season match-up between the two teams, the Comets cannot finish tied with the Storm; therefore, the Comets need to finish the regular season with a better record than the Storm.

In order to reach the playoffs, the Comets need to win all five of their remaining regular season games and the Seattle Storm must lose all four of their remaining games. In that scenario, the Comets would finish 15 and 19 and the Storm would finish 14 and 20.

To compound the Comets' woes, Seattle lost on the road tonight versus the Minnesota Lynx which means the Comets could have moved closer to the Storm with a victory tonight over the Liberty.

After tonight's loss, Tina Thompson said she did not know the Storm had lost.

"I didn't know at all," said Thompson. "I mean I knew (Seattle lost) when I came into the locker room because someone said it; but, I didn't know during the game."

Thompson acknowledged tonight's loss was a big missed opportunity for the Comets.

"Of course. We didn't expect them (Seattle) to lose." stated Thompson, "But, we didn't go into this game expecting them to lose. We went into this game expecting to come out and play hard with the opportunity to win and put ourselves in a better position. And, if they lost, that would make the opportunity that much sweeter; but, either way it didn't matter -- considering that we lost."